Mile High (Up in the Air #2)(90)

Without even thinking about it, my steps quickened until I was nearly running to him.

He wasn’t indifferent to my enthusiasm. He began to walk briskly towards me, obviously determined to meet me at least halfway.

When we got within arm’s reach of each other he grabbed me to him in a bone-jarring embrace, his hold painful but oh so comforting to me. I had thrown my arms around his neck at the same moment he’d grabbed and I held on tightly as he lifted me, moving back towards his car, one hand cupping the back of my head firmly. I felt like I was five years old, my feet dangling inches from the ground. I nearly laughed.

“James, put me down,” I sputtered.

He just gripped me tighter, moving purposefully towards the car. “I can’t be in public like this, Bianca. I feel too raw. God, I missed you. It felt like Christmas when I heard you were getting in ahead of schedule.”

I gripped his silky hair in my fists. “I missed you, too. It’s scary just how much. I don’t know how it happened so fast, but you feel like home to me, James.”

A hoarse, pained sound escaped his throat. “Yes,” he said, his voice rough with emotion. “This is home.”

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

James had me in the car and securely ensconced on his lap when Stephan and Javier finally joined us, both of them grinning widely. They had obviously found our over-enthusiastic reunion amusing.

“I have to warn you guys; that crew is going to tell the world about that little scene. That small sassy one, Marie, was even making noises about giving an interview to the press,” Stephan said, his voice more amused than worried.

I rolled my eyes. That little gossip-monger probably would, too. I tried to remember if I had told her anything I wouldn’t want shared, but mentally shrugged the whole thing off. There was nothing I could do about any of it now, and it was much more pleasant to bask in the presence of Mr. Beautiful than to worry about what-ifs.

James greeted the other men politely before he began to nuzzle into my hair. I felt him breathing me in, and my eyes closed in pleasure.

His arms were wrapped around me snugly, but suddenly they tightened to the point of pain and I felt him tense.

“I need to tell you something,” he whispered, his mouth at my ear. From the tension in his body and voice, I immediately knew that something was terribly wrong.

I stiffened, turning to study his face. His strange change of mood was troubling, to say the least. And his eyes were haunted, just the sight of them making my chest tighten in dread.

“What is it?”

“Sharon Karlsson was found dead in her home last night. She was murdered.” His voice was quiet, but the car went deathly silent at his news.

I just froze, staring at him as I processed his words. I had been trying to call her, to tell her about my father, but I had failed to get ahold of her.

Could I have prevented this? Was I to blame?

It wasn’t even a question to me who had killed her. It was just too big of a coincidence, and I had stared too fully into the murdering eyes of my father not to know that he was fully capable of killing again. It was only a wonder that he hadn’t killed again before this. Though, for all I knew, he had.

“How?” I finally asked.

He ran a hand over my hair, a gesture that I thought was to comfort himself as much as me. “She was shot in the head.”

I thought of the way my mother had died, a mock suicide where she’d ‘eaten the gun.’ “Like my mother?” I asked, my voice very small.

His eyes were impossibly tender, and infinitely worried, on my own. “Yes, like that.”

“I tried to tell her. I’ve been trying to call her since I found out she existed, but I feel responsible. He’s a killer, and he stayed free because I lied for him. I don’t know why, but I never imagined he’d kill again. I’ve known for all these years, and somehow it just never occurred to me. Why do you suppose that is? I should have thought of it.” My voice was pitched low, but it seemed to crack through the stunned silence of the car.

Everyone began to speak at once.

“You are not responsible for this,” James said, his voice firm and harsh and full of pain.

“You couldn’t have known, Buttercup,” Stephan said, his voice passionately sincere.

“Please don’t do that to yourself,” Javier implored quietly.

I ignored the reassurances, feeling the weight of her death like a heavy burden on my soul. And shamefully, even stronger than that guilt was the fear. My father had killed at least two women now, something he’d threatened to do to me more times than I could count. Even with the numb state my brain seemed to be in with the disturbing news of Sharon’s death, what I felt the most was a chilling terror that ran so deep I couldn’t remember a time that it hadn’t been a part of me.

I shared a long look with James. In his eyes I saw a wrenching helplessness that mirrored my own.