Saving Hailey: Chapter 22

“Okay, I’ve had it up to here,” Broadway snaps, his hand held parallel with his forehead as he exits the control room, probably lured out by the scent of coffee.

“What have you had up to here?” Koby asks, mimicking Broadway’s theatrical gesture.

“This,” he gestures around. “Sitting on our asses all the fucking time.” He pins me with a pointed stare. “What’s the plan, Carter?You do have one, right? It’s only a matter of time before your father gets here. He’s already too fucking close.”

He’s not wrong. After weeks of trying, Jackson finally snuck a bug onto Apollo’s phone. I have a nagging feeling Apollo clicked the link knowing full well what would happen. I can’t figure out his agenda. Why help me? Why kill his colleagues? Why give me ears into Rhett’s ranks?

Whatever his reasoning, be it lack of trust in my father, or cozying up to me as the obvious successor should Rhett go down in this shitshow, it works in my favor.

Thanks to Apollo, we know Rhett’s getting pretty fucking close to finding us. Right now, they don’t have a precise location. Some of the safe houses Dante has dotted around the USA are less anonymous than others and Rhett’s substantially narrowed down the list, raiding one place after another over the past two weeks.

“We’ll be here until Hailey remembers where the evidence is,” I say, “or it’s no longer safe. For now we’re staying. I can’t risk another Blaze-type situation.”

Time’s not our ally. The list of people interested in Hailey—or rather the locked-away contents of her mind—is growing exponentially.

Every time Dante calls, he mentions another name.

“You sure there’s nothing we can do to speed up the process?” Broadway clips, dropping onto the couch with a soft bounce. “Sitting around doesn’t strike me as the best option. You’re risking the evidence falling into the wrong hands. There might be other routes to it than through Hailey.”

“If you have any suggestions, I’m all ears.”

“Alex’s bank vault,” he says immediately.

He’s been poking me with that stick since the day Hailey went missing. I get why he considers checking the bank is a good idea, but he can’t see the bigger picture.

“You made us harvest that fridge-full of freak show,” he continues, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “We collected everything we need for biometrics. We don’t even need to take the guns if we don’t want to make a scene. Why the fuck did you make me carve off his decomposing eyes and fingers if you don’t want to check the bank?”

Koby chuckles by the breakfast bar where he’s stuffing his mouth with bacon. “That was a fun night.”

“It was disgusting,” Broadway huffs, shaking off the clinging memory.

“Are the parts usable?” I ask, lifting a cup to my lips.

“Kind of,” Koby says, chewing a big bite, unfazed by the discussion. “I doubt the eye will work, but the fingerprints should still register.”

“Good morning,” Hailey’s small voice sounds behind me, sending a thrill through my system.

I haven’t stopped thinking about her naked body since she ambushed me in the shower.

One look at her has the blood in my veins turning so hot it’s fucking scorching. She stands three steps from the bottom of the stairs, her big, rested eyes jumping between us. A hint of triumph shines in those blues when she catches me ogling my way down her body.

She’s in a fucking night dress, pinching the hem between her fingers, and accidentally rolling it up so high it’s a miracle I can’t see the blonde strip of hair between her legs.

“Heads down,” I clip at my men, jumping to my feet. “Upstairs, Hailey. Right now.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re not dressed,” I grind out, hurdling two steps to cover her from Ryder, Koby, and Broadway’s view. “You don’t leave your room unless you’re dressed.”

She crosses her arms over her chest, pushing her perky boobs up and closer together, the valley between them reduced to less than half an inch.

“You don’t get a say in what I’m allowed to wear. I’ll come downstairs naked if I want to.”

She wouldn’t. It’s not in her nature, but she knows saying that will piss me off and she’s been trying to force my hand since day one. I lost count of how many times she rolled her eyes at me, knowing damn well how feral it makes me.

She’s trying every trick in the book, hoping I’ll snap and give in, but she’s taken it too fucking far.

“Get dressed,” I grit out, towering above her despite standing one step lower. “It’s not a request, pretty girl.”

She scoffs, defiance painting her face. “Or what?”

If I could, I’d make her pay for this. She’d fucking beg for an orgasm, and I’d deny her. She knows how territorial I am about her body. That it drives me crazy to think about anyone even hearing her moans, so she must know there’s no way I’d let anyone see her in a fucking night dress.

“Or I’ll fling you over my shoulder and dress you myself.”

With her stare never leaving mine, she tips her chin up, eyes full of challenge. “I dareyou.”

God, that fucking defiance turns me on almost as much as her rolling those gorgeous blues. She’s perfect… and cruel, readily offering her body but guarding her heart.

“Get. Dressed,” I seethe, spinning her around and pushing her up a step.

She rolls her eyes again, and my cock notices, swelling further, my balls permanently blue. I still don’t understand why that move affects me so much I can barely keep my hands off her. There’s no rational explanation, but I’m not about to get hung up on the why while she’s climbing up the stairs without any underwear.

Knowing my men, their eyes are firmly on their breakfast—probably snickering away. But even without them looking, it drives me livid that Hailey had the fucking audacity to risk flashing any one of them.

I don’t give her space, my chest rubbing against her back with every step we climb until she’s safely out of view on the landing.

“You’re a caveman,” she huffs, storming into her bedroom. “It’s the twenty-first century, you know? Men don’t get a say in what women wear.”

“I don’t give a fuck what people do or think these days. I’m not one of them, and you knew that from the start. Argue all you want. Call me a caveman, call me toxic, call me a misogynistic bastard.”

“You’re all of those things.”

“I don’t care. You don’t trust me, but you’re mine, and that means you don’t parade around in front of my men without your fucking panties on, understood?”

Her cheeks heat like she just remembered she never wears underwear while she sleeps. Well, I remember and, standing this close to her, it’s damn near impossible not to grip her hips, throw her onto the bed and drive my cock home.

This woman should be Dante’s torture master. She’d drive any man insane.

“I see you leave the bedroom when you’re not decent and we’ll have a problem.”

I storm out before my resolve snaps completely and I end up giving her exactly what she wants. As much as I crave her body, there’s no way I’ll touch her until she trusts me. Until she stops loving Nash and starts loving Carter.

“Where were we?” I ask, taking a seat by the breakfast bar, the aromatic scent of pancakes and bacon hanging in the air.

“Getting off our asses to do something,” Broadway mutters, marshaling his smirk. “We should check the bank, Carter.”

“The moment we do, everyone will know we’re onto something. If the evidence is there and we don’t gain access, Vaughn will have a warrant in less than twenty-four hours—forged or real,” I clip. “That’s why we’ve been sitting on this information so long.”

“We have Alex’s parts, and we have Hailey.”

“She can’t remember how to access the deposit box,” Koby reasons.

“How hard can it be? It’s all fucking biometrics.”

“Not all of it,” Ryder says. “There are different protocols in place. Biometrics, passwords, cards, keys.”

Hailey’s footsteps echo down the stairs, and I spin round, checking if she’s being a good girl or a little devil.

She’s dressed, but something doesn’t quite add up. Instead of her usual sweater or sweats and a hoodie, or even one of the elegant, conservative dresses Layla’s stylist had delivered, she’s wearing a little denim pinafore number.

It’s short, which is fine, but coupled with the white blouse she has underneath, it makes her look infantile. Her blonde locks flow in waves down her back, her lips are stained pink to match her cheeks, and mascara pops her big eyes further…

She looks younger than she is.

Even younger than she looked at Lakeside wearing those flimsy flowery dresses Alex bought her. She’s dug up the most girly thing in the closet and cranked the outfit to eleven.

“What deposit box are you talking about?” she asks, feigning oblivious innocence as she sits beside me. “I wasn’t eavesdropping… your voices carry upstairs.”

It’s not just her outfit that’s glaringly different this morning. Her scars are nowhere to be seen, meticulously hidden beneath a thick layer of makeup.

I’m fucking reeling.

I want to grab her wrist and drag her upstairs so she’ll get changed. Make her wash the concealer away.

This isn’t her. It’s a defense mechanism. Something Alex conditioned her to do: use all means necessary to hold interest and earn attention.

My head pounds, blood slowing in my veins like cherry slurpy. She’s doing this for me. She’s reverting to the girl she was for Alex because I keep turning her down.

I bet she thinks this version of her will change my mind.

My chair scrapes along the tiles as I push away and storm into the control room, closing the door behind me.

I knew her insecurities had deep roots. I knew Alex trained her like a fucking circus monkey, but amnesia wiped the slate clean. Despite being thrown back into that state in her flashbacks, she was breaking away from his hold. She was finding out who she really is. I loved it when she transitioned from cardigans to wearing my hoodies and leaving her scars on display.

God, what the fuck have I done?

She’s back in the mold Alex put her in: firmly believing she should adapt and change so I’ll want her. So Carter will want her, because this isn’t Nash’s girl either.

I thought pushing her away, taking intimacy off the table, would prove a good choice. That it’d help her realize I love her and want her trust before I touch her again. That her mind and heart mean way more to me than her pussy.

Clearly, that backfired fast. Alex’s brainwashing resurfaced, and Hailey’s fallen into his toxic traits.

I grip the desk with both hands, hanging my head low. What the fuck am I supposed to do now?

If she gets my attention by looking like Alex’s wet dream, she’ll think it’s working. That this is what I expect. If I don’t, who knows what other fucked-up way she’ll find to adapt.

My fingers gouge into the hardwood so hard it’s not far off splintering. I lift my head, watching Koby set a plate before her on the live feed from the kitchen.

She starts poking the food, sending my stomach on a quick ride to my knees. All those times I watched her do this during the first few weeks at Lakeside come back to smack my face. Back then, I thought she didn’t need much food to feel full, but now, after two weeks here, seeing her playing with her meal again, I realize her behavior is more sinister.

She’s not eating the things she likes. No, she’s picking the light foods. Low in calories. She scoots the bacon and pancakes aside, despite devouring them just yesterday.

Not today, though.

Today she only takes an egg and some cherry tomatoes.

All the times when she had nothing but a fucking apple for breakfast, she was watching her weight. Whether it was a conscious decision, I don’t know. I don’t think so. She was doing it from day one, before she remembered Alex.

It took me a while to make her eat three healthy meals a day. She started gaining weight when we were together, but now she’s back thinking she’s not good enough as she is.

And I have no idea how to fix it…