The walk took longer than she’d thought and by the time she reached her apartment she was tired from not having slept the night before and she was impatient to get inside, take a shower and call Ash.
She cursed the fact that she’d left her cell phone in her living room. She could have already read her texts and listened to her voice mails. They would give her a good idea of Ash’s mood and whether it would be a simple matter of apologizing to him.
She put her key in the lock, frowning when she realized she must have forgotten to lock it on her way out. But then the last thing on her mind hadn’t been whether she locked up or not. She really needed to be more careful. Of course if she and Ash reconciled, she wouldn’t have to worry about that because he always made certain she was protected. For that matter he had still made sure she was protected, even though she’d left him. But then she hadn’t noticed her two shadows when she returned to her apartment. Had they given up? Had Ash given up?
A frown tugged at her lips as she pushed inside, closing and locking the door behind her. The minute she stepped inside her living room she realized she wasn’t alone.
Her breath caught when she saw three men standing, waiting, grim expressions on their faces. She recognized two of them from before. What she’d assumed were Ash’s men. For her protection. In that instant, she knew she was terribly wrong. These men weren’t here to protect her at all.
Before she could react, one moved in quickly behind her, barring her pathway to the door. Not that she would have had time to escape anyway since she’d locked her door on the way in.
“Miss Carlysle,” one of the men said in a tone that sent shivers down her skin. “There’s a message I want you to deliver to Gabe Hamilton, Jace Crestwell and Ash McIntyre.”
Before she could demand to know what he was talking about and that they get the hell out of her apartment, pain exploded through her body. She lay sprawled on the floor, utterly bewildered.
And then pain. More pain, agonizing, splintering through her body as they meted out violence. Blood smeared her nose. She could taste it in her mouth. She couldn’t breathe right. It hurt too much. She couldn’t even scream.
She was going to die.
That thought hit her and, oddly, she didn’t fight it because it meant escape from the horrific agony she was enduring.
Then it went silent. A hand dug into her hair and yanked her head painfully upward. A man leaned into her face, his nose just inches from her own.
“You tell them that nothing they hold dear is safe from me. I’m coming after them. They will regret the day they ever fucked with me. They ruined me. And by God, I’ll ruin them before I’m done.”
He shoved something into her hand and then dropped her head back onto the floor. Pain shot down her spine. She heard footsteps and then her door opening. And then it closing.
A low whimper stuttered past stiff, swollen lips. Ash. She had to get to her cell phone and call him. Had to warn him. He’d come for her. Everything would be all right if she could just get to her phone.
She tried to push herself up and shrieked in agony when she put weight on her right hand. She stared down at it, her vision fuzzy, one eye nearly swollen shut. What was wrong with her hand?
Using her elbow to prop herself up, she dragged herself toward the coffee table where she’d left her phone. She reached up for it, knocking it onto the floor and then praying she hadn’t broken it.
With her left hand she fumbled to push the right button to bring up her contacts. Then she changed her mind and hit recent calls because his would have been the last. She hit his name and with a whispered prayer as she waited for him to answer.
chapter thirty-one