Just hours ago, he’d been planning to show her his favorite parts of the city, like the old pub sitting next to some of the last remaining stones belonging to the original Roman wall of London. Special places he’d found and wanted to share with her.
But then she’d said she loved him, and suddenly everything changed. It meant he could bring her back to London again and again. He could take her to his house in Paris, his flat in Sicily, his cottage in the Swiss Alps. All the places he’d never shared with anyone special except his Maverick family.
Now he had Harper. And they had Jeremy.
And everything was suddenly so much better.
Better, at least, as long as she meant the words. As long as she felt them.
He tried to relax his muscles, tried to convince himself that it was okay to believe that Harper loved him...and that he was worthy of her love. But it was hard going when the truth was that he hadn’t believed himself worthy since he was a kid.
“No one will ever love a little shit like you,” his father used to say. “Not unless you can figure out how to be faster and smarter and sneakier than everyone else. Then maybe you’ll be worth something.”
So that was what Will had done—he’d figured out how to be fast and smart and sneaky. It wasn’t until he’d finally come to trust Susan and Bob and the Mavericks that he’d figured out how to love. And of course he loved them with everything in him, even if he’d often wondered how they could possibly love a fast-handed, sneaky smartass like him.
Thankfully, the tension in his body didn’t wake Harper. She stayed right there in his arms, her skin like silk against his, her leg thrown over him, her foot between his calves. And bells were ringing.
No, not bells. His phone.
Unwilling to let her go, he fumbled around on the nightstand, finally feeling it beneath his fingers. “Hello.” Though his voice was low, it sounded sharp in the quiet room, with only Harper’s soft breaths breaking the silence.
“Mr. Franconi, it’s Benny.”
His driver Benny was shuttling Jeremy to and from work. In an instant, Will’s heart began to beat fast and out of rhythm. “What’s wrong?”
“I can’t find Jeremy.”
No.
Please no.
Harper was still asleep. Still oblivious. While Will’s lungs felt like they’d been flattened by a speeding, out of control car.
“He was supposed to be in front of the building,” Benny said, his voice fast, nervous. “That’s what we arranged. But he wasn’t there. And I couldn’t find him upstairs in the office. No one remembers seeing him after three o’clock.”
Will glanced at the bedside clock. It was five-thirty in the evening back in San Francisco. Which meant that Jeremy had been missing for over two hours. It took everything Will had to figure out how to take that breath he needed so desperately.
“Will?” Harper finally shifted, his name sleepy on her tongue.
She’d just told him she loved him...and now he had to tell her that he’d lost the most precious person in her life.
“Have you called the police?” he asked Benny, each word sharp and hard.
“No, sir, we looked everywhere we could think of and then I called you.”
“Call them. Now.”
Harper sat up. “Will.” Sleep was gone—terror had invaded. Utter terror.
“But sir,” Benny said, “they won’t look for missing persons until it’s been twenty-four hours.”
Will threw his legs over the edge of the bed, and planted them firmly on the floor. He clenched his teeth so hard, he thought they might crack. “Tell them he’s disabled.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Will?”
Her strangled whisper damn near broke him in two. But he needed to finish. “And get Security to check every room, closet, bathroom, and stairwell in that building.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Will.”
“Have your phone with you at all times. Call me back as soon as you have anything new.”
“Yes, sir.”
The need to roar, to blame Benny and everyone else back in San Francisco, clawed at his insides. But he managed to keep the phone in his hand instead of throwing it across the room. For Harper, he needed whatever cool he had left.
She’d stopped saying his name. He turned, just enough to see her. And, like a coward, he thanked God there wasn’t enough light coming through the windows to show him her full devastation as he told her, “Benny can’t find Jeremy. He wasn’t waiting outside when Benny arrived, and no one in the office knows where he is.”
She’d gone completely still, and he swore he could hear every single worry she was thinking. Every fear she was feeling. Because he was thinking and feeling all of them, too.
“You said he’d be safe.”
His guts twisted. What the hell have I done?
He reached back to turn on the light. He couldn’t keep hiding from her in the dark. “We’re going back. Now. I’ll call the flight crew. I’ll call the cops myself. And I know a good private detective. I’m on it.”
But that was a lie, because his nerves were on fire. Every inch of him, inside and out, burned with uselessness. Helplessness.