Severed Ties: A Dark Stalker Romance (Tainted Love Book 1)
Severed Ties: Chapter 60

It’s been too long.

Too many hours since they took her.

Too many hours since I last held my fawn against me.

It’s the longest time I haven’t had eyes on her since the first time we met, and each minute makes my skin crawl.

Thirty-six hours, to be exact. The longest fucking hours of my life.

Everett tracked the car to an airfield just outside the city, but the fucking flight wasn’t logged. I don’t know how that’s possible, but I shouldn’t be surprised, considering who we’re dealing with. The Lombardi family is arguably the oldest crime family in the country, dating back to the eighteen hundreds, which means their roots know no bounds, even if they’ve now settled in Florida.

That’s where she has to be. It’s the only place that makes any sense, but Florida is a big fucking place, and we don’t have a hope in hell of replaceing her without some help.

Ace, Storm, and Elijah have been on the phone with everyone they know in the South, trying to get information about where Lombardi’s compound is, but they’re coming up empty, and the longer I sit here idle, the more likely I am to just fly down there and start shooting people and asking questions later.

We’ve all converged on the Saint James estate. The mansion is so large it can easily hold all of us and still have spare rooms, but it doesn’t have the empty feeling a lot of houses this size do. I lived here for a time after Ron Saint James found me on the street and employed me to work for him, and I’ve spent so much time within these walls that a part of me will always see this place as home.

“Tommy?” Ayvah says softly beside me, and I bring my eyes up to see the newest Saint James. Or almost, I suppose. They haven’t set a wedding date, but I know Storm is dying to get her down the aisle, so she’ll share his last name. Her dark-brown hair curls down her shoulders, and her deep eyes pull together with worry.

“Sorry, I’m a little out of it.”

“I know, it’s okay.”

She looks around Storm’s office, replaceing her fiancé behind his desk on the phone, Elijah and Everett across from him on their own calls. Wynter is nursing the baby on the couch against the far wall with Snow typing a mile a minute on her laptop beside her, and Emerson and Rayne are watching camera feeds on the other couch.

But I’m standing. I have been since we arrived here, only moving from my perch against the wall when absolutely necessary. Ace was here earlier, but he had to go and do a few things with the promise he’ll be back. But who knows. He and the Saint James family don’t tend to get along, so his time here may be limited.

“Do you want to go get a few hours of sleep? It sounds like they’re getting closer, and you want to be rested when you go get her.”

I shake my head. “I can’t sleep.” I don’t mean to be so blunt, but right now, all I can think about is getting my woman back and finally being able to breathe again. Because the last thirty-six hours have felt like I’ve been underwater, unable to reach the surface for long enough to drag in a breath, and at some point, I’m not going to be able to keep going.

“I know I haven’t been around for very long, but if there’s anything I’ve learned about the people in this room, it’s that they will always bring the people they love home. I can’t imagine how terrified you must be, but we’ll get her back. They won’t rest until we do.”

She gestures toward the room of people who are working relentlessly to bring my woman home.

“Thank you, Ayvah,” I say quietly, but she’s right.

These people won’t stop until we have her home, and that’s about as much comfort as I can replace right now.