Silence.

After Dane's announcement, there was absolute, stone-cold silence.

For about one second, and then all hell broke loose. They all started talking so fast that it was impossible to discern the different questions, or answer any of them. So he didn't try. He just held up his hand and waited until everyone finally stopped talking. "Here's what I know," he said. "Her mom came through town about twenty-five years ago and had a fling with your dad. She then left town and raised Jaimi by herself in Boston. Jaimi didn't know about you guys until two weeks ago, until her mom made her promise to track you all down as her deathbed wish—"

"Her mother's dead?" Steen asked, going straight to worrying about her well-being, as Dane knew they would. "Is Jaimi married? What about Emily's dad?"

"It's just the two of them now."

"We need to go after her," Zane said. "No Stockton stands alone—"

"Why'd she run?" Chase asked, looking at Dane, not moving from his spot. "Why did she look like she'd seen the devil himself when she came back here?"

Chase's question made everyone else fall silent.

Dane took a deep breath. "When she arrived, she wasn't sure whether she wanted to reveal who she was. Emily wanted to tell you guys, but Jaimi wasn't ready."

Zane whistled softly. "Emily knew the whole time? Damn, that kid is good. She never gave away anything."

Chase looked at him. "When Jaimi came back just now, she was different. What happened?"

Dane sighed. "I told her about her biological father. I told her how he died."

Chase let out a low groan, and a couple of the other brothers did the same. "And now she's on the run," Chase said. "Trying to get the hell away from the same childhood that haunts all of us."

"She thinks we're still monsters," Maddox said quietly, a man who knew that fear all too well, because he'd spent his life believing he was the same monster as his father. Only Hannah's love and her daughter's trust had convinced Maddox that he was a good man.

"Yeah. She kinda freaked." Kinda was an understatement.

Zane looked at Dane. "We aren't going to let her go, you know. She's family."

"I know, but she's scared." Dane held up his hands as everyone started talking again. "Let me go talk to her, and get her to at least stay in town. I'll let you guys know how she is."

"I want to meet her officially," Chase said. "I want to meet her as her brother."

"I know, but right now, you'll spook her." He looked directly at Mira, knowing that she was the core behind the brother. "Shut him down, Mira. This is important. I need to handle this."

Mira nodded and walked over to Chase, slipping her hand into his. "Trust Dane," she said gently. "Give him time."

Chase swore and looked at his brothers. They all had varying expressions of hope, awe, and tension on their faces. "Tomorrow. We'll give you until tomorrow."

"You said forty-eight hours."

Chase looked at him. "She's our sister, Dane—"

"Which means you'll do what's right for her, and right now, backing off is what's right. Forty-eight hours." Dane looked at Chase. "In her eyes, you're a murderer, Chase. If you walk up to her right now, she's going to run like hell."

Pain flashed across Chase's face, but Dane couldn't afford to feel regret. The situation was dicey, and he knew he was the glue holding the pieces together.

Ryder finally stepped forward. "I trust Dane," he said. "Go, bro. Fix this."

Dane flashed a grin at the man he'd been closest to as kids. "Thanks." When Ryder nodded at him, Dane knew that Ryder would do whatever it took to keep Chase and the others at bay until Dane could connect with her.

He didn't waste any more time. He just turned and sprinted toward the parking lot, hoping that he could somehow find her among the masses of cars beginning to exit. But even as he ran, he knew the odds were low, so he started formulating alternate plans.

There was no way in hell he was going to fail at this. There was too much at stake, for his brothers, for Jaimi, for Emily, and for his own damn heart.

* * *

"What do you mean, you gave away our room?" Jaimi's hands were still shaking, and she could barely think straight. All she wanted to do was get into her room, lock the door, and hunker down until morning came, and she could get out of town.

The flustered front desk attendant, whose nametag identified her as Peggy, held up her hands helplessly. "I'm so sorry. I wasn't on duty earlier, but check-in is by seven o'clock. We had so many people on the waitlist for the festival that we had to give it away when you didn't check in."

"You didn't have to give it away. You had my credit card—" Jaimi cut herself off, trying to keep herself calm. She knew it wasn't the fault of the woman standing in front of her, but she was so desperate she wanted to cry. "Please, we'll take anything. I have my six-year-old daughter with me. I can't sleep in the car with her!"

"I'm so sorry, but we're at capacity. There are no rooms."

Jaimi took a deep breath, trying to keep the panic at bay. Her biological father had tried to kill his own son. Her brother had murdered him. Dear God. She needed to get away, sit down, breathe, think. "Okay, so then, can you at least give me the names of any other hotels in the area?"

Peggy shook her head. "They will all be in the same situation as we are in. Every hotel is overbooked and at capacity due to the festival. People come from hundreds of miles away to attend this."

"So, please, tell me what I can do." She'd already called the airport to try to get a flight that night, but there was nothing until the following afternoon. She had no interest in driving until four in the morning, and then sleeping in an airport. If she was her mom, yeah, she'd probably think it was an adventure. But she wasn't her mom, and she had a child to keep safe. Emily tugged on her hand, but she shook her head. "Just a second, baby."

"Stay with a friend?" Peggy suggested.

"I don't know anyone here. I don’t have any friends!"

Emily tugged on her hand again. "Mom!"

She finally looked down, barely able to contain her impatience. "What?"

"Dane's our friend. He'd let us stay with him."

Oh, God. Like she needed that. "I'm sure he would, baby, but I don't have his number. I have no idea how to reach him." Not that she would ever try. She needed to get away from the Stocktons and all connections to them. She turned toward Peggy again. "Are there any B&B's in the area? A—"

"Mom!" Emily poked her in the hip. "You don't need to know his phone number."

Something about Emily's tone caught Jaimi's attention, and she looked down at her daughter again, foreboding welling up inside her. "Why don't I need his phone number?"

Emily pointed toward the lobby. "Because he's standing right there watching us." She waved, and grinned. "Hi, Dane!"

Jaimi closed her eyes as she heard Dane's voice. "Hey, Em."

"Oh…" Peggy's face lit up. "You know Dane? He's awesome." She leaned forward, whispering all too loudly. "He's so handsome, isn't he? Every woman in town has tried to snag him, but no one can get him."

Heat burned Jaimi's cheeks. "Thank you for that info—"

"Hey, Jaimi." He was right behind her. She knew that because of the look of adoration on Peggy's face, her daughter's delighted squeal, and the heat that seemed to be pouring through her from him being so close.

Slowly, she turned around. Her breath caught at the sight of him. His cowboy hat was tipped back on his head, his heavy black jacket framed his muscular shoulders perfectly, and his gorgeous brown eyes focused on her as if she were the only thing in the world that mattered to him. "Hey."

"Hi, Dane." Peggy giggled.

He glanced at Peggy long enough to give her a warm smile. "Good evening, Peggy." Then his attention snapped back to Jaimi. "Are you okay?"

She shrugged.

"She needs a place to crash," Peggy said, leaning forward. "We gave away her room earlier, and we're at capacity. Can she stay at your place?"

Jaimi's cheeks heated up. "We're fine—"

"You can stay with me," Dane said immediately.

"Yay! Mom! Did you hear that? We can stay at Dane's!" Emily shrieked with joy and flung her arms around Dane, who picked her up and settled her against his hip. "We were going to have to sleep in the car," she told Dane. "Grandma slept in a lot of cars when she was younger, but Mommy doesn't think that we should do it. She never lets us sleep in cars, and it's really cold here, so I don't want to do it anyway, you know?"

"I agree. Sleeping in cars in the winter in Wyoming isn't a great idea." He looked over at Jaimi. "We need to talk anyway."

"I don't want to talk."

"I know." He held out his hand. "Come on. You can slap some duct tape over my mouth when we get to my house, but don't skip out on a place that has walls and heat just because I'm an ass who delivered crappy news in a bad way."

"You swore!" Emily announced with delight as she locked her hands around his neck. "You said two bad words!"

Dane's cheeks turned red, and he looked so stricken that some of Jaimi's tension faded. Dane was a good man. She knew it in her heart. It wasn't Dane's fault that her father was a bad person, or that Chase had... Oh, God. She couldn't even think about it. "I don't want to talk about it," she said softly. "I can't."

"Okay." His face softened. "How about I just give you a safe place to crash, then?"

Safe. That sounded so good. And Dane made her feel safe. It was clear Emily felt safe with him too, and that was a precious gift. "Do you live far from here?"

"Ten minutes. Tops." He held out his hand. "Come on, sweetheart. Let's go."

For a long moment, she stared at his outstretched hand, then finally, she set her hand in his. He squeezed gently, and she felt her entire body sigh deeply and relax at the feel of his hand wrapped so securely around hers. He smiled, and pulled her close enough to give her a little kiss on her forehead before guiding them toward the door. "It'll be okay, sweetheart."

She glanced at him, too weary to argue. "I don't think it will be, Dane. I really don't."

Her mother would have shot her from the grave for being so pessimistic, but hey, her mom was an ash cloud in the Amazon right now, so it didn't really matter what her mom would think.

But it did.

And Jaimi knew she was falling short.