“Dax?” Angel’s voice was raspy and dry. She barely recognized it herself. She had been alternately hot and cold for however long she’d been…wherever she was. Her hands were tied behind her back and her ankles were wrapped together with duct tape. Something dark covered her eyes and when she’d first been taken from her apartment, a rag with an overwhelmingly strong chemical smell and taste had been shoved in her mouth and practically down her throat. It had all happened so quickly that she hadn’t had time to react.

After Mickey left, Micah showed up, which was strange, because he never came to her apartment. She decided it was a blessing in disguise, however, and she told him everything. She told him that she was done with all of it and that she didn’t care any longer what he thought, or Kyle or any of them. She was on her way to see Dax, to tell him the truth.

In all the years that she’d known Micah, and all the times they’d had arguments about things, he’d never become violent with her, not even close. But when she said she’d quit her job and she was going to see Dax, Micah lost it. He grabbed her hair and shoved her up against the wall. She thought he was going to hit her. The look in his dark eyes frightened her, and he had his right hand in a fist as he held onto her hair with his left. She was sure he would have hurt her if Mickey hadn’t come back. He’d forgotten his wallet. Micah let go of her as soon as he heard Mickey coming up the stairs, but her brother knew something was up and instead of taking the wallet and leaving, he took his place back on the couch where he’d been sitting earlier. Micah left but as he did he gave Angel a look that chilled her to the bone.

It took some doing, but almost two hours later, she got rid of Mickey again. After he was finally out the door and she watched from the second-story window as he got into his car and left, she grabbed her purse and keys and opened the front door. That was when she was grabbed by the throat and pushed backwards, and a rag that tasted and smelled like chloroform was shoved down her throat. She recognized the one they called Nolan and two of Dax’s prospects. Her last thought as her world went dark was, “It looks like I waited too long to come clean.”

Her mouth felt like cotton and her throat like sandpaper. She was sitting upright with her back against something firm, and although she hadn’t heard anyone come in, she smelled his woodsy aftershave and felt his overwhelming presence in the room. He wasn’t making a sound, but she knew he was watching her. “Dax, please talk to me.” There was nothing but silence for several more minutes and Angel thought maybe she was wrong. Maybe it wasn’t him. Maybe it wasn’t anyone. Maybe the fear and anxiety and the leftover chemical in her bloodstream was causing her to hallucinate. Then suddenly she heard his voice. It was as dark as the room around her as he said:

“I’ve been trying to think of what I wanted to say to you, Angel, but honestly, I have no words. The guys thought I should let someone else do this, that I shouldn’t have even come.”

“I’m glad you came, Dax. I was on my way to talk to you when they grabbed me. I was coming to tell you the truth…”

He laughed. “How convenient. Just when I discover your mountains of lies, you had already decided to come clean. I apologized to you for suspecting you that night when I got back from Canada—do you remember that night, Angel?”

“Yes, of course I do…”

“I apologized because I thought I had it figured out. I thought I knew who was setting me up and I convinced myself that it wasn’t you. I guess I was wrong again, it was you, wasn’t it?”

“No, not all of it, Dax. I wasn’t the one setting you and the Sinners up to fight or take the fall for the coins. I didn’t kill Max…”

“Not directly,” he said. She didn’t know what he meant by that but he went on to say, “You lied to me. You were watching everything I did and reporting back to your superiors. I was the topic of your weekly meetings. You were trying to find something on me. You were trying to send me to prison.”

“At first, yes. I was doing my job. But today, I was coming to tell you that I was finished with all that….” She heard the desperation in her own voice and felt it in her chest. She didn’t want to admit it just yet, but she knew that she wasn’t merely begging for his forgiveness, she was begging for her life.

“Like I said, convenient. The FBI was at my doorstep when I got the call about you. They found the murder weapon that killed Max and guess what? It has my fingerprints on it. Surprise, surprise. Did Dan give it to you? Did he tell you where to hide it?”

“Dan? What? What are you talking about?”

Instead of answering her question he said, “I never even knew your real name until today, Officer Cecelia Brady. Fuck!” There was a loud bang like his foot or his fist had connected with something solid, and then again, silence. The silence was the worst. Angel could almost hear the beads of sweat that rolled slowly down the sides of her face. The sound of her own breathing was practically deafening. She began talking again:

“They asked me to take this job and at first, I was excited about it. But then I got to know you, Dax…”

“The worst part,” he said, interrupting her, “wasn’t that you were a cop. It was that you were working with Dan. That was the ultimate betrayal.”

“What? No!”

“Shut up! God! I’m so sick of your lies! I have proof! There was a text message from him on your phone and he sent you a picture of the two of you. You look just like you do now, so it was recent.”

Angel felt like she’d been kicked directly in the stomach. Her head was spinning. That couldn’t be, not unless this Dan had found out about her and decided to set her up too. But how would he get her number? And, how in the hell did he have a picture of the two of them together? No one even knew what this guy looked like. “Dax, how do you know it’s Dan? Have you ever actually seen him?”

“It came from the same fucking number, Angel, and he captioned the fucking thing. “

“Listen, Dax, please. I have lied to you, but not about this, not about Dan. We’ve been looking for Dan too since Canada. But I haven’t found him. We haven’t found him. I don’t even know what he looks like. None of us do.”

He made a scoffing noise and then said, “Do you know how many friends…brothers…I’ve lost over all of this? Do you know how many people got hurt, including your father?” She shuddered at the mention of her father. Whoever talked to Dax knew everything. How the hell could that be? “I hope it was all worth it, Angel. I hope Dan was giving you some good dick…”

“Dax!” What on earth is he talking about? “Please listen to me. I don’t know Dan! I heard you and Hawk that day in Quebec, and that’s when I started looking into who he was and trying to find him. For four months, my team has been concentrating on learning about his past and trying to piece together his movements. We’ve been having the NYPD lean on the Rossis…”

“Lies. It’s all fucking lies.”

“Please listen to me. I did lie to you, and I’m so sorry. But not about this. Dan is the bad guy here, not you, and I’ve told my superiors that. I quit my job. I love you, Dax. I’m so sorry,”’ Tears soaking the blindfold that was still taped over her eyes. Dax was silent again for a few seconds and then she felt his breath against her face as he said:

“Your apologies mean nothing. I’m going to have to leave here and spend the rest of my life running, or…face a murder trial, maybe more than one. Is there a copy of that tape, Angel? The one my boys found in your apartment that shows me killing Frank? Did you already tell them about that? The FBI didn’t seem to be able to prove I was in Canada…but your team knows, don’t they, Officer Brady?”

“Yes, my team knows you were in Canada. They haven’t given that information to the FBI.”

“Because the greedy fuckers want to arrest me themselves, right? Well, it looks like the FBI beat them to it. They’re going to go with what they have…thanks to you, and your boyfriend, Dan.”

“He’s not my boyfriend! I’ve never met him. It’s a set-up. Dax, I can help you with the FBI. I will say you were with me…”

“Shut up! Just fucking shut up! You think I want your help? You think I would ever trust you? All that comes out of your mouth are lies! I can’t take one more, so just shut the fuck up.”

She stopped talking. Sweat was rolling into her eyes and tears were flowing down her face. Her neck was aching like crazy and her lower back was throbbing. None of it matched the gravity of the pain in her heart. When he started talking again, there was pain in his voice.

“What kind of cop fucks her suspect, huh? What kind of police officer uses her pussy to get information? If I had any respect for the cops to begin with, you would have destroyed it. Do you have even a shred of self-respect, Ang—Cecelia?” She stayed silent, figuring that it was a rhetorical question. Everything he’d said was true anyways. She’d done everything wrong from the beginning and people were probably even dead because of her. “I asked you a fucking question!”

She licked her lips, trying to get some moisture to them. Her tongue dragged across them like sandpaper and when she spoke her dry, raspy voice was so shaky that it was almost unintelligible. “No. I don’t have any self-respect left. I screwed up. You’re right. I screwed it all up. I’m sorry, Dax. I’m so sorry.”

“You think I care what you are right now?”

“No. I don’t expect you to care. I just want you to know that I was doing my job up until I fell in love with you, but I was not working with Dan. I know what kind of man you are…”

“Yes, you do. You have a video of me shooting a man and killing him in cold blood. You know what kind of man I am.” His voice was as cold and hard as steel, but she heard something, or she thought she did. Something that said he wanted to believe she didn’t think he was a bad person. Maybe she was letting her fantasies take over because most of her hope was gone.

“I know why you killed him. He hurt Symone. He hurt other little girls. He was the bad man, Dax. You were protecting that young girl.” He was quiet again and she was shaking so hard now that she could hear her teeth chatter inside of her head. It was so loud that it drowned out the noise she made when the tape was ripped from her eyes. They automatically tried to open but the glue from the tape held them down so that they were just watery slits. The blurry image of Dax’s face began to form in front of her and she concentrated on focusing until she could almost make out his features. The next time she spoke it was without any thought and it took even her by surprise. “I love you, Dax. I’m so much in love with you. I was willing to give up everything for you.”

“You’ve been giving information about me to the cops for months now. You are the fucking cops! You lied to me about everything. How fucking dare you call that love?”

“I never lied to you about how I felt. I have never been so in love with anyone. I have never been willing to do anything for a man. But for you, I was willing to give up everything. I already talked to my captain and told him I was leaving. My family knew. I was on my way to tell you today. I swear, it’s true.”

“Oh, you swear, do you? Well, that makes all the difference in the world. Tell me, Officer Brady, why now? Why suddenly today?”

“I just couldn’t take it any longer. All this…investigation stuff takes forever. It’s been months since I decided that you were what I wanted, all that I needed. I was sick and tired of living a double life and mostly, I was sick and tired of lying to you.”

She suddenly felt his hand on the side of her face. His palm was hot and she shuddered as he traced the line of her jaw with it. He seemed so angry, but he was touching her so gently. She was confused. Or maybe…hopeful again. Maybe she was getting through to him. He slid his hand down to her neck and stroked across it.

“Dax…”

His name on her lips was like a trigger. He suddenly tightened his hand across the front of her throat and since she couldn’t look away, she closed her eyes. She didn’t want to look into his blue eyes while he killed her. He squeezed tighter and she was suddenly struggling to breathe. “Open your eyes.” She kept them closed and tried to will the panic away. He was going to kill her. She couldn’t stop him. Maybe if she just gave into it, it wouldn’t be so bad. “Open them!” he barked as he squeezed tighter. They flew open then of their own will, and she wondered what he saw there as the muscles in his hand relaxed and he let go of her. In almost a whisper he said, “I’ve never been manipulated by a woman in my life. And then you come along and use that magic pussy of yours to turn my life upside down. I thought I loved you. I thought about changing my life for you. But I don’t even fucking know who you are, do I? I’ve ruined my reputation with my men…lost their respect…and I am probably destined to live out the next forty years of my life behind bars, all because you couldn’t keep your legs closed. You’ve taken everything from me.”

“You have a good heart and it touched mine like no one else’s heart ever has. But by the time I realized all that, Dax, I was in so deep that I didn’t know what to do about it. I didn’t know how to tell you, and I know I waited too long, but everyone I tried to tell on my side of things thinks that I’ve lost my mind.”

“Everyone? Like your four brothers, two of who are cops too? Are those the people that thought you lost your mind, Cecelia?”

“Yes. But, I don’t care about any of that any longer, Dax. I want to be with you!”

“Well then, I guess I should be impressed. I should just forgive everything, untie you, and let you go on your way.” He put a joint between his lips and brought his lighter up to light it. She watched as he took a long drag and then locked eyes with her again as he held it in his lungs. He blew it out into her face and as hard as she tried not to, she began to choke. His eyes never wavered from her face as she did. When she stopped coughing he said, “What do you think I should do with you, Angel? Maybe I should deliver your heart to your boyfriend in a box?”

“You’re trying to scare me, but I don’t believe you’d ever do that.”

Dax turned his head so that their eyes no longer met and as he smoked his joint he said, “Then maybe you don’t know me any better than I do you. You’d be surprised at exactly what I can do…to those that betray me.” While he talked, she took in what was directly in front of her: wooden crates stacked up across a wooden floor and pushed up against steel walls. She was in some kind of warehouse and the only light was coming from above Dax’s head, but she couldn’t look up and see if it was a window or a door. She suddenly remembered the surveillance van. Micah was watching her today. But Micah was pissed off at her. Had he still even been there when they came to get her? If so, why didn’t he try and stop them?

“Dax…who told you about me?”

“Your boyfriend told me, Angel. I called him after I saw the text and the photo. He admitted everything.”

“My boyfriend? Micah?” He kept referring to Dan as her boyfriend, but he never mentioned Micah. If Dax knew all about her life, shouldn’t he know that she was living with Micah? She was so confused.

He didn’t answer her. Instead he brought up his right arm and suddenly she was staring at the barrel of his .44 Magnum. She closed her eyes again and said a silent prayer. She was about to die at the hands of the man she loved. The man that she’d risked everything for…even her life.