Novel Palace
Saving Hailey: Chapter 15
Tires crunch over gravel as Koby maneuvers the car to a halt outside the double-wide garage doors.
“Damn, Dante didn’t skimp on this place,” Broadway says, scrutinizing the safe house.
It’s bigger than an average American house. Five bedrooms and six bathrooms, nestled deep within the woods, away from prying eyes. It’s even more secluded than Lakeside College. Here, you’re over an hour away from civilization in any direction. A thick canopy of trees shields the property, moonlight filtering through the gaps to cast shadows over the driveway.
“I take it it’s bulletproof?” Koby motions at the glass living room wall once Ryder opens the car door for me.
Sliding out without waking Hailey is a fucking feat, but I manage it while keeping her in my arms. She’s buried herself into my neck so close I feel the quiver of her eyelashes against my skin with every breath she takes. I wonder how little she slept at Blaze’s that none of this has roused her.
“The entire building is bulletproof, starting with the windows and ending with reinforced steel walls,” I tell Koby. “You know how crazy Dante gets with Layla. He’d lock her in a padded room if he could.”
Broadway smirks beside me, jutting his chin at Hailey. “Something tells me you’re worse than him.”
Ignoring their snickering, I approach the main entrance, punching the access code into a keypad on the wall. The biometric scanner does its thing, illuminating my face with blue light before the locks click, letting us in.
Ryder opens the door, stepping aside.
The faint scent of pine fills the open-space living area, bathed in the soft glow of warm LED lighting. The sitting room, fully equipped with a huge TV, rows of tall bookcases, and emerald furnishings fills the right side. That’s where Broadway aims, his heavy steps muffled by plush carpet as he flings a drinks cabinet open. Koby’s on the other side, making a mess in the sleek, modern kitchen.
Ryder gets familiar with the security system panel by the front door. “Want me to disarm the internal alarms and switch off the bedroom cameras?” he asks, the humor in his voice not lost on me.
“Yeah and activate the outside motion sensors.” I glance at Hailey when she stirs in my arms, expecting her pretty, sleepy eyes to look up, but she’s still asleep.
I cross the room and carry her up the spiral staircase, then into the bedroom at the end of the upstairs hallway. As I brace another complicated sequence of maneuvers to get her in bed, she finally stirs.ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .
“Sleep, pretty girl,” I whisper, pulling the comforter up to her chin. “I’m still here.”
She blinks at me but doesn’t say a word. Her eyes close and within seconds she’s asleep again, utterly exhausted. I don’t move for a long time, staring at her while the fear that’s poisoned my mind for days finally subsides.
It’s not until she shifts, nuzzling deeper into the pillows, that I decide it’s time to deal with my sorry-ass state. I deliver my luggage to the bedroom across the hall from Hailey’s and take a shower. Standing under the hot stream for ten minutes, I marvel in the sensation of my knotted muscles loosening slowly while the grime, sweat, and blood swirl into the drain.
Steam clouds the en suite by the time I dry off. I want to crawl beside Hailey and sleep for a week, but until we talk, I can’t invade her personal space. I have no idea what she’s been through, how much she’s figured out—whether she still wants me.
Instead of sleeping with her, I’ll stay here, alone. I’m about to fall face-first onto the large bed when I catch my reflection in the mirror. Blood seeps from the wound on my shoulder, quickly drenching my t-shirt.
Looks like sleep has to wait.
On my way downstairs, I crack Hailey’s bedroom door open, checking if she’s still asleep. The nightlamp casts a warm, muted glow across her calm face, making me pause.
I can’t fucking believe I have her back.
The past few days replay like a haunted reel in my head. Every moment she wasn’t with me, not knowing whether I’d find her in time, the dark scenarios infesting my mind every goddamn minute… fucking torture.
The comforter rises and falls steadily in time with her breathing, helping me calm the fuck down. She’s okay. She’s safe. She probably has as many questions as I do, but we’ll work through them one by one once she’s rested. It takes a lot of willpower to walk out and close the door behind me when all I want to do is hold her close.
My men sit by the fireplace, each with a glass of Bourbon, a fourth waiting for me on the coffee table.
“Is she alright?” Broadway asks, sprawled in the armchair, his glass resting on his knee.
“She’s asleep.”
“Did she say anything?”
“She didn’t wake up.” I open the fridge, taking out a bottle of water. “She’ll be okay. She’s tough.”
“That she is,” Broadway pipes in. “You guys should’ve fucking seen them at Noretto’s. Don’t get me wrong, she was scared, but she kept moving.”
“I did see them,” Ryder says, reminding Broadway he watched the whole thing over the surveillance system. “Never thought I’d see the day…” He pins me with a curious stare from across the room, “…when you’d charge through gunfire like a man possessed for a girl.”
“Now you’ve seen it all.” I take a seat, my ears perked up, listening closely for any sound from upstairs.
The burn of the amber liquid down my esophagus proves a pleasant distraction from the cacophony of my thoughts and the dull throb in my shoulder.
“You’ve got it bad,” Koby pipes in. “Your precision is nothing surprising, but fuck, Carter, you were shooting left and right, up and down, and still had time to calm her down mid-combat.”
“Multitasking.”
He chuckles, shaking his head. “Yeah, level: hard. It’s odd seeing you like this. The way you handle her…”
“You’re always in control,” Ryder says. “Always detached, but you’re fucking unpredictable where Hailey’s concerned.”
“Yeah,” Broadway chimes in, encouraged by my lack of scolding. “You, the one who always said a woman in our world makes a man weak. You didn’t seem weak tonight. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this fucking ruthless.”
“I haven’t changed my mind. Hailey does make me weak. She is my weakness. Anyone with half a brain can blackmail me if they get their hands on her.”
“No one’s getting through to her again,” Ryder promises, pushing his chest out. “We checked the perimeter. All clear. Motion sensors on and alarm system armed.”
“Good. We’ll take turns in the control room.”
“This place is a fortress once you lock it down,” Koby adds. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it could withstand a bomb drop.”
“Neither would I,” I admit, thinking about how over-the-top protective Dante is toward Layla since he almost lost her.
This place proves just how overprotective. Every square inch is under surveillance, including the bedrooms and half a mile of land every which way, all available via live feeds on twenty monitors in the control room. Armored blinds can cover the house at the flip of a switch, and motion detectors secure the perimeter.
Broadway grabs the Bourbon bottle once I set my empty glass on the coffee table. He refills it, then hurls a first aid kit at Ryder, pointing at my shoulder.
I tear off my t-shirt while Ryder lays his equipment out on the table. “Make it quick. I’m fucking exhausted.”
“Well, I don’t recall you sleeping for longer than an hour here and there the past week. I’m not surprised.”
Koby watches from the sidelines, a frown lining his forehead. “Does Hailey know your role in this?”
“After tonight, I’m pretty sure she knows I’m not a college student.”
I hiss when Ryder soaks my shoulder in antiseptic and starts stitching, every needle prick painstakingly precise.
“Wake me up when it’s my turn to man the control room,” I say as soon the wound is dressed. “I’m in the last room on the right.”
“No one’s waking you. You look like death, Carter. Go to bed. We’ll be fine.”
I’m too exhausted to argue.