The Proviso (114 page)

Sirens wailed in the distance, both KCPD and rescue,
coming closer, and she began to breathe easy.

Then another dark figure stepped out from the
shadows and planted his fist in her face.

*

7:00 a.m.

Giselle could always call in sick and probably
should. Her boss had been dinging her to stay home until she
delivered and finished maternity leave; Bryce agreed, but didn’t
push.

She felt that would show weakness, so of course, she
didn’t do that. This pregnancy had been very difficult for her;
she’d spent almost nine months battling her body and she seemed to
lose skirmish after skirmish.

Bryce had done his best to support her and while he
had
gotten used to the idea of another child, his nightmares
grew worse as her belly grew bigger. She had shocked him when she
told the therapist about them; he hadn’t known. The therapist told
them it might get worse before it got better—and it would be a long
time before it got better. The path was rocky, but Bryce was
proving his love and commitment to her by walking it and she would
walk it with him.

She’d started by getting her guns out of the
house.

Giselle had not asked him to go back to church with
her, but occasionally he would ask if she minded his company. She
thought that might be an empty gesture on his part to make her
happy, but she decided it best to simply thank him for going with
her. She didn’t know if he would ever go regularly, but right now,
for the next few years, Giselle only cared about getting him
better.

Bryce had balked at using his father’s name as their
son’s middle name. “I loved my father, Giselle, but that’s the last
thing I need for the rest of my life. What was your pirate
grandfather’s name?”

“Elliott.”

“That’s it.”

“Bryce, do you know how many cousins I have named
Elliott?”

“Four?”

“Six, not including Taight kid number two.”

“One more’s not going to make any difference. And if
we ever have a girl—”

“Oh, hey, don’t get any bright ideas. I’m done with
this whole pregnant bit. I’m way too old for this bullshit.”

“Are you
sure
?” he’d asked slowly with a wary
expression. “Because I’m okay with it if you want more.”

“Positive.”

Giselle fixed her lunch, then grabbed her briefcase
and drove to work. She parked and trudged into the building, into
the elevator, rode up the elevator, trudged to her office, closed
her office door somewhat so she could hang up her coat.

A dull pain hit her way down low in her belly. That
wasn’t new, but it was a different kind of pain.

Another pain struck her, sharp and swift that time,
and she put her hand to her back. Then another in her belly this
time. She doubled over, her eyes shut tight against it until she
felt her legs become drenched. She assumed her water had broken,
but it was too soon; at thirty-five weeks, she still had five more
to go.

She opened her eyes and fell to the floor, twisting
to protect her belly, but striking her head. She didn’t know if she
fell because she was so weak or because she had somehow slipped in
the blood pooled around her feet. The carpet was hard and wet under
her and she felt immensely icky. Who would clean up this mess?

Fighting to stay awake and lucid, she tried to
remember where the phone sat so she could call an ambulance. She
inched along the carpet, propelled by her feet and elbows. It took
her what seemed forever to get twelve inches, and when she looked
back to see how little progress she’d made, she wanted to cry, but
she couldn’t spare the energy. She was the only protector this
child had at this moment and it was up to her to keep him safe.
That was her job; that had always been her job. One way or another,
she protected people.

The walls shook when her office door slammed open
and she vaguely recognized a voice. It belonged to her boss, she
thought, but suddenly couldn’t remember his name.

He was talking to her—why couldn’t she remember his
name? He stroked her hair and face. “Giselle,” he said urgently,
“wake up for me, honey. Come on, open your eyes for me.”

“Water,” she whispered. Thirsty, so thirsty. Her
eyes would not open no matter how hard she tried.

The lip of a bottle was pressed to her lips in a
moment and she drank, then the faint sound of sirens wailing closer
and closer pierced her soggy, foggy brain.

Who’ll tell Bryce?

“It’s okay, Giselle,” said that man again whose name
she couldn’t remember, which embarrassed her. “We’ll find him.”

Please don’t take me away from Bryce. He won’t
survive my death.

“Nobody’s leaving anybody. You just put that out of
your mind.”

There was much commotion, metal clanging, people
hollering “This way!” but it seemed farther and farther away. She
was tired now, so tired. She felt a prick in the back of her hand
and then she went to sleep.

*

8:20 a.m.

Justice awoke slowly, her head throbbing, her face
aching, her feet on fire and cracking with dried blood. She waggled
her jaw back and forth, grateful it wasn’t broken. She tested her
nose and that, too, was intact. She tried to flex her feet, but
that really hurt. She remained still and listened carefully for any
hint of Mercy. There was none and her chest constricted in fear and
anguish.

She opened her eyes to see that she lay on a cot in
a large, dimly lit room that looked like an empty storeroom. The
blankets she’d managed to take from her bed cradled her. She wasn’t
bound, but she wouldn’t be going anywhere with glass embedded in
her feet and her heels and calves burnt to a crisp.

Light came from an office where a man cussed as
another gave directions. “Look, the tabs go in the back and you
wrap them around the front.”

“Shit. You do it, then, if you’re such an
expert.”

Just then, Mercy squalled and Justice breathed a
sigh of relief. Not only was her precious baby alive and in the
building, but someone at least made an attempt to take care of her,
however clumsily.

Fen had done this to them. If Knox hadn’t already
died in the fire, he wouldn’t live out the day. Fen would make sure
of that.

Justice’s chest ached so much she curled in on
herself, tears pouring down her face as she sobbed. Four years ago,
she’d fallen in love with a Knox Hilliard who didn’t exist. The one
who
did
exist had tricked and terrified her into his bed,
seduced her with his wicked magic, and caught her by letting her
go. He’d torn down a stuttering, timid little girl and built, in
her place, a woman. He’d taken her and pulled her inside out,
taught her grace, sensuality, and power. He’d won her love and her
trust, her respect and admiration for the man he was, not the
fantasy she’d concocted.

He was nothing she’d ever wanted and everything she
ever needed—and she would probably never see him alive again.

Mercy wailed then and continued to wail for what
seemed hours while the oafs, confounded by that small being, tried
to shush her. Justice’s breasts ached and she finally decided to do
what was best for her baby right now because she didn’t have a clue
what was best for her in the long run. “Hey!” she croaked, then
cleared her throat. “HEY!”

The men in the front scrambled to get through the
doorway. “She’s hungry,” Justice said. “Hand her over.”

Without a word and with great sighs of relief, they
gave Mercy to her and scurried back to their office. She shifted as
well as she could on the cot and hummed to Mercy as she rooted and
then found Justice’s nipple and latched on. She sucked to her
heart’s content, oblivious to the probability that she would lose
her father today—the father who loved her with his whole soul—and
Justice continued to cry silent tears of despair.

At least Justice would have the most precious thing
Knox Hilliard had ever given her, the best part of him, and she had
to protect that at all costs.

She tried to trust in Knox’s brilliance and cunning,
his courage and strength, his love for her and their daughter, his
family’s determination and unwavering loyalty. Neither he, nor
they, had gotten this far to fail, but this was too devastating to
overcome, too unexpected.

They should never have let their guard down. Justice
wondered if the rest of the pack had been ambushed and she
shuddered to think that all of them might suffer.

Justice turned the situation over in her head,
looked at it, took it apart and put it back together again
seventeen different ways.

Fen had lost what remained of his life the minute
Sebastian and Jack had placed their ad, when the Journal had
printed Sebastian’s letter. The feds had pounced immediately. As
Justice had suspected, they’d been waiting for Fen to make a wrong
move that they could prove—for which they had waited from the
moment a Mormon bishop had gone to them with Fen’s confession more
than a decade before. The FBI had played Knox the same way he’d
played them.

This was Fen’s last gasp. His reasoning was clear:
If he couldn’t have OKH, neither could Knox.

Her thoughts were interrupted by her captors, who
brought her the diaper bag. She requested aspirin for the pain in
her feet and they brought it, with a bottle of water. Mercy
continued to nurse until they both fell asleep.

*

10:11 a.m.

Bryce was in the middle of interrogating an expert
witness and the woman, some self-proclaimed forensics expert whose
credentials hadn’t checked out, had made a fool of herself. He
could tell the jury had grown impatient with her, so he continued
to push their buttons by questioning her just a bit more,
reinforcing their annoyance that she wasted their time.

Clerks very occasionally came and went from the
bench, delivering messages and taking messages away. His interns
sat behind him in the gallery, clicking away on laptops, and
texting back and forth with the office. Bryce vaguely wondered how
he’d done his job before aircards.

Bryce had just finished his questioning when the
judge said, “Recess. Counsel in my chambers.”

He and his adversary exchanged looks and she
shrugged; her second chair stood. He glanced over his shoulder at
his second and indicated that she should go with them.

The four of them filed in and saw that the judge
paced. He looked up to see Bryce and said, “Kenard, your wife’s
been taken to St. Luke’s emergency room. Geoff Hale’s been trying
to find you all morning.”

Bryce thought his knees would give way. His head
swam. He didn’t think about anything. He made no assumptions,
raised no scenarios in his head. But that ache—that too-familiar
ache that he had had when he was told his family had perished—it
was back in full force and he could barely breathe.

“ . . . second chair?”

“Yes,” he muttered absently, having not really heard
nor understood the question. “Sarah can carry it. I gotta go.”

It seemed such a long way from downtown to the
Plaza, and in the middle of the day, the traffic was a nightmare.
In his haste, he had forgotten the fastest way to get there.
Finally he parked and ran into the building, pushing people out of
the way to get to the admitting desk. The clerk checked her
database and then said, “Your wife is in surgery, Mr. Kenard. If
you could please fill out these papers and let me see your
insurance card, I’d appreciate it.”

Bryce did as requested, though he resented it and
yet, it gave him something to do. That done, she directed him to
the surgery waiting room, where he ripped off his suit coat and
tie, then paced alone for half an hour before it occurred to him to
call in the pack to pace with him. Knox didn’t answer.

“What happened?” Sebastian demanded once he arrived
and found Bryce.

“I have no idea. Judge just told me to get here and
no one seems to be able to tell me anything.”

“Can’t find Knox on his cell and apparently, every
lawyer in Chouteau County’s in court because nobody’s answering
phones.”

“Lilly’s not answering either.”

“Oh, she and my mom are probably—”

“Mr. Kenard?” Both men turned to see a nurse in the
doorway. “Your wife is out of surgery and in recovery.”

“How is she?”

“Doing as well as can be expected,” she said. “Come
with me. The doctor would like to talk to you.”

He followed her out and down the hallway. “My son?”
His heart and soul were wrapped up in that baby and had been since
he’d fallen in love with Giselle for the third time in his life. He
needed
to see that boy, talk to him, rock him. His son.
Giselle’s son. The life they had made together.

“He’s in the nursery, doing well. I’ll let the
doctor talk to you.”

He waited in a little anteroom with three chairs and
a small table that held a phone and a little thing of fake flowers.
He only noticed because there was nothing else to look at while he
waited. The door opened suddenly and he jumped.

“Mr. Kenard, I’m Dr. Sanford.” They shook hands and
the doctor, still in scrubs, didn’t waste any time. “Your wife had
what’s called a placental abruption. This is when the placenta
separates from the wall of the uterus. We were able to deliver the
baby, but she needed a lot of blood. We tried to save her uterus,
but because of the bleeding, we had to perform an emergency
hysterectomy. She won’t be able to have any more children.”

Bryce gulped. His heart ached suddenly—for her, for
himself, for the children they couldn’t possibly have together.
That neither of them wanted more seemed irrelevant at the
moment.

“The other thing is that she has a pretty severe
concussion and so we’re monitoring her for now.”

“Concussion? How?”

“She fell and hit her head on the floor.”