Exception (69 page)

He barely had time to process the information and what it meant, when he sensed movement at his right hand side. His head jerked instinctively just in time to see the massive man strike at him. His Krav Maga training instantly kicked in, slowing the events around him and allowing him to deliver a clean, effective sidekick to the other man’s groin.

Jason screamed in agony, grabbing his balls as he buckled to the pavement. Taylor knew he needed to flee. He needed to get to his car. If only he could make it. Before his legs registered what his mind had urged him to do, a click sounded from behind him. A sharp, piercing, needle sensation penetrated his back. His body stiffened.

Then there was the pain.

Voices screamed profanities around him, threats that he couldn’t make sense of. His body went rigid, fighting the electrical current that rocketed through it. Every muscle across every bone lost dexterity. His jaw locked forcefully. Trapped flesh from his cheek wedged between his teeth split open, leaving the coppery taste of blood on his tongue. He dropped to his knees, fighting against the exhaustion, the ache, the loss of control. He couldn’t breathe or think. Every ounce of energy he had was focused on resisting the pain, resisting a full collapse. A man on the floor is no longer a man in a fight; he’s a corpse.

Taylor couldn’t die. He wouldn’t give into it. He wouldn’t make it easy for them.

He wanted to scream. He had no control over his mouth or tongue. His stomach churned and he felt sure his heart would soon explode—but he persisted. He wouldn’t give up. He held on, refusing to collapse completely, until the pain stopped. He drew in a deep gasp of air.

“What the fuck?” a somewhat familiar voice yelled angrily behind him. “The motherfucker won’t drop.”

“You still have another charge, idiot. Fire that shit again,” Jason’s anguished voice cried.

Taylor cringed at the thought of being tasered again. He wanted to reach behind him and pull the barbs out, but he knew he only had a second, maybe two, before the electric discharge hit him once more. He also knew that, after that attack, he wouldn’t be able to resist and would fall to the ground, completely vulnerable. His blurry, watery eyes focused on the door in front of him. He knew what he needed to do.

His arms felt like overcooked spaghetti as he lifted them in front of him. With his palms against the wood, he jerked his body forward until his forehead connected to the thin glass by the locks. It shattered instantly, hopefully red-flagging the alarm. Shards of broken glass pierced his forehead and droplets of blood beaded his face—but that was the least of his worries. A second shockwave hit him. Exhausted and writhing in pain, he dropped, convulsing, to the ground.

The second charge was longer and so much worse than the first. At one point, he thought his heart would either stop or physically explode. In that anguished moment Emily’s face appeared behind his closed lids. She was telling him she loved him, and that she would marry him. That thought gave him the strength to ride the pain out until if finally stopped, leaving him spent on the sidewalk.

A long, nasty line of profanities came from Jason’s mouth. He sounded as pissed as a person could be. His voice and eyes were burning with anger. When his younger brother called on him to help on a payback job he’d been planning for months, he’d instantly agreed, for three reasons. The first, and most stupid, was the simple fact that they were brothers, and he was the kind of man who watched over his family, no matter what. Secondly, he’d agreed to help because, according to his brother, the target was a loaded pussy, which worked perfectly with his third reason: he was an addict, and in serious need of cash to pay his dealer.

With the second reason proving to be false and his certainty that the cops were now just minutes away, he regretted saying yes to his dickhead brother and his lousy plan.

It was too late to back out now. Taylor had seen his face and read his full name. He knew that he was, in fact, an employee of Prime Star Security, and it was only a matter of time before the cops were after him and he ended up in jail. The only salvation was to get Taylor in the Jeep, find a way to get filthy rich and skip the country, but for that he needed his brother to stop being an idiot and cooperate.

“Stop pressing the fucking button like a dumbass, Nickolas,” he growled, frustrated, as the cell phone in Taylor’s pocket started ringing. “Grab his feet; we’ve got to get him to the car, now. The window he busted had the sensor. It’s probably the company calling, which means the cops will be here in less than five minutes.”

The younger of the two brothers tucked the taser gun under his belt and moved to Taylor’s feet, kicking him in the ribs as he went.

Hearing the steps nearing his body, Taylor attempted to thrash his body in an attempt to kick the person approaching his legs. He knew his sore body wouldn’t obey him properly, but he had to show those bastards that he wouldn’t roll over and let them do what they wanted; he would fight until he had no strength left.

A loud curse sounded from above him and a heavy boot stepped on his back, right over the painful and undoubtedly already bruising spot where the barbs had bit his skin. He was pushed down, his body smashed against the pavement once more.

“Well, now I know why you insisted on the taser gun. Dude didn’t break your face because you were messed up, he did it because he’s got some steel balls,” Jason teased his brother.

Taylor heard Jason speak and didn’t need to see the second offender or hear his name; from Jason’s reference, he knew the face of the yet unseen brother was forever etched in his mind. Without giving him a second to process that thought, the boot left his back and came crashing down behind his head, a hard steel toe making his brain shake inside his skull and blood explode inside his mouth.

The faint sound of Nick gloating about having some steel of his own was the last thing Taylor heard before everything turned black and silent.

Emily had been sitting in the same spot by the window since Taylor left her. She was doing her best to keep her mind busy with the contents of the beautiful indie romance novel she was reading, but the task wasn’t the easiest one.
He proposed! And it was the sweetest proposal . . . goddamn it Taylor, come back already so I can say yes!
Her mind kept repeating the thought, over and over.

She checked her phone for the millionth time in the hope of seeing a text or a missed call from him, but there wasn’t any. Deciding to take matters into her own two hands, she dialed his number.

She knew he was inside the gallery, probably worrying himself crazy and talking to the cops, but she was sick and tired of the awful chills that kept traveling down her spine. She didn’t give a rat’s ass if the people around Taylor found her a needy girlfriend, it was the middle of the night, and he should be in his bed with her planning a wedding.

When the voice mail picked up her call, Emily’s stomach turned. Taylor never, ever missed her calls. Even when he was seriously busy he would pick up and tell her he’d call her back. She heard his greeting for the first time and waited for the beep.

“Hey babe, it’s me,” she started in an uneven voice. “I never heard the message before. You sound incredibly serious and stuck-up, it’s quite funny. I’m doing my part of the deal and waiting up for you, now you got to get your sexy ass back here, because we have serious business to take care of.” She was silent for a second or three, fighting some unnamed and unpleasant emotion. “I love you more than anything, Tay. Call me back, okay?”

Hanging up the phone, Emily pressed the device to her chest and closed her eyes, willing it to ring. It didn’t.

“Insomnia?”

The sweet voice approaching made her open her eyes and smile at a barefoot Penelope in cute purple cotton pajamas. “Something happened and Tay had to go to gallery,” she replied simply as if it explained everything, and apparently it did, because the younger woman nodded and dropped to the couch, getting cozy next to her.

“Don’t you hate how men can steal our precious hours of beauty sleep? I do, those lousy bastards.”

“Uh-oh . . . problems in Judeland, little sissy?”

Penelope looked at her with a mixture of pain and confusion in her eyes. “Yes . . . no . . . gaaahh!” she groaned, dropping her head into the pile of pillows between her and Emily.

Holding back a roar of laughter in her throat, Emily patted the young woman’s hair lovingly, imitating what Charlie used to do to her when she was really sad. “Oh, come on Poppy, you’ve been weird for days. Spill the—”

Emily’s words were cut short by sound of someone clearing their throat loudly. Both women looked up to the entrance of the living room where Nate stood in black boxer shorts and a white V-neck tee, his phone pressed tightly in his hand. “Uhm . . . hey, Ems, I’ve got the security company on the phone, apparently there’s some problem at the gallery and they can’t get a hold of Tay. Could you go wake him up for me?”

A wave of chills swept down Emily’s spine, all but freezing her bones and the blood in her veins. The amusement in her eyes vanished, giving room to shocked panic. Her hand stilled and fell to her lap as Penelope jerked her body up to look from her to Nate with a surprised look in her eyes.

Noticing that Emily wasn’t saying anything, Penelope offered the explanation. “Nate, Tay’s not here, he went to the gallery.”

“What do you mean?” he asked in a voice just a few decibels lower than a scream.

“About an hour ago Prime Star called him, asking him to go there. I tried calling him a few minutes ago but he didn’t pick up. I left a voice mail.” Emily’s voice was barely a whisper.

As Nate turned his attention and anger towards the person on the other side of the phone, Emily closed her eyes and tried to block everything around her out. She knew something was wrong. She’d known it since Taylor kicked that drawer.

In the darkness behind her lids, guilt, desperation and fear clawed at her heart, completely overwhelming her. It was a familiar feeling. Arms circled around her. They were weak, thin and not Taylor’s, and she didn’t want anything to do with them. However, at that moment, when her body was shaking and her breathing was shallow and her heart was breaking, she had no strength left to fight them.

T
HE MORNING
sun was shining through the living room window and making the oversized black t-shirt Emily was wearing unbearably hot, as she sat in her usual spot on the large couch. Her fingers traced patterns over the fabric and her toes opened and closed, allowing the fluffy rug to fill the space between them. She felt nothing. Not the burning sun, or the bumpy fabric, or the tickling between her toes. She was numb.