From Sanctum with Love (Masters and Mercenaries #10) - Lexi Blake Page 0,155

work? Because I kind of thought the office would be closed for the day.”

It wasn’t day anymore. They’d spent the entire morning and afternoon at the hospital, getting looked over and then talking to police. Sarah had required two stitches on her neck, but mostly she’d been a terribly lucky girl. She was all right with the singular exception of her heart. Kori was afraid that was broken. Jared had sent her a text apologizing and asking her not to contact him again.

That was when Sarah finally cried.

“I was told to bring you to Sanctum, Kori,” Case said. “And you know I always do as I’m told.”

Why was she here? Well, deep down she knew why she was here. Kai wanted to talk to her and apparently they were doing it on neutral ground. She knew she needed to talk to him, knew it had to happen soon, but she’d promised her friend. “I need to pack a bag for Sarah and get to the hotel. We’re all staying with Mia tonight.”

Somehow after everything they’d been through it was easy to forgive Mia.

It was easy to forgive Kai, too. She just wasn’t sure it was going to be easy to be honest with him about what she wanted.

She wanted him and only him for the rest of her life. She wanted to throw away all her inhibitions and love him and let herself be. She’d fought for so long to not be the girl she’d been with Morgan that she had to ask herself who she’d become. Becoming anti-Morgan was only another form of denying herself. What did she want?

Kori wanted Kai and she wanted to write. She was simply afraid to reach out and grasp them.

“I’ll pack for Sarah and take it over,” Case explained. “I want to talk to her anyway. I don’t know that she’ll feel safe in her house again. I’ve talked to some of her friends and they’re willing to put her up until she’s ready to make a decision. We’re all here for her.”

She might not have had a knife to her throat, but she’d still been a little traumatized. “You know I was there, too.”

“Ah, but your Master will handle you, sweet thing,” Case said with a wink. “Go on now. You don’t want to piss that one off more than you already have. I think you’ll find Sanctum is closed for the night, so you’ll have the place all to yourself.”

She stared at the building she knew so well. “I thought I was safe here.”

“You were. You are. You’re as safe as you can be, but Kori, nothing’s truly safe. That’s an illusion. I tell myself that every day. When I get pissed and angry because Theo died on an op, I tell myself he could have died while driving. He could have died when it didn’t matter. Instead he died trying to help take down something horrible. It was a good death. Nothing is guaranteed, Kori. I know that now.”

Kai could die tomorrow. He could have died earlier today. Jared had taken a step back and put a wall between himself and what he wanted. Shouldn’t she be brave if Kai was?

She placed her purse on her shoulder and slid out of the cab of the truck, her heart starting to beat. What was waiting for her in there? Would Kai have rethought everything after what happened earlier today? “Maybe you should take me home and let me get my own car. I’ll come back. I swear.”

Case reached across the cab and pulled the door shut. He drove off with a squeal of his tires.

“Well, you could have just said no.” Kori turned back to the doors that led to the lobby.

Luckily Case had given her his key card. He was a giver. She strode to the door because she wasn’t going to be the coward who ran away again. There was a note taped there.

Welcome, Kori. I’m waiting for you in the conference room. Please join me.

So they were going to be civil. Her heart sank a little. It was all right. It was better this way. They could talk and figure out how this was going to work from now on because she knew one thing. She wasn’t leaving again. She was going to help Serena with her script and she was going to find her place here. She wasn’t leaving this crazy family now that she’d found it. She pulled the note off the door and slid her