Dusk (Dangerous Web #1) - Aleatha Romig Page 0,66

the phone. He looked up at me. “The fucking line went dead.”

We both turned to the real-time, albeit delayed, satellite image as a flash and a plume of smoke came from between the trees. My heart sank in my chest. “What if she was in there?”

Mason’s head shook. “If she was, she wasn’t getting out.”

My steps staggered as I reached for the desk chair and my knees gave out. My sorrow quickly morphed to rage. I shot out of the chair, sending it flying behind me. “Lorna wasn’t in there.” My voice rose. “She wasn’t. There’s no way. I will fucking take down the whole goddamned Order.”

As Mason came toward me, I stared him down. “No. Don’t fucking try to stop me.”

He lifted his hands. “I’m not.”

My gaze searched the room around us. I had an unmet need to lash out, to hit, and to destroy. It bubbled within me from a simmering fury to a boiling rage. Turning away I stomped down the corridor toward the front of the house. I didn’t know where I was going or what I was seeking, but the small slice of humanity still within me said whatever I sought wasn’t inside. I wouldn’t find refuge in destroying Mason and Laurel’s home.

I flung open the tall wooden front door.

Like my emotions, the darkening sky was a simmering caldron of swirling gray clouds. Some hung low over the mountain peaks in the distance with shades of red decorating their undersides as rays of the setting sun shone upward. Others churned high above.

My steps led me out to the closest outbuilding.

I pulled open the door, searching.

For what, I didn’t know.

And then I saw it. In the diminishing light, leaning against a corner was a wooden baseball bat.

It didn’t matter to me who it belonged to.

I moved forward until it was in my grasp. My knuckles blanched as I gripped the handle and turned back outside to the dusk. A hundred yards away was the fence that contained one of the corrals. There were no horses up this way. There hadn’t been since we’d arrived. The ranch hands had them out on the property.

My mind focused on the baseball bat in my grasp.

I’d never been interested in sports.

When I was a kid, while other boys made a name for themselves on the football or baseball fields or basketball court, my nose was in a book. Whether it was math, science, or history, I couldn’t get enough. The coaches saw my height and the way my body matured. They watched as I took the mandatory gym class or weight training. They encouraged me to try out for this sport or for that. They told me stories of all-star athletes and the grandeur of six- and seven-digit salaries.

Coming from a modest beginning, I’d be lying if I said they didn’t make it sound appealing.

I talked to my mother and grandmother and told them what the coaches said.

They didn’t dismiss the offers. Instead, they told me that life was an offer.

Did I want to spend it doing something that didn’t appeal to me, simply because I could?

If I truly wanted the life the coaches described, wouldn’t it be more rewarding if I accomplished it doing what I loved?

“I did it,” I called out into the wind to the ghosts of my ancestors. “And now that life took her. I don’t fucking care about the money or the houses.” My stomach threatened to revolt as I screamed at the clouds. “I only care about Lorna.”

My attention went back to the bat in my hand. I gripped the handle as tight as I could and brought it back.

My anger, frustration, and grief materialized in the form of a six-inch-diameter fence post. I set my stance and swung. The bat struck the post. The impact reverberated through the bat to my grip. I veered back and struck it again. Each strike was harder than the last. Finally, the bat gave up. I was left with the handle of a splintered bat in my hand.

“Reid?”

I turned to see Laurel walking toward me. My head shook as my frustration came to life in the form of tears blurring my vision of the woman coming my way. “Don’t, Laurel.”

She stopped. Her long hair and dress were blowing in the breeze as the clouds continued to build. “Mason said to tell you that Christian and Romero are all right.”

Letting out a breath, I dropped the bat’s handle to the ground. “I can’t...”

Laurel came closer. “Nothing is for