Broken Beginnings: A High Heat Small Town Romance Suspense (Citrus Cove Book 1)

IT WAS DAVID.

Panic washed over me as I ran back inside, ignoring the pain ripping through me. Blood wet my shirt from where I’d torn open my stitches rushing downstairs.

I’d been too late.

I ran upstairs and grabbed my phone from the nightstand, calling Bud. My heart pounded in my chest, blood rushing in my ears.

“Hello?”

“He took her, Bud. He took her. I was here, and he took her and⁠—”

“Cam? What’s going⁠—”

“It was David. David took Haley. He had a gun. He took her from the house and is driving in a small black car I haven’t seen before. Fuck,” I rasped, leaning over the bed. I was breathing hard.

“I’m sending people your way and notifying everyone. Cam, don’t leave the house.”

“I’m calling my family.” I hung up before he could argue. I hit Hunter’s number as I went back downstairs, pacing.

I’d seen the look in his eyes. He’d never looked like that before.

“Cam—”

“David kidnapped Haley—he’s the killer. It was him. It was him this whole fucking time.”

Hunter let out a growl. “Fuck. Fuck.”

“He just took her. I’m too weak. I wasn’t able to stop him, and now she could be dead.” My breathing became harder, my vision dotting. I looked down, cursing. “And I’m bleeding because I tore open my fucking stitches.”

“Sammy, Colt, and I are on the way. If you’re passed out, you can’t help her. We will find her. This town is small.”

“What if she’s dead? What if he kills her?”

“Stop,” Hunter growled. “You have to take a deep breath. He won’t kill her.”

“You didn’t see him. You didn’t see his eyes.”

“Cameron. I need you to breathe. I’m on my way, brother.”

He hung up, and I stood there, frozen.

I should have moved faster, should have responded quicker. I never should have let her out of my sight.

Fuck.

I stood there until I heard the sirens. I turned right as Alexa came through the front door, her eyes falling to the blood on the floor.Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

“Why are you here? Instead of out there finding her.”

Alexa held up her hands as if she were approaching a wild animal. “Cameron, everyone is out looking already. Everyone that we have. I’m here to make sure you’re okay. And you’re not, by the looks of it.”

I felt myself falling apart. He’d taken her from me. From my home. From our home. I’d tried to move as fast as I could, but it hadn’t been enough. I hadn’t been enough.

Alexa winced as she approached, her eyes falling to my side.

“We need to get you patched up.”

“No. Not until she’s found. We need to go.”

“Cameron,” she said, grabbing my arm before I could rush past her. “Where did he go? Do you even know?”

“No,” I said. “I have no fucking clue. I’ve never seen him like this before. It was like he was a different person. He will hurt her.”

“Cam!”

Hunter rushed through the front door, followed by Sammy, Colt, and Sarah.

“The kids are with Honey,” Sarah said, her voice trembling. “David was supposed to be out of state for work until tomorrow. He really…”

“Yes.”

Alexa turned, her gaze hardening on Sarah. “You really had no idea he wanted to kill your sister?”

“What the fuck, Alexa?” Colt growled.

“She has a point,” Hunter said, his voice gruff.

Sarah’s eyes widened. “Do you really think I would have stayed if I had known?”

“You’d be shocked what people will do for their abusers.”

The silence that settled between us all was harsh. But meanwhile, Haley was out there in danger with a killer.

“This isn’t helping,” I said. “We need to get out there. Where would he have gone?”

“Has your husband killed anyone before?” Alexa asked.

Sarah scoffed. “No!”

“Are you certain?”

Sarah shook her head, her mouth open but no words coming free. “This is absurd. David has never hit me. He’s never threatened to kill me. He…” Her voice broke.

Sammy held up his hands. “Alexa, I think we need to focus on finding Haley. I’m going to call your neighbors. Hell, I’m going to call everyone I can.”

“And I’m going to stitch Cam up,” Hunter said.

“I’m going to check in with the other units. Don’t leave the house,” Alexa said, turning and storming off.

“We’ll find her,” Colt said to me. “She’s strong. She’ll be okay.”

She had to be. Because if she wasn’t, I would never recover. I could barely stand the fact that I hadn’t been strong enough to get to her in time. He’d taken her from our home. We were supposed to be booking our trip for a vacation, not dealing with a crisis. She’d been through too much, and it wasn’t right that this was happening.

Hot fury rolled through me again.

Hunter pushed me toward the living room. I sat on the armrest of the couch as he retrieved a first aid kit from the bathroom. I’d always kept supplies for stitches in it, a habit from growing up on the farm.

“I can’t do this right now,” I growled. “I would have followed them, but he slashed my fucking tires.”

Maybe I should’ve tried anyway. I ran through the scenario over and over in my head, trying to figure out what I should’ve done differently. Because right now, she was gone. She was gone, and I was helpless.

“He thought it through,” Hunter said, lifting my shirt up. “Shit, Cam. You tore this fucker wide open.”

“I don’t care.”

“I do. I need you in one fucking piece. Haley needs you in one piece. This is going to hurt.”

It did hurt, but I could barely feel it as my mind raced. Her expression killed me. Fuck. I kept replaying watching him leave with her over and over again. Pain clawed at my chest, my eyes watering.

“We have to find her,” I whispered.

“We will. I’m almost done. We really should take you in.”

“No.”

“Figured you’d say that,” Hunter sighed. “Alright.” He placed a bandage over the wound and then wrapped my waist with tape, grimacing at the job he did.

The moment he was done, I stood up, going back to the front porch. Alexa paced, talking on the phone. There was another cop with her, one talking to Colt and Sarah.

I walked over to them, interrupting. “I have questions for you,” I said to Sarah.

She looked up. Her eyes were red with tears. “I’ll answer anything.”

“He was driving a black electric car. Have you seen it before?”

Sarah frowned. “He doesn’t own an electric car. This is David we’re talking about.”

“Well, he was driving one. Why would he have been driving one?”

“I don’t know. One of his friends supposedly got an electric car recently but that’s all that comes to mind.”

“What friend?” I gritted out.

“I don’t know, Cam. I don’t know his friends.”

“How have you been married to him for so long and don’t know his friends? Do you know anything about him?”

“Cam,” Colt warned.

I ignored him. I wasn’t holding back my words.

She winced. “I’m sorry. I’m trying my best.”

“Did he go to Baltimore recently?”

“He never told me exactly where his trips were to.”

I shook my head. I couldn’t handle this.

“Cam.”

I turned, looking up at Alexa. Her eyes were burning with fury.

“The killer isn’t David.”

We all stared at her like she’d lost her mind.

“What?” Sarah whispered.

“The killer isn’t David. Baltimore confirmed it. They finally found fingerprints in Haley’s old apartment, and they recovered footage from a parking garage down the road from her. We have plates, but the fingerprints don’t match David’s.”

“I saw David with my own eyes,” I snarled. “Do they know who the killer is?”

“They matched with someone named Thomas Connor.”

“I—I thought it was Andy,” Sarah whispered. “I really did. I thought they caught the killer. I… But it’s not David?”

“Does David have a brother?” I asked. “A twin brother?”

Colt paled. “Fuck. Haley asked me that recently. If he has a doppelgänger.”

Fuck.

My head whipped back around. “Where would he take her, Sarah? Where?”

“I don’t know! David doesn’t have a brother!”

“Apparently he does!” I shouted. “Where would he take her?”

“Cameron,” Colt growled, stepping toward me. He put his hand on my chest, pushing me back. “She doesn’t know.”

“She was married to David for over a decade!” I snarled. “She has to know something!”

I was losing it. I was losing my mind, losing my patience. I was stuck at my house while Haley was out there. And not even with the person we thought.

She was probably so scared.

Fuck.

I ran my fingers through my hair, turning, thinking. Pacing. I’d been in their house. I’d seen glimpses of David. But I hadn’t seen glimpses of Thomas. How were we going to find her now?

I ran through everything, trying to find anything out of the ordinary. Anything that stuck out to me.

If this was David’s brother, maybe he kept things for him. Or information. Something.

“The basement,” I whispered.

The basement.

“What was in the basement?” I asked, turning to look at Sarah.

“I was never allowed down there,” she said.

My jaw ticked. I spun back around to Alexa. “Take me to Sarah’s house.”

“They’ve already checked there,” Alexa said. “His car wasn’t there.”

“Did they check inside? In the basement?” I asked.

Alexa frowned. “I don’t know.”

“Check,” I demanded. “I’m telling you, that’s where she is.”

“You’re still hurt⁠—”

“Either you drive, or I will,” Hunter threatened, already moving toward his truck. “We might as well fucking check instead of hanging around here. We’re not doing any good sitting.”

“Someone has to be here if she comes back,” Alexa growled, although she sounded doubtful that would be the case.

“Thomas isn’t going to just let her go,” I said. “And you don’t need to come. Hunter and I are perfectly capable of going.”

Alexa gave me a sharp glare. “I can’t let you go there alone, Harlow. Don’t be an ass.”

I bit my tongue. Part of me wanted to blame a lot of this on departments and people not doing their jobs, but now wasn’t the time.

Alexa cursed as she headed towards her cruiser. I followed, getting into the front seat. She slammed the driver’s door and rolled down the window, shouting at the other officer. “Stay here in case she comes back.”

She cranked the engine and flipped on the lights, peeling out of the drive.

I ignored the pain in my side, silently hoping that we found Haley in the basement. Because if we didn’t?

I didn’t have a clue where she might be.