Chapter Twenty-Two
Duke turned to Audrey and locked gazes with her in a manner that melted any walls she’d constructed. Fine. She still had feelings for the man. Why wouldn’t she when no one had measured up to him? She’d dated around, too, trying to find someone who could even come close to holding a candle to him. No one, and she meant no one, did.
“Okay,” he said to her. “I trust you to stick with me.”
Those words, spoken with conviction, brought tears to the backs of her eyes. Funny, Audrey would never classify herself as a crier. Normally, she would be offended at the urge. And yet that was exactly what she wanted to do. Tears no longer felt like weakness to her but seemed like sweet release instead.
But before she let her emotions take the wheel, they needed to check on the foal. She had a bad feeling creeping in.
“Okay then,” she said to Duke. “Let’s do this.”
Duke dipped his head down and pressed a kiss on her lips so tender it nearly robbed her breath. “And then let’s talk once the dust settles.”
Her heart leaped at those words, at the implication. Could they figure out a friendship? Because she would settle for that if it meant never losing Duke again. After spending these past two days with him, she couldn’t imagine her life without him. She remembered, though. It had felt like living in a cold dark cave. She was fine. She would be fine. She could survive without him. It wasn’t like she needed someone else to complete her.
He made her want to be a better version of herself. He drew that out of her. And she loved him for it.
Friends?
Good luck with that one, Audrey.
A noise that sounded like a grunt came past the door as Duke slid it open.
Audrey gasped at the sight of Nash on the hay flooring, lying on his side with his hands tied behind his back. The perp had on a dark hoodie. She was certain it was the same bastard.
He kicked Nash again.
That one movement was all it took for Duke to make a run toward him and Nash.
The smile on Trey’s face caused Audrey to instinctively reach for Duke’s arm to hold him back. He had thick, black eyebrows that curled down over his black eyes. His nose looked like it had been broken. She saw the look in his eyes—eyes that held pure evil.
Running at Nash was exactly what the bastard wanted Duke to do. The smirk on Trey’s face would haunt Audrey’s dreams for a long time to come.
Her reach wasn’t long enough for how fast Duke bolted toward the injured man.
Trey ran in the opposite direction toward the other end of the barn. At the door, he stopped, turned and held up something in his hand.
“No, Duke,” Audrey managed to get out.
“I said you would pay, bitch. Now, you can go to hell and take these bastards with you!” Trey tapped the detonator.
The explosion knocked Audrey back several feet. The ambush had been successful, and all she could think about was the fact she might have just lost her best friend a second time. And Nash was innocent in all this, and it might have just cost his life to protect her.
No one was safe around her. There was always someone in the background trying to strip everything away from her.
Not this time, bastard.
She managed to sit up and take inventory. She’d momentarily lost hearing in both of her ears. It sounded like she was being held underwater. Everything around her happened in slow motion. The blast had caused a small dust storm in the barn.
On a second look, that was smoke, not dust. The barn was on fire.
Somehow, she wasn’t exactly certain how, Audrey managed to stand up and run toward the growing blaze.
Thick smoke slammed into her the second she entered the barn doors, making her eyes burn and her lungs hurt. She pulled the top of her cotton shirt over her nose and mouth to stop from chugging so much smoke.
Coughing, eyes watering, she scanned the area to find Duke.
She didn’t immediately see him.
Nash, however, was still crumpled on his side. The older man hadn’t moved as far as Audrey could tell. Was he already gone? She forced tears back as she kept searching for Duke.
When she found him, he was already trying to crawl toward Nash. Audrey bolted toward the older man, figuring the best way to get both him and Duke out of the barn was to get Nash out. It wouldn’t do any good to run to Duke first. There was no way he would leave. He would only go toward Nash.
There was no time to see if Nash could open his eyes or speak. If he was alert, wouldn’t he be trying to get out of the barn, too?
Audrey reached his boots and grabbed him by the ankles. With great effort and a rush of adrenaline, she started dragging Nash out of the barn, ever aware the bastard who did this could be lurking anywhere. Tray had all but disappeared into the smoke, like some kind of freak phantom.
The fact he’d figured out who Duke was and where he lived to set up this ambush wasn’t lost on her. He might not have recognized present-day Duke asleep on her couch, but he could have been watching the hospital, knowing they would end up there.
That had to be it. He had to have been hiding among the vehicles when they parked at the hospital. He had to know that Duke would come check on Nash if the older gentleman stopped texting. This perp watched and waited before striking. The boot prints near her home at the cabin proved he studied a situation before he acted.
White-hot anger roared through Audrey, giving her the boost of power she needed to get Nash out of the smoke-filled barn. She checked his wrist and got a weak pulse. At least his heart was still beating.
That was as much as she could do because she needed to run back into the building and save Duke. This was exactly the kind of situation she was trained for, running into danger. Except she hated to leave Nash alone, vulnerable. Trey was somewhere around here. She’d bet money on the fact he was watching, lurking.
By the time she returned to the barn, a noise caught her attention. White foam sprayed next to her. She jumped to one side to get out of the way of the stream only to realize Duke was standing up, battling the blaze with a fire extinguisher.
While he had that under control, she needed to free the horses from their pens. Unfortunately, she was going to have to guide them out the opposite end where Work Boots had disappeared. One positive was that it also directly led them to the practice arena out back. Another was that the smoke hadn’t filled this side of the barn just yet, so the horses should be okay.
