His lawyer cleared his throat. “It’s your father. He was caught in the hospital.”

“Caught? What the hell does that mean?” He ran a hand through his hair.

“He threatened to kill Leah Roberts.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“And he had a prohibited gun.”

Harry felt as if he had been sucker-punched in the gut. Dad. “Oh, God. Where did he get the gun?” His voice was hoarse. “Didn’t the police seize them all?”

“Evidently not.” Randall cleared his throat. “Did you know he might do this?”

In the cab on the way back to the hotel, his father had rambled about vengeance. But Harry had other, more pressing matters on his mind—like blackmail. He had left his father in his hotel room and headed straight to the safe.

And his father must have turned around and gone straight to the hospital.

“He talked about vengeance, but I never thought…” He swallowed. “Oh, God.”

“He’s in a lot of trouble, Harry.” His lawyer’s voice was soft, but Harry could not miss the warning.

“Where is he now?” Harry grabbed his jacket.

“In the ER. His leg was broken during the arrest.”

“Will he be okay?” Dad. The pain in Harry’s heart was almost too much to bear. “I’m heading there right now.”

He hung up the phone and stared at the screen. His inbox had grown at an exponential rate along with his unanswered text messages.

But the one message he longed to receive—the one person he needed to hear from—was silent in the face of all this misery.

Of course, he knew why. The logical part of his brain accepted it.

But in the darkest moment of his life—of which there was no doubt that this was—he yearned for contact with the one person that he knew loved him.

Would it always be like this?

Harry waiting, counting the days, hours, minutes?

Would he always be at the mercy of their situation?

He remembered when their eyes met at a NATO security meeting. Coup de foudre. He was smitten, he was lost, he was drowning. And he could not control himself.

His fingers had a will of their own.

He typed: I need to see you. He knew that the message would not be seen for another twelve hours.

But he hit ‘send’ anyway.

Chapter 31

Chapter 31

5:15 p.m.

Aiden crammed as much of the cheeseburger as he could into his mouth, his jaw working furiously while he stared at his laptop screen. He was ravenous for food and starving for information. There was nothing more satisfying than having both of those needs met simultaneously, especially in an air-conditioned, neutral environment.