She shot him a smile and disappeared up the stairs.

He gave himself a beat to think and then fished his phone out of his pants pocket.

Brick: Emergency. My place. How soon can you be here?

Chief Ford: Is there blood or do I have time for coffee?

Brick: No blood. But get it to go.

Chief Ford: Be there in 5.

Brick locked the deadbolt on the front door and bounded up the stairs two at a time. He found Remi in the guest bedroom next to theirs. She’d laid out some of her own clothes on the bed and was karate chopping the bed pillows with more violence than style.

He watched her as she moved around the room. Tension in her jaw and shoulders. Every few moments, she’d stop and take a deep breath. Over and over again, the tension built and rose until she breathed it out.

“Fuck,” she muttered under her breath. She hurled a useless pillow against the wall and brought her hands to her face.

He went to her, banding his arms around her and holding on tight.

“None of this would be happening if I had gotten her out earlier,” she whispered against his chest. “If I had talked her into it. Hell, if I had kidnapped her and thrown her in my trunk and driven to Rhode Island.”

“None of this is your fault.”

“It’s not your father’s either,” she shot back.

He clenched his jaw. “He’s going to bring Vorhees right to you.”

She pulled back and looked up at him. “We both know he was always going to come for me. I never should have led him here.” Her voice broke, and it took a jagged piece of his heart with it.

He hugged her hard, wishing he could keep her right there, against his chest, locked in his arms where she was safe.

“Listen to me, Remington. None of this is your fault. This is how it’s playing out. There’s no point in wishing away how it started. What matters is how we’re ending it.”

“I hope it ends with my foot in his balls,” she whispered fiercely.

He vowed the man would never make it that close to her. Because if he did, a pair of handcuffs and a jail cell weren’t going to be enough.

“I need you to focus on Camille. She’s going to have to talk.”

Remi’s hands fisted in his sweatshirt like she couldn’t bear any space between them. He knew the feeling.

“He’s going to come for you, Brick.”

He hoped to fucking God that was the way it went down. He wanted his shot at the man who haunted Remi’s dreams.

“Don’t think like that,” he told her, stroking his hand over her hair. It settled him to slide his fingers through all that red gold.

“He’s going to come for Camille. And me. And you because it will hurt me.”

“I’m not going to let that happen.” He would walk through the fires of hell first.