Edge of Anarchy (Edge of Collapse, #4)

by Kyla Stone

In her panic, she’d opened the wrong door. She wasn’t in the garage. Hannah was back in the basement.

The last three weeks evaporated in a blink. The past came roaring back. She was in the basement again. The same basement she’d awakened to every day for five endless years.

Blinding fear took over. Her only thought was to hide. Gripping the railing for balance, barely able to see through her terror, she fled down the remaining steps. Down, down to the basement. Down to the pit of her worst nightmares.

Dust clogged her nostrils and irritated her throat with every shallow breath. It took everything she had not to sneeze. Her eyes watered.

“How about this. I’ll offer you a deal.” He paused. “Give me my child and I’ll let you live.”

“Don’t think I didn’t notice underneath that baggy sweatshirt. The baby. You had it.”

A part of her had been desperate to believe that he wouldn’t realize she’d had the baby. That he wouldn’t even think to look for her. How wrong she’d been.

She could hide here. For hours. Days, even. He would never find her. Even if he did, he couldn’t reach her. She was safe from him. Charlotte wasn’t.

In her fear, she’d fled instead of fighting. Maybe hiding would keep her alive, but it wouldn’t protect her child.

She’d tried to fight back. She’d thought she was getting better. Stronger.

A soft cry filtered through the floorboards. The distinctive wail of a newborn.

Even in the basement, even over Ghost’s relentless barking, the sound was unmistakable.

A terror like she’d never felt took...

She’d stayed alive for five torturous years for her son. For her daughter, she’d come back to life.

She hadn’t escaped her basement prison for this. She hadn’t bled and fought and clawed her way out for this.

She would fight, even if she was all alone. She would protect the ones she loved with every drop of blood that remained in her body.

She did not cower from the memory. She pushed into it. She focused on his squinty, reddened, watery eyes, on the trail of red staining his shoulder. She’d done those things. She’d hurt him. Just a man. She remembered who she was now. She remembered what she’d forgotten.

Hannah stabbed Pike in his stomach.

At the top of the stairs, she opened the basement door. One hand on the door handle, she paused on the top step. She turned and looked back at him. “You’re going to die here in this basement.”

Hannah gave a grim smile. “Who said it would be me?”

She didn’t have to tell Ghost what to do. He already knew.

The Great Pyrenees burst through the doorway, crossed the short hall in a single bound, and plunged down the stairs. He charged at Pike, one hundred and forty pounds of solid muscle, gleaming fangs, and relentless fury.

He never got a chance to finish his sentence. He barely had time to raise his hands in self-defense before the great dog was on him. With a savage snarl, Ghost leapt from halfway up the staircase and pounced on Pike.

The dog didn’t hesitate. Ghost lunged in. His sharp teeth ripped through the coat at Pike’s neck, shredding fabric like tissue paper. He closed his powerful jaws over Pike’s jugular.

Pike let out an unearthly howl that cut off abruptly in a wet gurgle as Ghost ripped his throat out.

Hannah sagged against the wall, listening to Ghost’s jaws tearing and slashing, listening to the terrible ...

Pike, her nemesis, her monster, was finally dead. Ghost—beautiful, brave Ghost—had meted out justice for them both.

She was safe. Hannah had kept her safe. Hannah and Ghost, together.

Ghost did not move from her side. With a soft whine, he flopped across her legs, a hundred and forty pounds of unconditional love and unfailing courage.

“I love you, you know that, right? You are the best dog in the whole wide world!”

“I know, I know,” Hannah crooned. “I’m right here. I’m here and I will never leave you. I promise, okay? I promise. I’m right here.”

Ghost padded over and touched his nose to Charlotte’s cheek. He sniffed her from head to toe as if checking to make sure she was okay. Seemingly satisfied, he gave a low chuff of approval.

He sat tall and alert, keeping watch—a handsome prince of a dog intent on guarding his little flock. His plumed tail thumped the floor in a slow, contented rhythm.

“Then I guess we’ll both have to be brave.” Ghost glanced back at her, a question in his beautiful brown eyes. “You are so brave. So good and brave. I have one more request of you, my friend.”

Ghost waited expectantly. “If he’s alive, find him and bring him back.” Hannah reached for the door handle. “Find Liam.”

He’d never feared death. He did fear what he would leave behind. Hannah and Charlotte would be on their own. And that was unacceptable.

It was Hannah he needed now. Hannah he needed to get to. It wasn’t just a mission anymore. Hadn’t been for a long time. His frozen heart thawing painfully, achingly slow, but thawing all the same.

He cared for her. He cared for Charlotte. He had to get back to them. Wanted to get back to them, with every beat of his heart.

The memory came to him in fractured pieces. This had happened before, years ago in Afghanistan after a mission. His crushed discs shifted, grinding, pinching a critical nerve that had severed the feeling in his lower half for hours.

His feet tingled painfully like they were being pierced with needles. It hurt like hell. The feeling spread slowly up his legs—so did the pain. Electric jolts seared his spine, scalding his nerves.

He had no idea where he was, no way to orient himself in the whiteout conditions. People could freeze to death five feet from their house—five feet from safety that they couldn’t see, hear, feel, or sense in a blinding snowstorm.

Ghost was coming for him. A great fluffy angel bounding through the snow.

“Lead me to our girl,” he said, his voice raw. “Take me to Hannah.”

Be alive. Please be alive, she prayed, mouthing the words fervently. Bring him back to me.

Only three weeks ago, Liam had found her weak and shivering in the middle of Manistee National Forest. He’d taken care of her. Now, it was her turn to take care of him.

She had to warm Liam’s torso and get his core body temperature up without sending him into rewarming shock.

There was no warm bath to stick him in, which was the best method but also the most dangerous. Applying heat directly to the skin was also a bad idea. So was massage, even though it seemed counterintuitive. Massaging the extremities could circulate the colder blood from near the skin to the core, shocking the body.

A hypothermic wrap covered every part of the body with as few open spaces as possible. A sleeping bag and ...

His upper torso was etched in scars. Scratches and bruises engraved his flesh.

She needed to bring him back. She needed to do more. This man had protected her, saved her, taken care of her. Strong, gruff, and reticent, but never unkind. Always thinking of her first—her protection, her safety, her comfort.