Page 20 of Between Control and Chaos
“No, thanks.” I can’t sit still. I feel like if I do, I might actually break.
“That wasn’t a question.” Halsey glares at me, and I glance toward the ambulance bay and ignore Halsey, stalking outside into the cold autumn air to find Ashton.
He’s been gone a few minutes, and I’m done dealing with Halsey.
I’m not mafia. I don’t have to take orders from them.
Halsey grumbles and follows me toward the exit, but he doesn’t leave the building. I turn around, raising an eyebrow when I catch him glancing at my mother and then back at me.
Strange.
My stomach somersaults, and the anxiety I’ve been feeling since the moment I learned of Harper’s disappearance has been gnawing at me.
“Shouldn’t you be helping look for Harper?” I glare at him.
Halsey sighs and folds his arms across his chest. “Not my job.” He doesn’t move from his position, keeping a watchful eye on the two of us.
Well, fuck him.
I saunter around the corner outside, barreling into Ashton. “She’s not going to like that, sir.”
Not going to like what?
Who is he talking to?
Dante?
Another minute, and he ends the call, Ashton shoving the phone into his pocket. He grabs my wrist and drags me back into the hospital.
“Oww, what are you doing?” I yank my arm free. It isn’t like he hurt me, not physically, but his touch right now, it’s giving me mixed signals, as is that intense, heated gaze behind those dark eyes.
“Protecting you,” Ashton says.
“I don’t need your protection,” I sneer and head past him, back out the doors and into the cold.
My jacket is beside Mom’s seat, and I don’t dare admit I’m freezing. At least I’m wearing a long, dusty-rose cardigan, but it’s not warm enough for today’s chill.
Ashton groans at me, removes his leather coat and slings it over my shoulders. “Dante wants you to have a bodyguard until this thing with Harper is resolved.”
“This thing—you mean her kidnapping?” I shoot him a nasty look. “I’m honestly shocked you didn’t go with Luca and decided to stay here.”
“Luca is back at the compound, with Dante.”
I stare at him like he’s sporting a halo, my mafia devil. “Why would he be there? Harper is missing.”
“We have her location, and I hung up the call with her to conserve battery power on her phone. Dante thinks he’s taking her all the way to Las Vegas.”
“You’re just going to let Nico take her there?” I keep walking, my legs growing cold, filled with a dull ache, but I slide my arms into Ashton’s coat that he lent me.
If he’s cold, he gives no indication of his discomfort.
“He’s getting a plane ready to get a team there upon her arrival.”
“A team? Dante doesn’t know who he can trust.” I stop walking and shiver.
Ashton pulls me closer. Grabbing the lapels of his jacket, he zips the leather up for me to keep warm. “He knows he can trust Luca, Liam, and me. The others—he’s interrogating himself.”
I expel a heavy breath, glad I’m not in the house right now.
