“Strength.” Her response was immediate.

“That’s what I see when I look at you.”

She blinked at him.

“Others . . . when they look at me, they see a criminal.” She needed to hear this. “Make no mistake, Sarah, I haven’t lived an easy life. I’ve broken laws. Done things that I regret.” And things that he’d never regret. “When it’s do-or-die, we all have to fight, and I’m a fighter to my core.”

“I know.”

Yes, she did.

“I try to follow a few rules. I never hurt a woman, no matter what the hell she’s done.” Because of the woman who’d raised him. Because she had loved him, and he’d loved her. He’d wanted to protect her, but that bastard who’d taken him . . . that bastard had hurt her again and again.

Until I got big enough to stop him. I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt her ever again.

He brushed his knuckles over Sarah’s cheeks. He felt the faint wetness of her tears. “I don’t hurt innocents.” He never went after the weak. When he ran his business, the people he was involved with knew the score. Always.

“The world isn’t black and white.” Oh, hell, no, it wasn’t. “I’ve been operating in the gray for a long time.” Until Sarah. Until she’d made him want to step out and into the light again. “I wish I could be different.” He looked down at all of the tats on his hands and thought of the battles he’d faced. “But you can’t change the past.”

If they’d come to find me . . . if my parents had looked . . .

If anyone had looked for me . . .

But he’d always known that his real family hadn’t cared. No one had ever bothered to search for him.

“You’re not the only one with nightmares, pretty Sarah.” He still dreamed of being trapped in that closet. Being a lost, scared kid. Calling out for his mother. Only she’d never come for him.

Then, later, the dreams had changed. He’d been a teenager. The bastard who took him . . . he’d come swinging at Jax when he stepped in front of Charlene. Jax had swung back. He’d hit him so hard and the man had slipped, falling down those stairs . . . falling . . . falling . . .

How do I tell her that I killed a man when I was fifteen? No one knew. Charlene had helped him. They’d covered up the past.

Another secret to stay buried.

But maybe, maybe Sarah could handle—

His phone rang. Jax swore. Someone had serious shit for timing.

“It could be the hospital,” Sarah said. “Gabe knew I was coming with you . . .”

He rose from the bed. He had on a pair of jogging sweats and he stalked toward the ringing phone. Jax glanced down at the screen and saw Brent West’s number flash on the screen. He answered, saying, “Is Molly all right?”

“She’s up and she’s talking.” West’s voice was hushed. “Get your lawyer man, get him fast.”

“What? Why?”

“Because I’m outside your place.” Again, his words were low, as if he didn’t want others to overhear him. “Molly named you. She said you took her.”

What the hell?

“I have to bring you in,” Brent said. “Procedure, shit—the captain is chomping at the bit on this one, so I have to bring you in,” he told him again.

Jax strode to his window. He saw Brent’s car outside, but Brent wasn’t alone. A cruiser was pulling up, and was that—yes, the man standing under the street light looked like Gabe Spencer.

“Call the lawyer, then come out.” Brent hung up.

Jax stared down at the phone. He quickly deleted that call from his phone list, not wanting to have that record in case anyone searched his phone.

“Jax? What is it?”

Sarah rose from the bed. She wrapped the sheet around her and it trailed over the hardwood floor as she came toward him. “Is Molly awake?”

“Yes.” He kept his gaze on the swirl of blue lights.

Sarah gasped and he knew she’d seen the lights, too.

“I didn’t do it, Sarah.”

“Jax?”

“I didn’t have anything to do with her disappearance.” Now he turned toward her. “I wouldn’t try to hurt you.”

“I know that.”

He nodded. “Good. Remember that, would you?” He grabbed for his clothes. And dressed as quickly as he could because he’d be damned if the cops hauled him out of his house half naked.

Sarah grabbed his arm. “What’s happening?”

“Molly’s awake, and, according to a tip I just got, she’s saying that I’m the man who took her.”

Her hand jerked away from him, as if she’d been burned. “That’s not possible.”

He pointed to the window and the swirl of blue lights. “They’re here to take me in.” He dialed his lawyer. The guy was on retainer, so it was no big surprise that—even in the middle of the night—Ty answered on the second ring. “Meet me at the station,” Jax ordered him.

Ty swore. “What is it now?”

“If I had to guess, then I’d say the charges will be kidnapping and attempted murder.” Those would just be the start.

“Holy shit . . .”

Exactly.

He heard rustling and turned to see Sarah yanking on her clothes. She was moving so fast.

And someone was pushing on the call button near his main gate. The buzzing sound echoed through the house.

“Hurry to that station,” Jax told his lawyer. He shoved the phone in his pocket. Then he crossed the room to stand in front of Sarah. “I didn’t do this.”

“I know.” Her chin lifted. “I know you didn’t.”

Good. Because plenty of people had doubted him over the years and if Sarah had, too . . .

He kissed her. Not wild and hard. Soft. Gentle.

She tasted so damn sweet.

But he had to pull away from her. Had to walk down those stairs and to the door. He was aware of Sarah following silently behind him. He didn’t look back at her. Right then, he couldn’t. Jax sucked in a deep breath before he turned off his alarm. He had to get his game face on. The face he wore with everyone but Sarah.

Then he reached for the door. He walked across the courtyard and straight toward his gate. He deactivated the security there, too. When he yanked the gate open, Jax was smiling. He looked at Detective West. At that dick Cross who was rushing to join the little party. At the uniformed cops.

“Well, well, little late for a chat, isn’t it?” Jax asked.

Brent stepped forward. “You need to come with us.”

“Am I under arrest?” Because he needed to be clear on that.

Brent gave a short, negative shake of his head. But it was Cross who spoke. “You’re wanted for questioning, Fontaine.” And he had his cuffs at the ready.

Jax felt his smile turn into a snarl. If that guy actually thought he’d cuff him . . . right on Jax’s own property . . .

“He didn’t do it,” Sarah said from behind him. “Jax had nothing to do with Molly Guthrie’s abduction.”

“And how would you know about that?” Cross demanded. “Did he tell you that we were coming to arrest him—”

“I have my own intel. I know exactly what’s going on.”

Her voice was so cool and in control. It was hard to believe that she was the woman who’d been so vulnerable in his arms just moments before.

“Jax has been with me . . . he was with me. The night that Molly vanished, he and I were in bed together.”

Gabe had approached, and Jax knew the guy had been close enough to overhear her confession.

“He didn’t take Molly. You’ve got the wrong man.”

Brent looked from Jax to Sarah. “We have to follow procedure,” he said.

Of course, procedure was always so big with the cops.

“You’d better call a lawyer,” Cross growled.

Jax smiled. “He’ll show up.” But before he left with them, Jax glanced back at Sarah. “Don’t worry. I’ll be seeing you again soon.”

“You didn’t do it!”

She was so convinced of his innocence. That was touching. But surely even Sarah realized that if he’d wanted to take someone—even when Sarah was curled up in bed with him—all he had to do was make a phone call.

He knew the cops realized that fact, and, based on the assessing stare in Gabe’s eyes, that guy knew it, too.