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  Savage Grace

  A Sydney Rye Mystery, Book 12

  Emily Kimelman

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Sneak Peek

  A Note From Emily

  About the Author

  Emily’s Bookshelf

  Savage Grace

  Copyright © 2019 by Emily Kimelman

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Heading illustration by Autumn Whitehurst

  Chapter One

  Sydney

  Gripping the pregnancy test in my hand, I can’t stop staring at the blue cross in the window.

  I’m pregnant.

  Tears start to roll, hot and slow, down my cheeks. I crouch, my knees cracking as I huddle in a low ball, emotion bowing me. My dog, Blue, whines and presses against my side, his warm tongue laving my cheek, his musky scent enveloping me. A familiar comfort.

  Will my child love Blue as I do?

  My phone vibrates on the bathroom counter, and I hiccup a sob. Squeezing my eyes shut, pressing more tears free, I hold my breath. Blood rushes in my ears, and my heart throbs in my chest…a tidal wave is washing me away. I can’t do this.

  The soft ping of a voicemail brings my eyes open. I’m staring at the cross again.

  Blue shifts closer, leaning his warm weight against me. As tall as a Great Dane, with the elegant snout of a collie, the markings of a wolf, and mismatched eyes—one blue the other brown—Blue means the world to me.

  My heart will have to make room for more.

  But everyone I love dies.

  Fear slices through me, adrenaline flooding my veins and bringing another soft whine from Blue. Standing quickly, the adrenaline demanding action, I glance at my phone.

  Robert Maxim.

  He can’t know. My eyes trace to the trash can of the hotel bathroom. Wrap up the test and put it in there.

  But my hand won’t follow the advice. My fingers grip tighter, refusing to release the small wand of plastic. The proof. The truth.

  Grabbing my phone off the counter, I step back into the hotel room. Blue stays close to my hip, his nose tapping my waist once, a gentle reminder he is there.

  I shove the plastic wand into my bag, pushing it into a zipper interior pocket and closing it up. Locking it away.

  Just throw it out.

  I can’t.

  My hand strays to my stomach, and Blue’s nose swipes against my fingers. Vision blurred with tears, I stand in the center of the hotel room, my mind reeling. Lightning sizzles across my vision, and thunder ricochets inside my mind.

  Oh fuck me.

  Robert

  Sydney is not picking up.

  My hold on the phone tightens. I close my eyes and take in a slow, deep breath, relaxing my shoulders and consciously unclenching my hand. The news anchor on the television sounds gleeful as he predicts the devastation of the coming storm.

  South Florida has never seen floods like this before.

  Sydney picked a hell of a week to take some alone time. The mansion on Star Island—an enclave for the richest of the rich in Miami—is hollow without her. Dammit. I never needed company before.

  My three marriages made this house feel overly full—full of clothing and shoes and purses and jewelry. Full of expectations and conversations. They all wanted so much from me.

  I’m not a good husband. I don’t love and cherish; I procure and protect. Each wife understood the deal before the wedding, yet inevitably found me lacking. Cold, inhuman, cruel even.

  My pampered wives never knew cruelty. But they must have understood my capacity for it.

  Sydney isn’t my wife, but she knows me. Really knows me.

  Blue’s puppies, Nila and Frank, whom Sydney left with me because one giant dog is enough hassle for most hotels, shift at the sound of footsteps approaching my office. Nila’s low growl wakes Frank, who rolls over and promptly passes out again. A guard dog he is not.

  A light knock. Must be José, my chef. “Come in.”

  A Cuban immigrant, with a head of hair like Elvis, would envy steps into my home office. “Can I get you anything?” he asks.

  I have no appetite for food but a smile turns my lips. José cares about me—worries like a mother hen. “Some toast, please.” José nods and turns to leave. “Brock told you the evacuation plans?”

  “Yes,” José nods. “I’ll go with the rest of the staff. Is Sydney back yet?”

  My sour mood floods back. “No, I can’t get ahold of her.”

  “You’ll reach her, sir.”

  I wave a hand of dismissal, staring at my computer screen. Glancing at my watch—a gold Rolex I bought back in ’98 when I made my first million—I note the time. If I don’t hear from her in ten, I’ll hunt her down.

  A man can only take so much.

  Sydney

  “A storm is coming,” Robert’s voice is calm, but his words bolt terror through me. He knows. “Miami is under an evacuation order. Traffic will be hell. We’ll take the helicopter. Where are you? I’ll send someone to pick you up.” I don’t respond. “Funny—” He pauses, and I can hear the TV in the background. “They named the hurricane Joy.” My birth name.

  My mother’s face flashes across my mind's eye—thin from her recent injuries, her eyes the same startling gray as mine, lit with a similar fervor.

  Robert sighs. “I’m not trying to cut your solo time short, Sydney. I can’t control the weather.” He sounds disappointed in himself for the shortcoming, and that brings a smile to my lips.

  All-powerful Robert Maxim can’t control the weather. And he hasn’t read my mind. My secret is zipped into a pocket of my bag. The storm is not a metaphor but an actual hurricane bearing down on Florida.

  “I’m at the Jubilee Hotel,” My throat is still raw from the crying I did earlier, and my voice comes out gritty. “I’m surprised you didn’t know that; you’re usually such a stalker control freak.”

  Robert huffs out a laugh. “I’m working on those tendencies.”

  I sit on the edge of the bed, and Blue leans against my leg. “Thanks for calling.” I clear my throat, emotion roughening my voice. “For looking out for me.”

  I’ve never thanked him. Probably because he’s tried to kill me almost as many times as he’s saved me. But still…in his own way Robert Maxim cares. We’ve taken a long and twisted road marred by potholes, fallen trees, and loose electric wires but the journey has cemented a close friendship. We understand each other.

  “You’re welcome.” There is a note of surprise in his voice. He didn’t expect my gratitude. I’m not good at thank yous, or goodbyes…or any of that normal, healthy emotional stuff. “Brock will be there soon.” Robert references his head of home security.

  My next call is Dan. As the phone rings across the thousands of miles between us, I play with one of Blue’
s velvety ears.

  “Hey,” Dan’s voice is thick with sleep. “Everything okay?”

  No! "Sure, sorry if I woke you." I glance at the clock on the side table. It's 2 p.m. here, which means it's 4 a.m. where Dan is, on an island in the middle of the Pacific. It serves as the headquarters for Joyful Justice—the vigilante organization we founded together.

  "No worries." He’s sounding more awake now. Dan is a computer hacker/genius and often keeps strange hours. If he gets sucked into a project, Dan stays up for days at a time.

  “I wanted to check in and see if you had a line on Mulberry…” My voice drifts off into nothingness. Mulberry is another founding member of Joyful Justice and the father of my child. Holy shit.

  Mulberry is avoiding me for some valid reasons—after almost dying while searching for me in ISIS-controlled territory, Mulberry lost part of his leg and a lot of his memories. He didn’t remember me or any of the trauma we’d experienced together. Mulberry reunited with his ex-wife, and I let him. I didn’t fight for him. I should have told him the truth. That I loved him…and he loved me.

  Instead, I tried to let him have a safe and “normal” life. A laugh gurgles in my chest at how ridiculous that sounds even as a thought in my head, let alone as a sentence spoken out loud. When Mulberry’s memories came flooding back, so did a tidal wave of anger…at me. So, yes, he has valid reasons to avoid my calls, but now I’ve got a life-altering bomb to drop on him.

  “He’s still in the wind,” Dan says. “He knows I’m looking for him. Took out a bunch of cash and either isn’t using a phone or has a burner.”

  I chew on my lip, staring at Blue. His eyes are closed, his dark lashes fanned over his white fur, as he luxuriates in the ear petting. “Okay, thanks.”

  “Don’t worry,” Dan says. I hear him shifting in bed, his voice lowering to calm and comfort me. “He’ll turn up.”

  The last time Mulberry and I saw each other. When… my gaze shifts from Blue to my stomach… Mulberry told me he wanted to be a part of Joyful Justice again. But then he ghosted us. And that is difficult to do. “I need to talk to him. Please Dan, find him.”

  “I’ll keep looking.” Dan promises.

  “Thank you.” We hang up, and I watch Blue for another beat before picking myself up. Brock will be here soon. Eventually, I will tell Dan and the rest of the Joyful Justice council that I’m pregnant. But for now I’ve got a city to escape and a secret to keep.

  Chapter Two

  Mulberry

  The bar smells of sawdust, sweat, and spilled beer. I lock the door behind me and call out. I’m the first one here. Glancing at my watch, I see I’m ten minutes early. Rather be early than late.

  My boss, Shirley, cares about punctuality.

  She inherited the place from her father and has run it since he passed back in ’95—dropped dead of a heart attack behind the scarred bar.

  With dyed red hair and a sword piercing a heart tattoo on her left shoulder, Shirley doesn’t take any crap and holds her employees to a high standard. “Doesn’t matter that the bar is a dive and our customers are mostly lowlifes.” She punctuated that statement with a laugh made rough by years of smoking. “I run a tight ship. If you want to work behind my bar, you’ll be on time, you’ll be showered, and you’ll smile. Got it?”

  I do get it. I like working at the bar. I like Shirley, and the lowlifes, and the cash I take home to my rented room each night. I’m anonymous here, a nobody. Not the only guy in the room using a fake name. Tyler Dirk.

  I take chairs off tables, their legs scraping on the scratched wooden floor. The main area put to rights, I check behind the bar, removing the plastic wrap over the bottles and checking what I need to bring up from the basement. We’re low on well whiskey and Bud cans.

  I glimpse myself in the hazy mirror above the booze and pause for a moment to stare at the stranger looking back at me. He looks relaxed. Not happy—too alone for that—but not stressed either. The weight of the world isn’t riding on his shoulders.

  The beard that coats my jaw has flashes of red in it. My sister’s mane of red hair floats across my vision. I should call her.

  My dark hair, sparkling with hints of silver, curls over my ears. It’s grayer than my father’s ever was, even though I’m younger…he died before time could take its full toll. In two years I’ll be the same age he was when he passed. He kept all his limbs. That kind of thing ages a man.

  Shaking my head, clearing it, I continue with setup.

  The barrel of sawdust is out the back door, and I run into Laura, a cocktail waitress, as I step into the late afternoon sunshine. She gives me a yellow-toothed smile and drops her cigarette onto the alley’s broken cement, rubbing it out with the heel of her pink cowboy boot. “Hey, Tyler.”

  “Hey,” I say back, as I take the lid off the barrel, gather a scoop of sawdust and start filling up the two buckets. The briny scent of the Gulf of Mexico barely reaches this spot behind the bar, with its green dumpster and deep shadows, but the beach is only a block and a half away.

  “Should be a good night, tonight,” Laura says, rummaging in her purse for something.

  “Fridays usually are,” I agree.

  Laura pulls out a pack of gum and folds a stick into her mouth. “You busy later?”

  I don’t look up at her, just give a shrug. “I’m usually dead tired after my shift.” Not a total lie but still a falsehood. After work I go home and read old paperbacks and pretend like this is my life. Like it’s all my life has ever been. I spend the hours when I’m not pulling beers and breaking up fights avoiding thinking. I don’t think about Sydney Rye or Joyful Justice or how I lost my damn leg.

  I just want to be Tyler Dirk, bartender and man of mystery.

  “Maybe I could help with that,” Laura offers. I glance up. She pops her gum and winks at me.

  I give her a half smile. “You're too good for me, Laura.” Hefting the buckets now filled with sawdust, I head back into the bar, my leg aching as I take the two steps into the dark space. Laura follows, the scent of cigarettes wafting off her and mixing with the sawdust.

  The air conditioner kicks on with a hum, and a cold breeze hits the back of my neck. I spread the sawdust over the floor, throwing it in arcs and then spreading it around with my feet. The front door opens, letting in a flare of orange light from the setting sun. Shirley lets it slam shut behind her, not bothering to lock up. We open in five anyway.

  “Tyler,” she says in greeting. I nod. Shirley sashays to the bar, and I finish laying the fresh sawdust. “We need well whiskey and Buds,” she says.

  “Yup. Going to grab them now.” I put the buckets back in their spot by the door and head to the basement steps. They’re made of plywood and wheeze under my weight. I duck to avoid cracking my head on one of the exposed rafters.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket as I’m about to pick up a case of Budweiser. It’s a flip phone, a burner, so should be untraceable, but nothing is untraceable for Dan. He and Shirley are the only ones who have the number.

  “Hey,” I say, straightening between two of the beams. “What’s up?”

  “Just checking in,” Dan says.

  “Liar,” I smile.

  Dan lets out a short laugh. “Sydney asked about you again. She’s worried.”

  Serves her right. I run my free hand through my hair and rub the back of my neck. “I’m just not ready to see her yet.” I’ll end up kissing her again—falling into her again. It’s impossible to stay mad at her when she’s right in front of me, looking at me with those eyes of hers, and saying things…sweet, dreamy things I shouldn’t believe.

  “That’s fine, but at least call her, okay?” I don’t answer, just stare down at the dusty floor and my scuffed-up work boots. In long pants you can’t tell one of my feet is false. “Mulberry?”

  “Sorry,” I take a deep breath. “I just don’t think I’m ready; I can’t forgive her yet.”

  “You don’t have to forgive her to talk to her…”
br />   “I’ll think about it, okay?”

  “That’s fine. But I won’t keep lying for you. One more week then I’m giving her your number.”

  “Got it.”

  “Good.”

  We hang up, and I put the phone back in my pocket, hefting the case of beer up the steps. I’m shoving the beer into the ice when the front door opens and our first customer of the night steps in. I put on a smile. At least for now I’m still Tyler Dirk. Just a bartender. Nothing more.

  And I can always get a new burner phone…

  Sydney

  Brock takes me directly to the helipad. Robert is standing next to the machine, waiting for me, his gray suit jacket—the same shiny hue as the glinting clouds behind him—flapping in the breeze. Nila and Frank sit beside him, their fur fluttering in the wind. The bay behind them is white capped and angry looking. A storm is coming.

  Frank lets out a happy yelp when he spots me, while Nila’s tail taps rhythmically against the ground. I release Blue with a small hand gesture, and he trots over to his puppies, greeting them with head nuzzles and playful bites. Frank rolls onto his back, feet in the air, instantly surrendering…an alpha he is not.

  Robert’s matte black sunglasses hide his eyes. I want to see them. “We should go,” he says, glancing over his shoulder at the waiting helicopter. “My plane is waiting. I want to get out now. Everybody is leaving the city.”