I jab an elbow into his gut before his words sink into my brain. I’m still fighting him like a wild thing when I finally comprehend what he’s repeating over and over.
Rafe is alive. He’s alive. I swear.
“What?” The single word comes out on a ragged breath as his hold loosens.
“He’s alive. I swear to God,” Kane says. “It was all—”
I spin in the circle of his arms as disbelief wars with soul-burning rage. Kane’s icy blue gaze blazes with tortured agony that matches the emotions fueling my wrath. Drip by drip, a fraction of the pain drains away, and my brain spins in a completely new direction.
“You played me?” I stare at him like he told me they were both abducted by aliens. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“It was the only way.”
The admission might as well be a Golden Glove boxer’s combo that knocks me on my ass. I barely stay upright as reality pummels me.
They’re alive.
Both of them.
Rafe is okay.
Kane isn’t dead.
As much as I want to believe every single word of what he’s saying to the very depths of my soul, I’m done living on faith. I’m done trusting blindly.
“I don’t believe you.”
“I swear on—”
Slowly, coldly, I repeat, “I don’t care what you swear on. I don’t believe you.”
A flash of something flickers over Kane’s face. I could swear it’s pain, but I don’t care right now. It’s not even a fraction of the torment I’ve been living with the past month.
His jaw ticks as he watches me. “Temperance, please—”
I want to believe him. I want to believe him more than I want to take my next breath, but I can’t be stupid. I can’t be naive.I can’t trust him again so easily.
“You lied to me! Why should I believe a goddamn thing you say? I want proof. Proof of life. Proof that this isn’t just one more elaborate scheme to get me to trust you so you can make a half-million dollars by putting a bullet in the only family I have left.”
Kane’s expression goes blank, then he pulls out a phone and enters a passcode before dialing a number. He taps the command for the call to go to speaker as soon as it starts ringing.
I wait with the most excruciating hope as it rings four times. Just before I give up hope, he answers.
“What the fuck you need? I’m busy.”
“Rafe?” My voice shakes as I say my brother’s name.
“Saxon? What the fuck?” It’s my brother’s voice, his tone sharp, but my faith in believing what I see and hear is shattered.
“I made an executive decision. Your sister needs to know you’re okay.”
Rafe curses before he replies. “Tempe? That you?”
“Yes,” I whisper. I rack my brain to think of a question to ask him that no one else would know the answer to, but Rafe’s tone changes.
“I didn’t want you to find out this way. Saxon shouldn’t have—”
I interrupt him. “How old was I the first time I ate catfish?”