Page 20 of Sparrow

Arden Rossi.

Arden fucking Rossi.

But it doesn’t matter how many times I repeat her name, because this doesn’t make any fucking sense. I saw the girl at Thanksgiving and she was entering her last year at NYU and full of dreams about what she was going to do with a business degree. She’d talked my ear off about her plans, and I had the idea then that she was desperate for someone to actually listen to.

I’d watched as her father approached us mid-conversation, his expression one of barely contained rage. And then I’d watched as Arden shrunk further into herself with every one of his steps, disappearing piece by piece, her voice growing quieter and more tentative. By the time he drew to an impatient stop in front of us and told us dinner was ready, she was nothing more than a blank slate.

Nothing that anyone would pay attention to–and, I suspected, nothing her father could get angry about.

And now here she is in Hawke’s Wood, brought by what can only be a kidnapping plot, with only one guard and a suspiciously deserted clubhouse that’s generally full of bikers.

I don’t know how long they’ve had her or what they’ve tried to do with her, but I know who her father is, and the girl is worth money. She should have been held for ransom, at worst, while he was given a set of numbers.

She shouldn’t have been taken out of the city at all.

But this fragile, hollow-eyed girl isn’t the one I saw in November, and it’s not a reach to guess that they’ve had her for more than a couple days.

Which means Roberto Rossi either didn’t get a ransom note... or didn’t pay the amount they were asking for.

My hands clench in anger at the thought, and I nearly stop and put my fist through the fucking wall. How the fuck could that be? How could you have someone like Arden in your life–your fucking daughter!–and refuse to do everything in your power to get her back if someone took her? How could you receive a ransom demand and just not act on it?

But there’s no other answer.

Well, there is. But I refuse to look at it. Because it would mean picturing Arden in a situation that no girl or boy should ever be put in, and I don’t know if my heart could stand it.

I don’t know if my heart can stand her presence at all.

Because the kidnapping is only the first piece of the puzzle. The second is the effect she’s already having on me. The girl has always been beautiful in a vague, sunshiny way, her features matching the pixies I’ve always imagined in the forest.

But she’s also always been tethered to my sister, and her family, and I’ve only ever seen her in that environment.

Now she’s suddenly in my house, no parents attached, and she’s...

Otherworldly in her beauty. Delicate and tiny and fine-boned and in need of a hero. She looks haunted and traumatized, but I can see strength there, too–a strength I’ve never noticed in her before.

And ye gods, the change in her is doing something to me.

I clench my hands again, but this time it’s not out of anger. It’s the memory of her skin under my fingers when I put her on my bike. The pressure of her legs around me. The heat of her pressed against my back as we rode home.

I gasp out loud at the shock that runs through my body, and then turn and rush down the stairs. I have to get outside into the air, where I can fucking breathe. Get to a quiet space where I can think with a clear head.

Get out of the house where Arden is even now getting undressed to climb into a bed that I made up this morning with my own hands.

“What’s the deal with the girl?” Orion asks the moment I get to the main floor.

Gods, I do not want this conversation right now, when the girl in question has me unsteady on my feet and questioning my whole moral code. But I know Orion.

If he has a question, he won’t rest until he gets an answer.

“She’s going to sleep,” I say, sidestepping his question. “Had a long day, and I’m guessing an even longer couple of months.”

He presses his lips together like he’s rethinking his original opinion, and I nearly step past him, anxious to be done with this. But he puts his hand out and stops me when I try.

“She’s not going to be safe here.”

I want to scoff at this, but I know he’s right. Still, I can’t give in to him. “You don’t know that.”

When he meets my eyes, his are nearly black with concern. “I do, and so do you. She’s obviously in some kind of trouble. She was locked up in one of the cottages on the Saints’ property, with a guard. And I’m guessing she didn’t rent the place out for a vacation. Someone brought her here and locked her up, and when they figure out she’s gone, they’re gonna have a problem with it.”