“Maybe I should talk to Salem.” Royal’s voice stayed steady and low but her words shook like an earthquake through my entire being.

My heart sank and my fingers curled around Salem’s hands reflexively. “I’ll just put you on speaker.”

“Okay.” She waited a second as I moved the phone away from my ear and held it between me and my girl after switching on the speaker.

“Go ahead, Royal.”

She sighed over the line and I heard sirens and commotion in the background. “First of all, Poppy is all right. She’s in an ambulance on the way to a hospital in Albuquerque.”

Salem made a noise and fell forward so that her forehead was resting on my shoulder. “Thank God.”

“Yeah. The State Patrol picked up on the alert for the car her husband was driving after he had already crossed the state border. It looks like he was headed back to Texas with her.”

“Figures.” I was relieved, but there was something about the way Royal was talking, the distant, professionally smooth recounting of events, that was off-putting. I could literally feel the other shoe waiting to drop.

“Umm . . . Poppy was in pretty bad shape when the cops finally got to her. I don’t know what the extent of the injuries is but I know it isn’t good.” I could tell she was glossing it over for Salem’s sake. Fat tears were glittering on Salem’s black lashes and I could tell she was reading between the lines as well.

“What else, Royal? Just lay it all out so we can work on getting to New Mexico as soon as possible.”

She sighed again and finally her cop persona cracked just a little. Her voice quivered just a little bit and there was just enough of a thread of emotion in it to turn her from her professional role into a friend.

“The husband didn’t go easily. The cops cornered him at a rest stop after a forty-five-minute car chase. He still had the gun.” She paused for a second and I froze as Salem’s nails dug into my skin hard enough to break the skin. “There was a standoff.”

“Shit.” It just slipped out but Salem nodded. It was like listening to our worst fears being played out.

“Yeah. He had the gun to Poppy’s head. He threatened to shoot her, threatened to shoot himself. The State Patrol called in a critical response team to negotiate the hostage situation. It’ll be all over the news within the next hour, I’m sure.”

Salem shook her head numbly back and forth like she could deny any of this had happened to her little sister.

“At the end of the day the SWAT team took preventative measures to mitigate the threat.”

Salem let go of her death grip on me and got to her feet. She looked exhausted and fragile, but as always there was that core of strength in her that just wouldn’t bend.

“What happened, Royal?”

“Oliver Martinez is dead.”

I let out a deep breath and shared a solemn look with Salem. “Good.”

“Yeah, well, at the end the hostage was rescued . . . but, Rowdy . . .” Her voice faded out and she had to clear her throat. “That poor girl went through hell. She had to witness someone she was married to die right in front of her. It doesn’t matter how much he might’ve hurt her, or how awful he was . . . that changes a person. She isn’t going to be the same after this experience.”

I pulled Salem to my chest in a one-armed hug as the tears finally escaped the trap of her feathery lashes. “Of course not, but we’ll take care of her and help her heal. It’s what this family does.”

“I know. She’s lucky to be part of the fold.”

“Thank you for the update, Royal.”

“Sure. If you need anything else let me know. I’ll text you the info I have for where they are taking her.”

Salem mumbled a thank-you that was lost in the fabric of my shirt as I ended the call and used both arms to squeeze her to me as tightly as I could.

“She’ll be okay. Poppy is a Cruz and you girls are fighters.”

She wrapped her arms around my waist and laid her cheek on the spot in my chest where my heart was thudding erratically from adrenaline and relief.

“Yeah, but a lifetime of fighting gets old after a while.” She pulled back and looked up at me, and I could see it, feel it, and smell it in the air. The storm had hit land and she was ready to level everything in her path. “It’s time for a knockout once and for all.”

All I could do was shrug my agreement. “Let’s go take care of your sister first.”

She moved away from me with a nod. “I love you and I love that you know what I have to do and aren’t freaking out about it.”

I was already on my phone looking at flights out of DIA to Albuquerque. Luckily it was a short flight and wouldn’t take us too long to get to Poppy’s side. I looked up from the screen and gave Salem a half grin.

“You’ll always have a little bit of gypsy in you, Salem. As long as you return to me, I’m willing to let you go wherever it is you want to go. I’ll be right here when you get back.”

I saw her bottom lip tremble at my words, and before I could hit send on the ridiculously expensive last-minute flight, she launched herself back at me and I had my arms full of quivering, shaking female. She grabbed my face in both of her hands and kissed me in a way that had forever laced all the way through it.

“Gypsies can see the future in their crystal ball, Rowdy. Do you wanna guess what I see in mine?”

“Us?”

She laughed just a little and kissed me again. “Definitely us. I’m gonna grab some stuff to take to Poppy and we need to figure out what to do with Jimbo since we’re both going and have no idea how long we’re going to be gone for.”

I had a plethora of people that I knew for a fact would ride to the rescue to help me out with the dog, but for some reason the first person I put a call in to was Sayer and it didn’t have anything to do with the fact she had a giant backyard.

Sayer, of course, told me she was dropping everything and headed over to get the dog. She was also genuinely overjoyed that Poppy was all right, but took a minute to quietly tell me that she had the names of several victims’ counselors that she could refer Poppy to when the time was right. Sayer was good people and remarkably understanding. The more I talked to her, the more that I let her in, the more I realized how proud I was to have the same blood as her running through my veins. I was happy that she wanted me to be part of her family and I was looking forward to introducing her to the rest of mine.