Chapter 18 – CARTER
18
CARTER
G ray clouds filling a navy sky.
The full moon peeking out from behind them.
The dark ocean creeping in. Creeping out.
I sat back in my office chair, staring at Anna’s photograph. Even after years of examining it, I was still able to find new depths to it. New meanings. For years, all I had was this photo and my memories. I examined them constantly, looking for any angle I could have missed, like I could find proof that I would see her again.
When Anna came back to my life, she was infinitely more complex than those memories. She had survived so much, and it made her stronger, but more wary. Some of her innocence had faded, but none of her goodness.
She fascinated me more than ever. Even though so much changed, she was still mine . The link between us had never broken. But she would need to learn to trust me with more than her body.
I needed her to trust me like she used to. Before everything was ruined.
I had changed her perception of me, so she could still think of me as some kind of hero.
My thoughts were interrupted by my cell ringing. I frowned when I saw Derek Hobbes’ name on the caller ID. There was only an hour until midnight. He’d never called me outside of business hours before.
“Yes?” I said, picking up the phone.
On the other line, Hobbes took a long breath. “I’m sorry for the late call, Carter. Unfortunately, I’ve spoken with my family, and we decided we don’t want to sell. I wanted to let you know personally.”
Acid churned in my stomach. My purchase of Hobbes Construction was supposed to be all but complete.
“Care to explain why?”
“You offered a very good deal,” Hobbes said, coughing to cover the wobble in his voice. “But I heard from an old friend who advised me strongly against it. I had no choice but to listen.”
My focus narrowed to those two words. No choice . Sounded like Hobbes’ “old friend” gave him more than advice. I had a suspicion I knew who he was.
It was only a matter of time until he found out where his precious daughter was spending her time. Just like he’d figured it out last time.
“That’s a shame. Does this ‘friend’ have a name?”
Hobbes was silent for a long beat. “I just can’t do it, Carter,” he said finally. “Please understand. If it were up to me, I’d sell it to you. All I want is to retire.”
My teeth ground together. This had Hudson Vaugn’s fingerprints all over it. Of course, a little coward like Hobbes would bow to the governor. Normally, I’d lean on Hobbes until he collapsed. I didn’t let anybody run my business for me, much less Hudson fucking Vaughn. But now, there were more important pieces in play.
Like Anna.
If Hudson Vaughn was declaring war, I wouldn’t waste energy on Hobbes.
“That’s unfortunate. Call me when you find your balls, Hobbes. I’ll be waiting.”
Then I hung up on him, ending the conversation there.
I sighed, gazing up at Anna’s photograph on my office wall. I closed my eyes and pictured a full moon, searching for some meager sense of serenity. Hudson had already ruined my life once, and apparently he wasn’t finished meddling in it.
There were few fucks to give about the failing construction company, but if he intended to brake check every one of my campaigns, I’d be too busy putting out fires to spend all my time between his daughter’s thighs.
Except, I learned early on that everything I had could be taken away at a moment’s notice. I invested early and I invested young. I could live off those investment portfolios and offshore accounts comfortably for the rest of my life. There were billions there, tucked safely away from any legal bullshit Hudson Vaughn could sling my way.
Any, save for one vital piece of evidence he could use against me. But would it even hold up after all this time? And did he even have the balls to use it?
He had to know I’d retaliate. I wouldn’t go down unless I took him with me.
I wouldn’t leave Anna in his hands.
I was interrupted when my phone rang again.
The number wasn’t saved. I frowned, my thumb hovering over the red decline icon. I had more than one phone number, obviously, and this one only went out to my close associates and home staff.
Curiosity nagged at me.
Could it be…
I hit the button and brought the phone to my ear, saying nothing, waiting.
“Stay away from her,” said a deep, gruff voice.
No preamble, no greeting, nothing.
A man with a plan.
Focused .
If it were anyone else, I could respect it. I didn’t though. I didn’t respect anything about Hudson Vaughn.
“Who gave you this number, old man?”
His steely baritone used to scare me half to death when I was still nothing more than a kid, barely twenty.
We didn’t speak more than a handful of times, but the short conversations we had were immortalized in my memory. Seared into my mind so well, he might as well have used a hot fireplace poker like my old man used to.
The message was the same, just with a different purpose.
Worthless.
Pathetic.
A waste of skin.
A quick chill ran over me. Anna’s ex might’ve left physical bruises on my girl, but Hudson had hurt her, too. He cared too much about appearances to mark her on the outside, but I knew she had just as many scars as I had. Different ones. The kind that made it feel impossible to just to exist. Made even breathing a chore.
“Leave her alone,” Hudson repeated. I tipped my head back, in the mood for a little fun.
I licked my lips. “No. I don’t think I will.”
He balked.
“Excuse me?”
“I said ‘no.’”
I heard movement. Scraping, like the sound of a chair across the floor. Hudson Vaughn standing to his full height.
“Did you forget, boy? That money you took came with strings.”
“So you weren’t just trying to help an underprivileged youth pay for his ma’s hospital bills?”
“Leave. Her. Alone.”
“ No .”
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” he snarled.
I was getting under his skin. It was surprisingly thin for a politician. With that job, you would think he was comfortable with a little ribbing.
“Ask Anna who I am. She knows better than anyone.”
“You’re a dirty, worthless piece of trash just like your father. You wouldn’t be able to so much as walk past that building you work in without being arrested if it wasn’t for my help.”
He might as well have taken that line right out of the Frank Cole playbook.
When I was a dirty, worthless piece of trash who wouldn’t be welcome to clean the floors of the building I worked in, maybe his words would have hit different.
I wasn’t a broke, desperate kid with a sick mother, scared that I’d be homeless the next month. He wasn’t as powerful as he thought anymore, not over me and not over his daughter.
“If you’re done, I’m sure both of us have better things to do tonight,” I said. “I can think of at least one on my end.”
A low sound almost like a growl came down the line, and I wondered why he made it so fucking easy to find just the right buttons. The man, for all his success, had a lot to learn with this sort of business.
“I know what you said to her. Why do you think she’ll give you a chance? You broke her heart. I saw her when she came home, Carter. Do you really think she’ll forgive you?”
My teeth ground together. Cold snaked around my neck. What did he know? She wasn’t close to him. She wouldn’t come crying to him about what happened between us. I swayed, losing my footing in the ring.
“Why don’t you ask her, Vaughn? This time, she might even tell you the truth.”
“You will leave my daughter alone or I’ll?—”
“You’ll what? Tell the police what I did six fucking years ago? ” I scoffed. “I have every judge up the entire mother fucking coast in my back pocket.”
“No,” he replied, dripping venom. “I’ll tell her. I’ll tell Anna.”
My blood practically froze in my veins.
Anna was smart enough to know what I was capable of, and strong enough to bear knowing it. But seeing it would be different.
She hadn’t wanted to see what I did to Jaden, but she seemed fine enough knowing— accepting —that I hurt him. Killed him, actually. The cleanup crew got rid of the evidence and made it look like he skipped town, running scared.
I hadn’t told Anna that he was dead. I was happy to let her believe what Jaden’s closest clients and friends whispered to the tabloids. She didn’t need to know.
Knowing might change her perception of me and we’d already come so far.
Seeing.
Seeing could destroy everything. And Hudson could make her see.
I couldn’t take that chance.
“So? Will you be a good dog and keep your distance? Stay away from her until I get her engaged, and I’ll have Hobbes sell you his company. Plus a $10 million bonus for every year before she’s got the ring on her finger and a baby in her belly.”
The metal case on my phone groaned as my grip tightened on it, my head filling with steam so hard to see through all I could think of was reaching through the phone and strangling Hudson Vaughn where he stood until his windpipe snapped under my thumbs.
I wanted to tell him to fuck off. No amount of money on earth could make me stay away from my girl. Not this time.
$10 million was a laughable nothing to me. And now that I knew about his feeble revenge plans, I could shut him down before he sabotaged every business arrangement I had.
But he still held the trump card.
Anna couldn’t know what I did to my father.
She wasn’t ready for that part of me, yet. It would ruin everything, and I’d already done enough of that.
As much as I loathed letting Hudson Vaugn think he won, I had to buy time to convince Anna to trust me again.
So I said nothing.
Hudson laughed. “That’s what I thought. Even after all these years, you can still be bought.”
Before he could say anything else, I hung up.
My fingertips felt numb, all the blood in my body collecting into this ball of white hot rage in my chest that made it hard to breathe. Fuck. I could drown in it.
I staggered to the window, throwing it open. The moon was nothing but a sliver slit in the sky tonight, but feeling its light on my face and inhaling the salt breeze into my lungs, I sighed.
I’d find a way.
We would always find a way.