97. Chapter Twenty-Eight
Carrie
Chapter ninety-seven
Reid
The past that he can never escape…
“I love you.”
Those words stop me in my tracks, which in this case is on a sidewalk on my way back to my apartment after leaving a dorm party early so I could study. I pull Kelly in front of me. “What?”
“I love you. I just thought you should know.”
“We need to talk, Kelly,” I say, because yeah, she’s a pretty redhead with a heart of gold, but she’s not my woman. She’s not the woman for me She’s a person I fuck and that line is it for me. “I told you what this is. It’s college fucking.”
“I know,” she says, pushing to her toes to kiss me. “I need a soda to take back to your apartment.” She darts away and into the store to my right.
I scrub my face and grimace. Fuck. This has to end tonight. I’m not in love with her. I’ll never be in love with her and I hate what that means. I’m going to hurt her. I’m going to cut her and deep.
I follow her into the store and she’s already walking toward me. “I got you one too,” she says, holding up her hands with a soda in each.
I stare at her and damn, she’s beautiful and sweet and I should be in love with her, but I’m just not wired that way. I’m not in that place in my life or maybe just with her.
The door opens behind me and Kelly’s eyes go wide, terror on her face. I whirl around and find a guy in a ski mask, holding a sawed-off shotgun he’s waving between me and the kid behind the counter. And he is a kid, a few years younger than me. I take a step toward the asshole and he does just what I want. He points the gun at me and me alone. “Hands up or I’ll shoot!” he shouts.
“Give me the gun,” I order.
“Back off, dude,” the masked man orders. “Or I will shoot you.”
I stare into his eyes, seeing the panic in them and I believe him. He’s going to shoot, and if it’s not me, it’s the kid behind the counter. “I’m not going to let you hurt anyone else,” I warn. “So either leave or shoot me.”
“Hi,” Kelly says, jumping to my side. “Hi. Please don’t hurt anyone.” She darts forward, right in front of me. My heart lurches and I grab her arm to shove her behind me, stepping toward the gunman.
I release her and he shouts, “Back off now! Get me the money. Get it now, now, now!” He looks toward the guy at the register and the gun swings back my direction and everything goes into slow motion.
Kelly darts in front of me again and a moment later, she’s on the ground and I’m staring down at her blood pooling around her body. The gunman rushes for the door and I kneel next to Kelly, my heart in my throat. “Kelly,” I breathe out. “Kelly. Damn it.”
Her mouth is open and she’s trying to speak, but can’t. “Don’t try to talk,” I say, applying pressure to the wound in her chest. “Get an ambulance! I need an ambulance.”
Kelly starts to convulse and I know even before it happens what that means. She jerks and then goes still, her eyes no longer blinking. Sirens sound and the kid behind the counter appears and kneels beside me. “What can I do?”
“Hold pressure on the wound,” I say, and the minute he takes over, I try mouth to mouth, damn glad my mother made me learn it. I breathe into her mouth and keep trying but I know she’s gone. I know she’s not coming back but I have to try. I have to try and I do. Over and over and over again until someone is grabbing me and pulling me off of her.
“No,” I shout. “No, I have to save her.”
The next thing I remember, I’m sitting on the back of an EMS vehicle with a blanket around me and I’m staring at the blood drenching my shirt. Kelly is dead. I killed her. I repeat this in my mind over and over and somehow I’m dialing my father. “Something happened,” I say when he answers.
“What happened?”
“The store I was in was robbed. My girlfriend threw herself in front of me to save me from a bullet. She’s dead.”
“Go home. Stay there until I get there and tell no one.”
“What? Why? I don’t understand.”
“You’re going to look like the weak asshole who let a woman take a bullet for him. That’s unacceptable. You’re changing schools. You’re leaving tonight. I’ll call you back.” He hangs up.
“Fuck you, dad,” I growl, not about to leave before Kelly’s funeral. I’m staying. I killed her. I am the weak asshole who let her die. I’m facing the hate that comes with that because I deserve it.
Present day, thirty minutes before she showed up at Gabe’s door with Reid’s father…
I’m pacing the living room, worried about what Reid is doing right now. I dial Cat because I need to talk, but then I realize she’s pregnant. I can’t worry her and what if this sets her up for danger, too? Oh God. What if she’s already in danger? I want to call Reid. I can’t stop myself. I dial his number but he doesn’t answer. I press my hand to my head. Where would he go if not to Elijah’s place? The office? Gabe’s? Yes. Gabe’s. I think he went to Gabe’s. I rush to the bedroom, grab my purse and pull on a coat with the intent of going to Gabe’s place when my phone rings.
I answer without checking the number. “Carrie.”
“Dad?”
“Yes, why do you sound so stressed? Did Reid upset you?”
“No. Yes. No.” I press my hand to my face. “He’s trying to protect me at all costs. I’m worried about him. I need—”
“Protect you from what?”
“It’s a long story. Someone who hates him came after me today.”
“Elijah?”
My eyes go wide. “What do you know about Elijah?”
“He came to me when Reid took over the company. He wanted me to partner with him to destroy Reid and hand me the reins for the company again, but you already know that’s not what I wanted. And even if I did, I wouldn’t have partnered with Elijah. Personal vendettas like ‘he fucked my wife’ are dangerous and I had enough of that with Reid’s father.”
“He didn’t know who she was. She used him to rattle Elijah, and don’t tell me I’m a fool to believe that. It’s true.”
“I’m not going to debate the right and wrong of Reid Maxwell. That aside, Elijah struck me as erratic. His own board questions his stability. And what do you mean he came after you?”
“Followed me and confronted me about Reid’s action. He even grabbed me. Reid’s losing his mind. He wanted to go to him and hurt him but Walker Security, the team we use for investigative work, stopped him. They’re trying to figure out what triggered this sudden anger. They think he’s perhaps unstable, which means nothing Reid would do to him professionally to shut him down will work.”
“If Reid feels his hands are tied, that worries me. Let me make some calls.”
“Don’t do anything. Don’t set anything in motion.”
“I won’t. I’ll call you and Reid to coordinate. You have my word.”
“You’d call Reid?”
“To protect my daughter, yes. I love you, honey. I hate I’ve made you think differently. I’ll call you soon.” He hangs up and I don’t give myself time to analyze the emotion balling in my chest at his offer of support. I head for the door and dial Royce. “I’m going out. Is someone coming with me or just following me or what?”
“Savage will meet you at the door.”
“I’m going to Gabe’s,” I say. “Is Reid there?”
“Yes, but you didn’t hear that from me.”
“Thank you because I really think he needs me to ground him right now.”
“Agreed,” Royce says, “and it was all I could do not to call you, but he would have killed me.” We disconnect and I step into the elevator. I want to feel relief that he’s with Gabe, but Gabe is just as fucked up as Reid. I’ve seen that in his eyes. For all I know, he’ll push him to take destructive actions.
I arrive in the lobby and Savage steps to my side the minute I’m outside the building in the cold. “He’s going to do something he regrets later,” I say. “I feel it in my bones.” He meets my stare and nods and that’s all we say. We start jogging our way to Gabe’s place, the cold biting to my skin, but I don’t care. I need to be with Reid. He needs me to be with him for the very reason that he wants me to stay away: he can’t make a decision on Elijah driven by the past. He wants to throw himself or Elijah in front of a bullet so I won’t take it. I know he does.
We reach Gabe’s building and the minute we’re in the lobby, we’re confronted by the last person I want to see right now: Reid’s father. “What are you doing here?”
“There’s trouble in the air for my son,” he says. “And for you. Let’s go upstairs and talk about how to save him.”
“What trouble?”
“I’ll discuss that with my son, but you are a problem. You’re his weakness and you’re already being used against him. I don’t like it.” He turns and starts walking toward the elevator.
“I’m riding up with you,” Savage says. “I’ll stay in the hallway once we’re upstairs but you’re not going anywhere alone with that man.”
No, I think, I don’t want to be alone with Reid’s father, but if he can help Reid, I’ll get on that elevator with him.