Chapter 15
The water came down hot from the rain showerhead mounted above the outdoor stall, washing the last of the bloodstained water down the slatted teak floor and into the drain below.
Flowering hibiscus and heliconia crowded the bathing area, shielding it from view while leaving the night sky exposed above her.
Remi turned her face into the spray and let it hit her full-on, needling against her closed eyelids, her cheeks, her throat.
She’d turned the handle all the way to the left.
The water was hot enough to sting. She needed it that way.
She needed an anchor to the present. She’d been a prisoner in her mind as she went through the motions, racing down from The Bluffs and easing into the semi-submersible waiting on the rocky shore to be whisked away to a place she didn’t know.
She trusted Everett to keep her safe as her mind kept dragging her back to what she’d done tonight.
Turning her back to the water, she wiped her eyes and stared up into the black sky. The stars blurred, and the breadfruit tree rose in her mind as if she were standing beneath it again.
She’d reached for the machete, tugging gently to loosen it from the packed dirt.
She hadn’t thought about it. Hadn’t planned it.
Her hand had simply found the grip in the dark, her fingers curling around the worn handle as if her body had already decided what her mind hadn’t caught up to yet.
The blade was heavy, darkened with sap, and gritty from the soil.
She’d straightened as a decision settled within her. One she couldn’t come back from.
Because she couldn’t erase what she’d heard.
The truth about Bobby that changed everything in an instant.
She didn’t remember walking into the living room.
The next memory was fragmented, broken.
But she could see Bobby clearly.
He was hunched over the low coffee table, fingers tapping feverishly on the keyboard of his laptop. A duffel bag lay near his feet, clothes, shoes, and toiletries inside.
A leather folio lay open, revealing multiple passports, all bearing his photo and undoubtedly a slew of different aliases. Next to it was a thick stack of banded bills.
This was the real man she’d married.
How stupid she’d been, falling for all his lies.
She tightened her grip on the machete and crossed the room without making a sound.
“Going somewhere?” she’d asked, her voice low and tense.
He jumped at the sound of her voice, looking up at her. His gaze left her face for a brief moment, resting on the passports and the money. A cunning shadow moved across his face in real time. Had he always done that, and she’d been too wrapped up in her issues to notice?
Bobby closed the laptop, then stood and faced her. “I have to leave town. Tonight.”
She stared at him.
“I won’t be gone long,” he said, running a hand through his hair. Sweat beaded across his face despite the chill from the air conditioning. His clothes were wrinkled, his collar crooked, and his shirt half-tucked. “Just a quick trip to Miami?—”
“Don’t. Do not lie to me. Again. Don’t do it.”
His eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”
“You expect me to believe that this sudden need to leave has nothing to do with the Marengos being in our home?” she asked. “Two of the most dangerous men in the PC-5 were here talking to you. Why is that, Bobby?”
He opened his mouth, probably to lie, but then stopped cold when his gaze dropped to her hand. The machete was clenched in her fist, hanging at her side. His expression shifted, calculation giving way to something sharper.
“You heard everything, didn’t you?” he asked. “You know I’m a dead man if I don’t get out of here tonight. It’s not something that I ever wanted, Remi. I don’t want to leave you. But I don’t have the same protection that you do. If I don’t go, they will kill me. You understand, don’t you?”
“Yes, I understand that.” She lifted the machete with ease, touching the edge of the blade with her finger. “But I want to talk about some things I don’t understand.”
His gaze flicked from the blade to her face and back again.
“Let’s talk about how you lied to me over and over again when you said you’d left the cartel life behind. You promised me that you weren’t involved with the PC-5 anymore. You knew how important it was to my family and to me that we had no ties with them!”
“I do a few side jobs, but that’s it?—”
“Side jobs do not get you on the damn death list, Bobby!” She screamed, pointing the machete at him. “Don’t forget, I am the daughter of Mr. Goodnight. I know what the death list means.”
“Fine. I’m in the island gang. I never left, and now they want to kill me,” he said, a bitter laugh scraping out of him. “Guess the joke is on me. If I hadn’t been a liar, I might not be a dead man walking right now.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you. That’s the least of your … crimes … against me.” She stepped closer, staring him in the eyes. “I know what you did in Jamaica.”
Bobby’s face blanched. He turned away, pressing both hands against the back of his head. His breaths grew heavy and ragged.
“I was seven months pregnant with Everett’s baby.
You knew that, and you blew his cover anyway.
You put a target on his back. You put one on mine, too.
” She inhaled a shaky breath. She’d been desperate to get to the safehouse.
The yearning to tell Everett he was going to be a father before months or years of more undercover work stretched between them.
She thought she was doing something good.
Something right. “It’s because of you that those thugs found me.
That they beat me. That they cut my unborn child from me.
They left me to die. That is your fault! ”
He turned to face her, fully absorbing her accusations with not a single shred of denial. The grief on his face was real. She didn’t doubt it. It made her hate him more.
“I didn’t know you were there,” he said. “Remi. I swear to you, I did not know you were there.”
“That’s not the worst thing you did. After you destroyed my life, you swooped in like some kind of knight in shining armor.
Like it was a miracle that you knew where I was and needed help.
You found me. You held my hand through the months of grief and pain and surgeries and missing the man I loved. ”
The truth was destroying every memory she had of him.
“I was so grateful that you were there with me. One of my closest friends helping me through the darkest moments of my life. Especially after Everett couldn’t be with me anymore.”
“I did everything I could for you after …” His voice cracked. “I wanted to be the one to help you get back what you lost. I wanted to be there for you?—”
“You fucking married me knowing that you caused every heinous thing that happened to me!” Remi screamed at him, lunging with the machete. She pressed it against his stomach.
Bobby didn’t flinch. He didn’t move the blade.
“I know it was my fault you lost everything you ever wanted. I never meant for you to get hurt. I love you, Remi. I always have,” Bobby said. “You have to believe me. I’d never knowingly hurt you?—”
“You lying bastard. You didn’t think setting the man I love, the father of my child, directly in the path to be killed would hurt me?”
Bobby went still. His jaw clenched.
“Are you stupid? Or do you think I am?”
His blue eyes went flat, turning ice-cold as he refused to look at her.
She waited a long moment before asking the question she needed answered the most.
“Why did you do it?”
Bobby grabbed her wrist, squeezing hard.
She winced from the unexpected pain.
He jerked her toward him, his face mere inches from hers.
“Because Everett has fucking everything,” Bobby said through gritted teeth, spittle shining at the corner of his mouth as years of resentment broke loose.
“Everything!” He snaked an arm around her waist, pulling her against his body.
His breath was hot on her cheek. “I wasn’t going to let him have you, too. ”
For the first time, she understood everything. Bobby’s betrayal was mired in a hatred he’d carried for so long that it had become part of him. He hated Everett so much that he wanted him to die. And he was willing to do whatever it took to make that happen.
Her scream was feral as she pushed away from him and swung the machete?—
The shower sputtered, then cold water doused Remi’s skin. She yelped, then sidestepped out of the stream.
She turned off the taps.
Stepping into the crisp night air, she reached for the towel and dried off without looking at herself.
She never did. Reaching for the clothes resting on the bench between the overgrown hibiscus and heliconia bushes, she slipped into the oversized T-shirt and pajama pants, both unmistakably Everett’s.
Everett.
She wasn’t ready to face him.
Or his questions.
But she couldn’t avoid him any longer.
He deserved to know the truth.
She hoped she was strong enough to tell him.