48. Chapter 47
Chapter 47
Layne
The thought of Keaton going to Vegas hadn’t bothered me much, but now that he was gone, I started getting restless. That place was packed with temptation, and old habits died hard. What if he relapsed?
Lying on Tripp’s sofa in his living room, I hugged one of the pillows to my chest. Give him some credit, Layne. He read the Bible and prayed daily. He wanted to get baptized. A man of God didn’t slip back into his old life that easily, right?
Right, God?
“ Holzchopf .” Tripp came sauntering into the room. “You need anything from the grocery store?”
I sat up. “Can I come?” He’d never find the special foods I needed. Keaton would. The fact that he knew exactly what I could eat and what not nearly did me in. Nobody had ever cared about my food intolerances. I had been gluten-free for a decade, and Mom still kept forgetting.
Also, I needed to get out of here before I started crawling up the walls.
Tripp gave me a curt nod. “There’s a letter for you in the kitchen.”
Curious, I retrieved it and examined the C5 envelope as I followed my brother outside to his pickup. Mrs. Layne Grady was written on it in a neat script, but no address. So someone had dropped it off personally. Someone who knew I was living here for the next couple of days and had access to the base.
Shivers clawed up my neck. Who was this?
Once we were on the road, I ripped open the envelope. Glossy pictures were inside, and I pulled them out. What the . . .
One by one, I flipped through them. No, this couldn’t be. Keaton wouldn’t do that to me. He’d said he wanted to get married again, this time for real.
But the pictures told another tale. The brunette with flawless olive skin smiled at him, and he smiled back. In the next picture they hugged. And in the next, she was practically sitting on top of him.
And they kissed. Keaton was kissing another woman, and it wasn’t just any woman.
It was Delilah.
In my peripheral vision, I registered Tripp going rigid. “I swear I’m gonna kill him,” he snarled.
I barely heard him over the same thought pounding in my head over and over: I will always play second fiddle.
“You’re going to divorce that guy, you hear me?”
Looking up, I realized we were in the parking lot of the grocery store. Apparently I had zoned out for several minutes.
“This has to be fake,” I mumbled. “He’d never do that.”
“This isn’t fake, Layne, it’s—”
“What if it’s photoshopped or AI?” Keaton wouldn’t do this. Not after giving his life to Jesus. There had to be an explanation.
“Layne, look at me.”
I turned to Tripp—and shuddered at the dark expression I found on his face.
“I’ve seen a lot of fake footage and photos on my job. These aren’t fake.”
Not knowing what to respond, I turned to the passenger door and opened it. Tripp came around the Raptor, and we went into the grocery store without saying another word. Even though it wasn’t too busy, I could feel my symptoms flare up. I had only been outside a handful of times over the past year, and every time it’d felt like I had crawled out of a cave after hibernation. This time wasn’t any different. The lights were too bright, the sounds of freezer doors being ripped open and banging closed too loud. I was beyond grateful when I had everything I needed and could head to the checkout.
“Can I have the key fob of the Raptor?” I asked Tripp, who met me there. “I need to go sit down.”
He dug it out of his jeans and passed it to me, as brooding as ever.
The storm of confusion, hurt, and betrayal raging inside of me starkly contrasted the beautiful sunshine welcoming me as I stepped back outside. Add to that the flare that was coming on. I shouldn’t have tagged along. My muscles started locking up, making it hard to walk. My bones hurt, and my head burned from a total sensory overload and an onslaught of thoughts I couldn’t process.
“Come on, Layne, you got this,” I muttered to myself. I looked around to make sure no vehicle was coming while I crossed the parking lot to Tripp’s pickup, then locked my gaze onto my feet. This helped me to keep going. “One step at a time.”
Tires screeched to my left. I jerked my head up just in time to see a black SUV coming straight at me.
Fast. It couldn’t be more than ten yards away.
I stumbled forward—
Something slammed into me. Knocked me off my feet and tossed me sideways.
The force I hit the concrete floor with jarred me. Punched the air from my lungs.
Lying on my side, I gasped for a breath. What had just happened? I was pretty sure that car hadn’t been there when I’d looked before crossing.
The ground shifted beneath me, startling me.
Wait, that wasn’t my brain glitching. I was half lying on top of someone.
“You okay?” Coming from right behind me, Tripp’s voice sounded strained.
He’d shoved me out of the way. Saved my life from a deranged driver. Who sped like that in a parking lot?
My breath stalled. The Psycho. He’d targeted me on purpose.
“Yeah, I think I’m all right.” Grateful for Tripp’s support, I sat up. My hands trembled, my heart hammering.
“You hurt?” He squatted before me and started examining my body, lightly squeezing my limbs.
“Don’t think so. Just shook. But you are.”
A nasty road rash stretched the length of his right arm, the side that had taken the brunt of the impact with the asphalt. His jeans were ripped.
“I’m solid. C’mon, let’s get you up.” He helped me stand on my jelly-legs and escorted me to his Raptor. Groceries were strewn all around us, but I was sure this wasn’t the reason why Tripp’s mood had turned blacker than the pavement. He was very much aware of what’d just happened.
Yet he said nothing as he helped me climb into his pickup. The seat was so high I was almost at eye level with him.
“This isn’t Keaton’s fault.”
The curse Tripp spat in Swiss German made me wince. He smacked the frame of the Raptor with his palm. “Of course it is. I’m gonna end him. I swear I’ll—” He gritted his teeth. “He should’ve backed down from that CEO position long ago.”
“It’s not that simple. There’s a lot you don’t know.”
No idea why I defended Keaton. Maybe because I’d thought we were in this together. I had really wanted him to start the Monroe Foundation. Hoped it would help him heal from Monroe’s loss.
Instead, he’d cheated on me.
Again, I felt that sting of betrayal. Second fiddle, second fiddle, second fiddle.
“Not that simple?” Tripp flared his nostrils. “Either you neutralize the threat, or you move out of the danger zone. Anything else is downright idiotic.”
I closed my eyes. “Can we go home, please?” The adrenaline rush was over, leaving me depleted. I needed to go lie down in a dark, noiseless room.
Tripp closed my door, and after scraping the groceries off the concrete, drove me back to his house.
My brain was too muddled to produce a coherent thought or make sense of things. All I knew was that I didn’t want to see Keaton right now. Maybe it was better that the year was almost over. Maybe it was for the best if we got divorced, and I moved back to Switzerland. My drawings and paintings sold so well that I could keep myself afloat.
Maybe.
I didn’t know.
I knew nothing anymore.