Chapter 43
FORTY-THREE
T
he words were like a bomb in her head. In her chest.
Willow hitched in a breath, the blood rushing out of her face. No.
She stared at Tripp, horror ripping through her.
“Shut the fuck up, Earl,” Tripp snapped, trying to take her by the arm again.
She shook her head and stepped out of reach, not wanting to believe it. Couldn’t accept it. Tripp had loved Peyton like a brother. “Is it true?” She could barely get the words out. Barely heard them over the dull roar in her ears.
But the stricken look on his face, the silent apology in his eyes told her everything she needed to know.
“Oh my God,” she cried, whirling and rushing for the exit.
Her shoulder slammed into someone. She bounced off the man, kept going, pushing past a knot of people blocking the door, her only thought escape.
Tripp had ordered the strike that had killed Peyton. And he’d never breathed a word about it to her this whole time.
She didn’t want to hear whatever excuse he had, especially not with an audience. She just needed to get the hell away from here. And him.
“Willow!”
She ignored his shout behind her. Ignored the stares and murmurs from strangers as she raced past the lineup outside, blinded by a hot rush of tears. Didn’t care that she’d made a scene as she ran up the sidewalk on rubbery legs, nausea swirling in her stomach, a sob locked in her chest.
Darkness swallowed her as she cut down an alleyway. She had to get away. Couldn’t look at Tripp right now or she would explode. She’d trusted him. Let herself fall in love with him. Given all of herself to him. And he’d hidden this from her.
It was unforgiveable.
Her breath sawed in and out of her lungs as she ran, half blind with shock. Driven by the agony of betrayal that burned like fire in her chest.
“Willow, wait!” Tripp’s voice was distant behind her, indistinct as if floated down the alley.
She ran faster. Darted up a side street and down another alley. Down another until she spotted a taxi coming down the road. She ran out in front of it, flagging it down frantically.
The driver stopped immediately, rolled down the window. “You okay?”
No. She wasn’t okay. She was breaking apart inside, a howling storm of grief engulfing her.
She fumbled to get the back door open. Slid inside and hunkered down to hide in case Tripp had spotted her. Managed to tell the driver her address through chattering teeth.
She was shaking hard. Gasping.
Her phone rang in her coat pocket. She ignored it, knowing it was Tripp.
She needed time to process this. To think.
“Do you need me to call anyone for you?” the driver asked. “You look really upset.”
“No. Thanks. J-just an argument.” She didn’t want to talk to anyone. She just wanted to get away from everything and everyone.
By the time the driver dropped her off at her house, the shock had mostly receded. Instead, the cold, hideous truth pushed tears into her eyes.
She opened the door, the beep of the alarm startling her. Quickly inputting the code to shut it off, she grabbed her keys and Rufus’s leash. He was already standing right next to her, tail wagging like mad in greeting.
She clipped the leash onto his collar and hurried him out to her car, put him in the back, the urgency to hurry pushing her. Angrily wiping the tears from her face, she raced up the street.
Tripp would come here looking for her at some point. She wanted to be far away before he got close. Didn’t want him to be able to follow or find her. He’d had all the time in the world to talk to her. Him keeping something so huge from her...
She couldn’t face him right now.
With a shock, she realized that it was still late afternoon. The sun was bright in the western sky. An awful numbness began to creep in as she drove toward it, heading for Shipwreck Cove.
A call came through on her car’s hands-free system. Mae.
For a moment she thought about declining it. Tripp had probably reached out to Mae to check on her. But she desperately needed to talk to a friend.
“Hi.” There was no way to hide that she’d been crying.
“Honey, what’s going on? Tripp called me, all frantic. Where are you?”
“Driving.”
“What happened?”
“Tripp’s been lying to me. For the past two fucking years, he’s been lying to me and my family. He’s the reason Peyton didn’t come home.” Her voice cracked. She pressed her lips together, unable to go on.
A heavy silence filled the line. “Did he tell you what happened?”
“No, but he didn’t deny it,” she spat. “I can’t believe he—”
“Now you listen to me, young lady.” The uncharacteristic sternness in Mae’s voice made Willow blink.
“I know you’re hurting, and I don’t know what happened in Syria, but I do know that boy has been through hell, and that there’s not a single day goes by that he doesn’t wish he’d died in your brother’s place. ”
Willow winced. “So you knew too?” she asked, unable to conceal the bitterness eating at her.
“Yes,” Mae admitted.
Willow ended the call before Mae could say another word, shaking her head in fury and disgust. She’d trusted her and Tripp, and they’d both hidden the truth from her this whole time.
Mae’s betrayal hurt, but Tripp’s was unforgiveable.
On some level she realized she wasn’t thinking clearly at the moment, but didn’t give a shit with the rage riding her. At this point she never wanted to see him again.
Compared to shock and helplessness, the fury whipping through her felt good. It fueled her across the island to the parking area near the hiking trails at Shipwreck Cove.
Rufus sat politely in the backseat, ears cocked as he watched her, the tip of the right one flopping over.
He would never betray her. Dogs were so much better than people.
“Come on, buddy, let’s go.” She let him out, wound the strap of the leash around her wrist and locked the car before heading across the parking lot to the trail entrance at the edge of the forest.
There was still plenty of daylight left. She had several hours to burn off this unbearable load of rage, hurt, and grief with Rufus with a brisk hike before it got dark.
Her phone kept buzzing with incoming calls and texts. She took it out and silenced it without looking at any messages or alerts, went to shove it into her coat pocket and stopped.
Bronwyn. She needed to talk to her bestie immediately.
Zipping up her thin coat to give her some protection from the mosquitoes, she dialed Bronwyn’s number and started up the trail with Rufus.
Darren set the nearly empty glass of bourbon down next to the open bottle on his desk and gripped the phone harder, staring at the video feed playing on his screen.
It was from one of the cameras near another cache he’d helped dig up and move last night.
He and the others hadn’t had time to remove the cameras yet, but now he was glad.
Willow was walking through that area of the woods with her dog. And as far as he could tell, she was alone.
He drew in an unsteady breath as hatred pumped through him, partly fueled by the half-finished bottle next to him.
This fucking bitch had exposed his entire operation and threatened not only his financial future, but his life.
She was the reason the cops were sniffing around, investigating him and the other members.
Her interference might get him fucking killed. And even if he managed to save his own skin, she was a potential key witness if he were ever prosecuted for the caches or involvement with the militia and his case went to trial.
Watching her wander through his sights, oblivious that she was on camera, he became aware that his heart slammed so hard against his chest it felt bruised.
Self-preservation shot him from his chair. He went straight to the basement, accessed the gun safe in a hidden panel beneath a rug on the floor, and took out a pistol plus two full mags.
He hurried back upstairs, tucking the weapon away out of sight under his shirt. From the kitchen, his wife looked over at him from the stove where she stirred whatever she was making for dinner. Their kids were coming over.
She eyed him, her expression tightened. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going out.” He could feel the seconds ticking past. Too fast. He was running out of time. Had to do this before he lost his nerve. Couldn’t allow himself to stop and think about what he was going to do.
“Out where? Why?”
The less she knew, the better. Plausible deniability. If this all went to shit, at least she and the kids would be okay.
“Don’t hold dinner. I don’t know when I’ll be back,” he muttered, grabbing his keys and rushing out the back door.
He wasn’t sure how much time he had left. It was at least a twenty-minute drive to the area where Willow was. He had to get to her while she was alone.
The drone was in the bed of the truck where he’d left it. He got into the driver’s seat, spun the truck in a tight circle that kicked up gravel at the edge of the driveway, and sped for the main road.
The tires skidded slightly as he made the turn. He tightened his grip on the wheel, struggled to keep it steady and shook his head to clear some of the fog away.
Shit, he was drunker than he’d realized. He couldn’t slow down, but he couldn’t afford to get pulled over either.
He licked his lips. Tasted salt from the sweat beading on his upper one.
An icy trickle of fear began to bleed through the rage and hatred. He fought it back.
Fear was a weakness he couldn’t afford. If he could get to Willow while she was alone, he could get rid of at least one threat against him.
He would use the drone to find her. Then make her death look like an accident.
Unease crept up his spine, making his skin prickle.
“It’s her or you,” he told himself as he sped along, steeling himself for what he had to do.
He’d killed before, in combat. To protect himself. But Willow was a civilian.
“This is the same fucking thing,” he growled, focused on the road ahead.
Either he made Willow and all the rest of this go away, or the people he worked for would end him.
But not until after they made him—and maybe his family—beg for death.