28. Knox
Knox
Morning light streams through the curtains, making Sawyer’s golden hair glow. She’s propped on an elbow, waiting for me to finish spilling the details about last night, but I’m too distracted by her sex hair and freshly fucked glow.
Guess I can’t pretend everything’s fine forever. It’s time to get moving and figure shit out.
“Repeat everything, because I don’t know if I’m just tired or if what I’m hearing sounds completely insane,” she says, voice rough from sleep.
“You heard right. I want to go talk to my asshole father.” I sit up, dragging a hand down my face.
“Moretti saying he’s done associating with him is what we wanted, except it didn’t work out like I’d hoped with the wedding.
And I don’t know, I’m not all warm and fuzzy about the way he said he’d escalate things with my father. ”
I replay how he sounded when he said the word escalate. There’s no doubt in my mind he means hurting him, or worse.
“Tell me about the wedding part again.”
“He wants the wedding to happen, with or without my father’s business partnership. For Ella’s happiness, he said. Whatever the hell that actually means coming from a psycho like him. I’m sure that’s not his real reason.”
She plays with a thread on the sheet, face scrunched. “So what are you going to say to Richard? We can’t go warn him and have him bolt. We need him here and unsuspecting for the detectives when they’re ready.”
I sigh. “You’re right. But I don’t want to see him getting killed before any of that happens.”
“Yeah, true.” She bites her lower lip, thinking. “I’m surprised Moretti bailed so quickly…one short conversation and he’s ready to end a business relationship like that.”
“Guys like that will do anything to cover their own ass,” I say.
“Maybe that’s why he’s still insisting on the wedding…
keeping me under his thumb while my father goes down.
I don’t know. Whatever it is, he can go to hell.
Ella doesn’t want me now either. I—” I hesitate remembering the conversation with Ella that feels like it was days ago.
“I told Ella about us. We cleared the air.”
Sawyer scrambles up, back against the headboard. “Shit. Is she okay?”
I can’t help but laugh. “The two of you care more about how each other feels. It’s wild. Yeah, she’s as good as can be expected. We also talked about Owen.”
She nods, eyes cast down. “That’s good. Maybe when this mess is settled, her and I can get coffee again and talk more. I know it’s crazy but I actually like her.”
“Not crazy.” I push a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “I think she’d like that.”
“Good.” Sawyer leans into my touch, some of the tension leaving her face. “We can all use an extra person in our corner.”
She kisses my palm and I sigh knowing I need to get up and moving. “Time to go talk to the devil himself. If anything, I want to see where his head’s at. He’s been quieter lately, and it’s unlike him not to follow up after sending you that letter.”
“Listen, I don’t know what you’re going to say to him, but you can’t save him, Knox. You’ve done nothing but try to save everyone in your life for years, but now he has to reap what he’s sowed.” She shrugs.
“I know, and he will.”
“I love that about you, by the way. The way you’re always trying to save people.”
The word love lingers in the air between us and I almost forget how to breathe. “What else do you love about me?”
“Cocky as always.” She laughs but there’s a real smile there, warm and unguarded.
She leans in and ghosts her lips over mine.
“I love your terrible sense of humor. Your glasses.” She taps the frame with one finger.
“I love that you’re actually a huge nerd underneath all the brooding.
I love that you push me to be better, to never settle. ”
“Keep going.”
“I love that you carried me through the woods like some beefed up Tarzan and I still can’t decide if it was insane or the hottest thing anyone’s ever done to me.
” She presses a kiss to my jaw. “You’re my rock, but also the only person with the power to absolutely wreck me.
Maybe I’m crazy but I love that. And mostly, I love that even after everything your family has put you through, you’re still going to show up for them, even when no one would blame you for walking away. ”
My throat feels tight, clogged with emotion. It takes everything in me not to cry in front of her. I blink, and cup her cheeks. “You give me hope, Sawyer. I love you. I love you so fucking much.”
I kiss her slowly, memorizing this exact moment before I have to go ruin it by walking into my father’s house.
“I love you too,” she says once we break apart. “Come back to me. Whatever happens today. Come back.”
“Always.”
My parent’s house is too quiet when I let myself in. It’s never a loud place, but there’s always some kind of noise.
No TV in the background. No footsteps on the wooden floors. No one fussing around in the kitchen.
There’s a plate on the kitchen counter, though—a cream colored smear on it going hard around the edges. My mother’s car is here, but I didn’t think to check the garage for his.
“Dad.”
Nothing.
I head down the hall and his office door is standing wide open, which never happens. The smell hits before I reach it. Stale scotch and sweat.
I step inside and stop.
Every drawer in the desk is pulled out. Paperwork’s all over the floor, the piles he had sorted into whatever order made sense to him last time I was here scattered apart or gone.
The filing cabinet’s worse. The second drawer with the squealing track is hanging halfway out, and the third one, the one I had to yank open, is empty. Every manila folder in it, gone.
Wonder World Phase II, gone.
Not that it matters. I’ve got all of it on my phone and in my email and printed in a stack in my trunk. But it means he knows I’ve been in here. It means he sat in this room since I last saw him and made a decision.
The shredder bin in the corner is overflowing and his laptop’s not on the desk. Unless this wasn’t him. Did Moretti already grab him so quickly?
I go through the rest of the house. The living room, the kitchen, the sunroom no one ever uses. Upstairs, their bedroom door is open and half his closet is bare hangers. His car isn’t in the garage.
He’s gone.
I go back downstairs and stand in the middle of his wrecked office, stomach churning.
Moretti wouldn’t have taken his car. Something else is going on.
He’s running.
I pull out my phone and call him, putting it on speaker.
It rings and rings. I’m ready for voicemail when the line opens and there’s nothing on the other end for a second, just road noise.
“Why are you calling me so early? I’m busy.”
“Where are you?” I ask.
“I’m driving.”
“I’m standing in your office.” I toe a folder on the floor. “You want to tell me what happened in here?”
“Spring cleaning.”
“It’s August.”
He doesn’t respond, there’s only the faint hum of his engine. He could be minutes away or hours, and there’s no way for me to know which.
“Where’s Mom?”
“How should I know? Probably still passed out in bed.”
She’s not, but I don’t bother telling him that. He couldn’t give two shits.
“I talked to Moretti last night,” I say.
The pause is long enough that I check the screen to make sure the call’s still connected.
“Yeah? So?”
“He’s done with you. Dropped you like that.” I snap my fingers into the phone. “No more partnership, and I’m working on the wedding too.”
“Doubtful, son. I know men like Vince, and they don’t give up easily.”
“You’re a dumb fuck if you think that.”
“Watch your fucking mouth.”
“Or what?” I plant a hand on the edge of his empty desk. “You’ll beat my ass again? Cut me off? Newsflash, Richard, you’ve already made sure I have nothing left to lose.”
There’s silence on the line.
“You think you can hide all your files,” I say. “But I found the truth about Velocity, about David…about every single thing you’ve been hiding since before Owen even died.”
“You don’t know—”
“Save your bullshit.” My voice comes out louder than I mean it to and it bounces off the bare walls of this room.
“I’ve talked to David. I’ve seen the reports.
I know you cut corners on the Velocity project to pad your own pockets, I know that was only one of many like it, and I know you let him take the fall for crimes that were mostly yours. ”
For a long moment, there’s only him breathing.
“There’s things behind the scenes that you don’t understand,” he says. “That you’ll never understand.”
“Then explain them.”
“What you did was stupid, Knox.” He sounds tired more than anything. Not scared. Not anxious. Tired, like I’ve made extra work for him. “And now I’m going to have to clean up your mess.”
My mess.
And that’s when I feel the words coming up my throat. He’s going to kill you. I’ve seen what his men do. I’ve got the bruises. You don’t have much time left. All of it, right there and ready.
I hold it behind my teeth.
Because Sawyer’s voice is in my head. We can’t go warn him and have him bolt. We need him here and unsuspecting. I’ve already done the work, found him out. Eight people are dead because of him, and I refuse to give him another reason to hide out like a snake waiting to strike.
Vince can find him if he wants to. Or maybe he won’t, maybe the detectives will get to him first.
“Promise me one thing.” My hand’s shaking against the desk so I move it to my side. “Whatever you’re doing, wherever you are, you take care of Mom for once in your life. Stop treating her like another possession. Actually fucking help her.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I watch you with her. How you bark orders and she folds in on herself.” Long held anger comes up with every word.
I should’ve let it out years ago. “She’s not well and you know it.
She hasn’t been well for much longer than I ever knew.
I don’t care if you’re scared, or drunk, or losing everything you built.
You don’t get to keep making her smaller just because your own life’s falling apart. ”
I can almost hear him grinding his teeth.
“And Richard,” I say. “I want you to hear it from me. You’re done.”
“Done?” He lets out a humorless laugh. “We’ll see.”
The line clicks.
I stand there with the phone in my hand, listening to nothing for longer than I should.
When I lower it, my mother’s in the doorway.
I don’t know how long she’s been there. She’s in her robe and slippers, hair flat on one side, holding a mug with both hands. Her eyes move past me to the drawers, the folders on the floor, the empty cabinet, and then back to my face.
“Mom? You okay?”
She doesn’t answer.
I cross the room and give her a side hug. She smells like coffee and hairspray and the same perfume she’s worn my whole life. One of her hands rests on my back and she lets me lead her to the couch in the living room.
“He’s not coming back today,” I tell her.
“I know,” she says.
I get a good look at her, eyes red-rimmed and puffy. She seems like she’s in shock. Where was she when I searched the house?
“Can I get you something to eat? Anything?” I ask, unsure what to do with her.
She shakes her head. “No, I’ll be fine. You go. Get your rest for the wedding.”
I blink at her, and wait a full minute absorbing what she said. “Yeah, okay, Mom. Call me if you need anything. And let me know when Dad comes back.”
Leaving her is hard, but I know I can’t stay. Maybe I should call someone to be with her? One of her friends from town. No. She’d kill me if I let someone see her that way. I’ll have to call her in a few hours and check in.
Once I’m in the Jeep with the engine running and cool air coming through the vents, I glance back at the house I grew up in. It doesn’t look like home. Never did. More like walls that held too many thoughts no one ever said out loud.
I said some of them today. Not the one that would’ve saved him from his own grave. I keep waiting to feel bad for my omission but it doesn’t come.
I fire off a text to Sawyer once I’m at the end of the driveway.
He’s gone. Cleaned out the office and took off. I called him, but it didn’t really get me anywhere.
Her reply comes fast.
Sawyer: Shit. Where do you think he’s going?
No clue but I’m heading back soon.
Sawyer: Okay. Be safe. I love you.
Those three words bring warmth to my chest. The house behind me may not be home, but I have Sawyer now. Home is wherever she is.
I love you too.
I sit at the end of the driveway longer than I need to, thumb on the wheel, solidifying my plan.
Richard’s got that hidden account, a passport, and a head start. You can’t serve papers to someone who’s missing. Lawyers can build whatever cases they want and it won’t mean a damn thing if there’s nobody standing there when they’re ready to use it.
Then it hits me, and I actually laugh out loud.
August twenty-fifth.
If I know anything about my father, it’s that he would crawl out of whatever hole he’s in for a performance. A tent on his lawn, his name on the invitations, all of Ashford watching. Even a rocky relationship with Moretti won’t keep him from playing the part of dutiful father.
He’ll come. He won’t be able to help himself.
This could work. I pull out onto the road and call Sawyer. She’ll have to be on board and we’ll need some help.