Chapter 22 Harper
HARPER
Faith showed up at my door, holding a bottle of wine in one hand and her dog Rainbow’s leash in the other.
The wine looked expensive. The dog looked like she’d been through a garbage disposal. Twice.
“Time to celebrate!” Faith announced, shoving past me before I could respond.
Rainbow waddled in behind her, all four mismatched legs working overtime.
The dog had a growth on her side that I could only describe as a …
dick. A fuzzy little appendage that bobbed when she walked.
Her eyes pointed in two different directions, her teeth looked like she’d tried to French kiss a blender, and no matter how many baths Faith gave her, she perpetually looked like she’d been fished out of a dumpster.
But Faith loved that rescue mutt with her whole heart. And honestly? I did too.
“Celebrate what?” I asked, closing the door behind them.
“Your new job!” Faith held up the bottle like a trophy. “Totally belated. Should’ve done this a month ago!”
Truth be told, I wasn’t in the mood to celebrate after finding that note from Silas.
Hell, I almost hadn’t answered the door and had checked the window three times to make sure he wasn’t lurking behind Faith, but Faith had become my best friend recently, and if she’d come all the way over here with a bottle of wine, I wasn’t going to be a Debbie Downer.
“Also,” she added, “I brought glasses because I wasn’t sure you had any. And, I brought Rainbow because Ryker’s working late and she gets separation anxiety. Don’t you, baby girl?”
Rainbow responded by immediately finding my one decent throw pillow and mounting it.
“Rainbow, no!” Faith yanked the leash. The dog gave her a look of pure betrayal, then flopped onto the carpet and farted.
Welcome to my new life.
I smiled and surveyed my bungalow through fresh eyes. The kitchen counters were about forty years old, covered in scratches and dents. One cabinet door had literally fallen off and been duct-taped back on. The laminate counters had taken an equal beating. And the carpet …
Let’s just say, I’d invested heavily in air fresheners.
Other people would see a dilapidated dump.
I saw it as mine.
Well, mine as long as I paid rent. But still, who needed fancy when you could have freedom? I’d lived for so long under the stifling weight of fear that this place felt like a golden paradise. A scratched, duct-taped, slightly musty paradise.
Faith poured the wine and handed me a glass. “So, how was your first month?”
“Interesting.” I took a sip. “The inmates are exactly what you’d expect. Violent. Crude. Looking for any weakness they can exploit.”
“Sounds like my first three Tinder dates.”
I snorted. “At least these guys are behind bars.”
Rainbow had found my trash can and was sniffing it with intense focus. One eye seemed to be examining the ceiling while the other locked on to a banana peel.
Faith pulled her away. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”
“I won’t answer if I don’t want to,” I assured her.
She smirked at that. Not bothered, not offended. Impressed, if anything.
“Is Harper your real name?”
I cocked my head.
She shrugged and started picking imaginary lint off her pants. “I don’t want to put you on the spot. I just … when you moved in, you had a black eye. And you moved in suddenly. It all has the markings of someone running. And I’m curious if you went as far as changing your name.”
I shook my head. “No. I left in a hurry, and he’s the type of guy that if he wants to find me, a name change won’t help.
” Although based on the note on my car, maybe that had been a wrong move.
Maybe I should have gone through the elaborate steps of changing my identity, but at the time, it had seemed so extreme, ya know?
Like, yes, Silas was an abusive asshole, but it hadn’t struck me as go into the witness protection program level dangerous. What if I’d been wrong?
I took another sip of wine.
“Well, if you ever do want to change it, one of my friends is extremely wealthy. If anyone could figure out how to make it happen, he would.”
It was silly to wonder if I should take her up on that. Right?
Yes. It was overkill. I could handle Silas, and I certainly wasn’t going to let him drive me away again. I had a friend now. A place of my own. And a job that I was coming to like. A lot.
Feeling Faith’s curious eyes on me, I shook off my inner thoughts and focused on what she’d said. Her friend with lots of money. “Wealthy, huh?”
“He’s a really good guy. Powerful too. With one phone call, he could probably convert your fingerprints and DNA into someone else’s.”
“That’s … both impressive and terrifying.” I shook my head. “But I’m trying to do this on my own.”
Rainbow chose that moment to bark at absolutely nothing. We both stared at her. She stared at the wall like it had personally wronged her, then lost interest and started licking herself.
“So”—Faith settled deeper into my secondhand couch—“do you have any friends? Like, besides me and this gorgeous angel?” She gestured toward Rainbow.
My lips thinned. Guilt clawed at my ribs as I thought back to the few friends I’d had before moving.
The ones I’d slowly stopped seeing without even noticing.
All in the name of being a couple. Hanging out with his friends.
His life. Looking back, I hadn’t even recognized the control for what it was.
And then, one day, I woke up and realized my life was gone.
The only life I had was his life. His roof over my head. His friends. His everything.
But that was okay. You learn from your mistakes and all that.
“I don’t really have any friends,” I admitted. “Not anymore.”
Faith nodded like she understood.
“Enough about me.” I needed to redirect before this got too heavy. “How are you and Ryker doing?”
Her whole face lit up. “Good! We’re hunting for new places to live.”
“I thought he was fighting the no-pets rule in that lease?” I questioned.
She rolled her eyes. “His neighbors hate pets and banded together. We decided it just wasn’t worth the fight. He doesn’t want me to get side-eyed every time I take her out on a walk.”
Wow. That was beyond thoughtful of him. “He’s really willing to move out of that penthouse?”
“Well, I’m not leaving Rainbow behind. And for reasons I’ll never understand, he didn’t want to move into my shitty bungalow. So, yeah, we’re house-hunting.”
I laughed.
Rainbow had somehow gotten her leash wrapped around the coffee table leg and was now spinning in circles, trying to free herself, that weird growth on her side flopping with each rotation.
“Speaking of your job,” Faith said casually. Too casually. “Have you met any of the inmates yet? Anyone … notable?”
My stomach tightened. “Why?”
“Just curious.”
Was it written all over my face? My unprofessional, forbidden non-hatred of Knox? “What are you getting at?”
She sighed. “Knox Blackwood. Have you met him?”
The name hit me like a splash of cold water. How the hell would she know about that? I hadn’t told anyone. Hell, there was nothing to tell. These feelings for him weren’t real. Refer to my inner meltdown prior to finding that note on my car. “How do you know Knox Blackwood?”
“Ryker. Knox is one of his best friends.” Holy. Shit. “Ryker’s his criminal defense attorney, trying to help him get parole.”
I set my wineglass down. “And you’re just now telling me this?”
“When was I supposed to tell you?”
“How about when you found out I was going to work at the penitentiary?”
“I’m sorry. At the time, I was a little fixated on the fact that I was about to go to prison myself.”
Okay. Fair point.
“So, you actually met him?” Faith asked, her voice climbing higher. “Knox Blackwood? In person?”
“I did.”
“Wow.” She blinked. “I honestly thought it was a long shot. That place is huge. What are the odds you’d even cross paths?”
I shrugged, but something in my chest tightened. “I’ve seen him more than once actually.”
Faith set her wineglass down slowly, like a detective who’d just spotted a clue. “Okay, hold on. Why did you say it like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like that. All weird and dodgy.” She pointed at me. “Something happened.”
I rubbed the inside of my thumb with my fingernail. “He sort of … stuck up for me. Protected me against some nasty inmates who were giving me trouble.”
Faith’s jaw dropped. “Seriously?”
“It was nothing,” I lied because I wasn’t ready to explore those feelings out loud with anyone yet.
“It was clearly not nothing because your face is doing a thing right now.”
“My face is not doing a thing.”
“It’s doing a whole thing. A very specific thing.” She leaned forward. “Harper, do you like him?”
“What? No.” I grabbed my wineglass like a shield. “There’s no way I can like Knox. He killed a man. In cold blood.”
Faith raised an eyebrow. “You said that to your new bestie, who was found covered in blood in the woods.”
“That was different.”
“Was it?”
“You did that in self-defense,” I said.
“You didn’t know that when you invited yourself over, got drunk, and attacked Ryker with a lamp.”
“I was desperate for a friend!”
“Details …”
Rainbow barked again, apparently having opinions about our argument. Or maybe she’d spotted a dust particle. Hard to tell with those eyes.
“Do you know why he killed that guy?” she asked.
“No. Do you?” I leaned forward, shocked at how much I wanted to know.
She shook her head. “No.”
Damn. “Well, your experience was an anomaly. He’s a killer. I can’t not hate him.” Maybe if I said it enough times, it would come true. Like Dorothy clicking her heels in The Wizard of Oz.
She sighed.
“You think I’m judging him,” I said.
“Are you?”