Chapter 13
CHAPTER 13
MACKENZIE
T he sharp crack of a gunshot rips through the house. I’m almost at the pool house when I hear it.
For a second, everything goes still. My body, my breath—time itself seems to freeze.
Then my legs move of their own accord, through the kitchen, in time to see my mother running down the hallway toward the study. I should follow, but my feet refuse to cooperate. My mind is still catching up to what I just heard.
I don’t know what I expect to see when I finally step into the room.
What if it’s Creed who got shot?
My father is slumped on the floor, his once-imposing frame now lifeless, his expensive shirt dark with blood. The sharp scent of whiskey and gunpowder hangs in the air thick enough to choke on.
Creed stands over him, chest rising and falling with uneven breaths, his fingers still curled around the gun. His knuckles are white, his expression blank—but his eyes.
His eyes find mine, and I see fear in them. Not for himself. For me.
I don’t know how to feel. I don’t know if I can feel. My father is dead. He was a monster, and now he’s gone. Should I be relieved? Should I be guilty that Creed did the one thing I never had the balls to do?
I feel none of it. Just a cold, empty space inside me.
And then my mother speaks.
“Put the gun down, Creed.”
Her voice is eerily calm, like she’s reprimanding an employee rather than the man standing over her husband’s dead body. Creed doesn’t move at first, his gaze flicking between her and me.
“I said put it down. ”
I nod. His jaw clenches, but he does. Slowly, he lowers the gun, letting it clatter onto the desk behind him.
My mother exhales, smoothing a hand over her pristine blouse as she takes a careful step forward. Not toward my father. Toward Creed.
Her lips press together in something almost like approval. Then she presses a perfectly manicured finger to his lips. “Go,” she says. “Now. I’ll handle this.”
Creed blinks. “Amelia—”
“I said go. ” She looks over her shoulder at me, her expression unreadable. “Take Mackenzie with you.”
My stomach drops. “What?”
She ignores me, eyes back on Creed. “You don’t need to be here when the police arrive. I’ll make all this go away.”
Creed hesitates. I can see the calculation in his expression, the war between trusting her and knowing he shouldn’t. But she’s giving him an out, and if Creed is anything, he’s a survivor.
His gaze finds mine one last time, and I see it—hesitation. A question he doesn’t ask.
I don’t have an answer.
So I say nothing.
Creed doesn’t either.
Then, with one final glance at my mother, he steps around my father’s body and walks toward me.
Creed’s grip on my wrist is firm but not forceful as he pulls me along. My feet move on autopilot, my mind still back in that study, replaying the way my father’s body crumpled, the way my mother didn’t even flinch.
The way she looked at Creed.
Like he was a piece on her chessboard, and she’d just decided where to move him.
I glance up at him as we step outside, the cold air biting against my skin. His face is carved from stone, his jaw locked tight, his body radiating tension. Whatever passed between him and my mother in those few seconds, it shifted something.
And I don’t like it.
We reach his car, and he finally lets go of me, yanking the door open. “Get in.”
The sharpness of his tone jolts something inside me. “You don’t get to order me around.”
His head snaps toward me, his nostrils flaring. He looks like he wants to argue, but then he exhales sharply and runs a hand through his hair. “Mackenzie. Please. Just—get in.”
Please.
Creed doesn’t beg. He takes, he controls, especially when it comes to me. But right now, standing under the dim glow of the streetlamp, he just looks… tired.
I don’t know why that makes my chest tighten.
I don’t argue. I slide into the passenger seat, and he slams the door shut behind me before rounding the car and climbing in.
Silence stretches between us as he grips the steering wheel, his knuckles pale from the pressure. He doesn’t start the car.
I cross my arms, my voice coming out quieter than I want. “You never should’ve gone in there.”
His eyes snap to mine, dark and unreadable. “I couldn’t let him keep hurting you.”
A lump forms in my throat, but I swallow it down. “And now what? Is my mother just going to fix this?” I let out a bitter laugh. “You don’t know what she’s capable of.”
Something flickers in his expression, something calculating. “I think I’m starting to.”
A chill skates down my spine.
Whatever my mother whispered to him in that room, it wasn’t just a favor. It was a transaction.
And I have no idea what the cost will be.