Chapter Ten #2
His phone chirped from his back pocket. Callum checked the time. The lines above his brow deepened. “I have to take this.”
He stepped outside to take the call. She hadn’t seen him do that with a phone call before. Grace glanced at the grandfather clock.
Who called someone that early? Not work. Her curiosity piqued, then plummeted. For all the discussions they’d had about being alive and about her ex-husband, she hadn’t asked about him. Who was he now?
Callum could be married. Would Hayden have told her that?
She didn’t ask about anyone. That had initially been about self-preservation but then became a habit built out of guilt.
Getting updates on others when they didn’t know about her felt wrong.
Callum hadn’t volunteered news of his life when he questioned her, and she hadn’t asked.
He might have a family. Maybe kids. Either way, he definitely had an entire life that she selfishly hadn’t thought about.
She pinched her eyes shut. How egotistical.
Surprise! She was alive.
Surprise! Her ex-husband had found her.
Not once had she asked about him.
Had he been wearing a wedding band? Surely she would have noticed. But the lack of a wedding band didn’t preclude a girlfriend at home or even children. Callum as a father? She hadn’t pictured it before. He would be a great dad. Stern but understanding. Responsible and fun.
It gave her the warm-and-fuzzies, which quickly fizzled into regret. His life had moved forward. He probably shared it with an amazing woman. Grace’s life had stayed the same since she had dropped off the radar.
In all the years since she’d been hiding from Dominic, she’d never been jealous. There had been lonely times, times when she was curious what another life might look like, times when she desperately craved being held in the middle of the night. But she’d never been jealous of what might have been.
Not until now.
He opened the living room door—and was pissed. Arms crossed, face scowling, he strode to her as if she’d been hiding Dominic in the kitchen. “What else have you left out?”
“What?” Grace blinked back regretful tears she hadn’t realized were pooling in her eyes.
“Forget our list of questions and tell me the important parts you’ve left out.”
“What?”
“No. We’re not going to pretend here. If I’m laying everything out, you need to also.”
“What, exactly, are you laying out?”
His glare tightened. Glowering over her, he leaned in and lowered his voice. “You know what I mean. I’m here until this shit is fixed. You keep lying—”
“I’m not.”
“You’ve lied about a whole hell of a lot. So pardon me if we have a trust issue. That’s the starting point you gave me.”
Grace squared off with him. He tipped his face down. She tipped hers up. Her breath raced, and confusion rang in her ears. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“This is serious.”
“Really? You think?” she shouted. “Because, no kidding, Callum. If I hadn’t already known that after living my damn life like this every day, I think I would have figured it out sometime after macing you and before the FedEx delivery.”
He jerked away. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he paced as waves of anger rolled off him like the aftershocks of an earthquake.
Yelling at each other would not fix this. She swallowed over the ache in her throat and hoarsely asked, “What’s going on?”
He halted and turned to face her. With a disappointed shake of his head, he said, “We know about your attorneys. We have the records of the incoming calls.”
Her blood ran cold. “What?”
“This will not work if you keep lying.”
“Maybe you should listen to me. Because I’m not.”
“Maybe you’re trying to protect them. Maybe you signed a legal agreement.
Maybe you have something else going on, or fuck it, Grace, maybe you’re just scared.
The thing is, I trump everyone. I’m at the top of the pile of people involved in this.
Do you get that? Because everyone else you’ve stitched into your disappearing act?
They’re beneath me. Under me. I call rank in this crazy-ass world you created. ”
“You sound like an ass.”
“I am an ass right now. Get that through your beautiful brain. Look, I don’t care who helped you pull off this gigantic, fraudulent charade. I’m over it with Hayden. I don’t care about your attorneys. But starting right now, you have to be upfront with me.”
“I don’t have attorneys.”
“Your phone records say otherwise.” Gone was the emotion from his voice. Callum was disconcertingly cold, and the shift terrified her.
She couldn’t continue their standoff and reached for her coffee. Her hand trembled. She wrapped her other hand around it to steady the mug. “What part of ‘no attorneys’ do you not understand?”
He ran his tongue along the inside of his cheek. His jaw sawed, and both irritation and frustration burned hot in his angry eyes. “We know that Dominic’s not the only one looking for you, babe.”
She faltered mid-sip of coffee. “What are you talking about?”
“The attorneys who represented you in Dominic’s felony trial—”
Her attorneys didn’t know she was alive. They couldn’t be looking for her. “No.”
“And your divorce attorney,” he said, lifting two fingers, then added a third, “and some attorneys at the Department of Justice.”
“No.” Her stomach bottomed out. The coffee mug shook harder than she could hide. She set it down. “They aren’t. They don’t know I’m alive.”
“Your phone records disagree and have almost since the day Marino was released.”
That was back in April, and now it was August. “No.”
“What’s the point of lying? Because you don’t want to go into witness protection? Do you know how much of my time you have wasted?”
Her stomach turned, as if her coffee had spoiled in her gut. “That’s. Not. Possible. Why would I lie?”
He rubbed the back of his neck and paced again. “I don’t know.”
Grace grabbed his biceps. “If I have to trust you, you have to trust me.”
He looked down. Tension flexed in his jaw, and his pinched lips rolled together.
“Callum.” She squeezed her fingers into his arms. “Listen to me. Trust me.”
His breath came quicker. “I had no reason not to. Then you left.”
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. Tears blurred her vision. “So sorry.”
He deflated, wrapped an arm around her like he was angry, until he folded her to his chest. She sobbed. Years of emotions and bad decisions and fear bubbled up.
“I shouldn’t have come at you like that.” He wrapped his other arm around her. “Take a breath.”
But that wasn’t why she was crying. She’d hurt him. Hurt everyone. And he was pulling away when they’d just reconnected. “I really am so sorry.”
He soothed a hand over her back. “It’s okay. C’mere.” Guiding them to the couch, Callum pulled her next to him and held her close, still soothing, still rubbing, until she caught her breath and wiped her eyes.
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” he whispered. “I’ve got a short fuse when it comes to betrayal—not by you,” he caught himself. “I’ve got other shit on my mind.” He kept her close, resting his chin on top of her head. “It’s okay. Catch your breath.”
Again, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. They were due for a blowup, she guessed. They’d had them over the years, but it had never ended with her crying.
Grace wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that. He let her stay in his arms until she was ready.
“I’m not in touch with my old attorneys. I promise.”
He nodded. “I believe you.”
“Do you swear?”
He nodded again. “I trust you.”
Something was happening with her phone that she didn’t understand. This was the same dread that had churned in her gut the day the FBI had raided Marino’s penthouse in Las Vegas. “I didn’t talk to them, but even if I did, why would they want to get a hold of me?”
He casually rubbed her back. “I don’t know. My office is talking to them.”
His phone signaled an incoming call. This time she wasn’t worried about whether he was married with kids.
“Give me a minute.” He swiped the screen on his phone and pressed it to his ear, staying on the couch beside her with an arm still draped around her shoulder. “Hey, yeah. She’s not in contact with them.”
He pulled the phone away. “Just to confirm, no calls, voicemails, emails? Nothing?”
“Nothing,” she confirmed.
“Nothing.” He pulled his arm from around her and cradled his forehead for a moment before dragging his hand through his hair. “I’m sure.” He glanced her way, then pushed off the couch to stare out the window, lowering his voice. “Doesn’t look like it, unless she’s one hell of an actress.”
They didn’t believe her.
But Callum did.
That should have made her feel the slightest bit better. She wasn’t sure if it did. Grace was too busy trying not to freak out more than she already was.
“That was my thought, too. When you know more, let me know. But that’s the understanding we’ll operate under.” He ended the call and didn’t move from the window, keeping his back to her.
“What’s the understanding?” she managed.
He joined her on the couch again and tossed the phone onto the coffee table. His shoulders bunched and relaxed, and he bent over, elbows on his knees, head in his hand as he thought. “Give me a second to think.” Finally, he lifted his head. “Did you ever get my voicemails?”
“No.”
He nodded, as if he could see the missing pieces. Callum picked up his phone. “Give me the best number to reach you at.”
She did. He dialed. “Where’s your phone?”
“The kitchen.” It was a bare-bones burner, not exactly something she’d keep by her nightstand to scroll social media.
“Is your ringer on?”
“Yeah.”
His phone rang through. Her phone wasn’t registering a call.
A generic prerecorded voicemail message answered on Callum’s phone. A beep signaled that he should record his message. “Hey, Grace. Checking in. If you get this, call me.”
Callum ended his call and strode to the kitchen to grab her phone. After a quick glance, he handed it to her.
“No missed calls. No messages,” she said.
He rubbed his jaw.
“What’s going on?”
“Your ex is a dozen steps ahead of us.” He let out an exhausted sigh. “Dean will have to confirm this, but my guess is that Marino has access to your email and phone numbers. He’s screening who’s in contact with you.”
It was happening again. Everything she had tried to protect against.
“Despite everything you’ve been doing, he’s been tracking you since before he walked out of prison. If not before.”