Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
AVERY
M y eyes opened to a sea of brown, the details slowly coming into focus as my body bounced. Brown upholstery beneath me. Brown fabric stretched above me. I was in a vehicle. How had I…?
It all came rushing back—Caro Haywood, Cole. The understanding had hit me so suddenly, I hadn’t been able to hide it. And he’d seen. He’d followed me into the brewery. He’d had something... A taser?
I tried to feel for an injury, but my hands were tied behind my back, whatever bound them cutting into my wrists. I shifted and realized my feet were tied as well. He’d trussed me up like a pig for roasting, and somehow, he’d gotten me out of Sawyers Bend Brewing without anyone seeing.
I tried to think. Was I better off pretending I was still unconscious, or should I talk to him?
I wanted to know why. Everyone knew how devoted Cole Haywood had been to his wife.
If Prentice had been having an affair with her, I could understand Cole shooting him.
Not the best way to resolve marital differences, but that made sense. Coming after the rest of us, though?—
Why? I needed to know.
Forget playing like I was out cold. I had too many questions for that.
“Where are we going?” I asked, twisting and straining, struggling to bring myself to a seated position. I needed to see his face—or what I could catch from the back seat.
“We’re going nowhere,” he said with a short laugh.
I tried to figure out if he sounded unhinged or if the laugh was him sounding normal.
I couldn’t. A man I’d known for years had just kidnapped me.
He wasn’t my friend. He was eight or nine years older than Griffen and my father’s business associate.
There were a lot of reasons I’d never sought out Cole Haywood’s company, but none of them were because I thought he was dangerous.
If anything, I’d always thought he was boring, just another buttoned-up business suit.
I’d never pictured him with that taser in his hand, much less holding the knife that had killed Anna Novak.
I lurched my way into a seated position. I couldn’t see his eyes. They were, fortunately, focused on the road, but I got a good look at Cole Haywood’s profile.
It wasn’t what I’d expected. I don’t know—maybe I thought when he kidnapped me, the mask would come off and the crazy would be out in the open. But he just looked like Cole Haywood: chiseled jawline, blade-sharp cheekbones, perfectly styled dark hair. I’d been kidnapped by a menswear model .
“What do you mean we’re going nowhere?” I asked, confused by both his answer and his laugh.
“We’re going to the middle of nowhere,” he said, amusement coloring his words, “A little piece of property I walked a couple of years ago. I thought about investing in it with your father, actually. Changed my mind. Too remote. But while we were out there, we discovered that long ago, someone dug a well and covered it up. Weeds grew over the cover, but the well was still there. I thought, someday, that might be the perfect place to hide a body. And look, here you are, a body I need to hide. Convenient, isn’t it? ”
“Not for me,” I muttered.
“Well, no,” he agreed. “Not for you.” Cole’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “You weren’t on my list, Avery. I wasn’t planning on getting rid of you. But I’m not done with your family yet. And somehow, you figured it out. So, here we are.”
“One of Sterling’s contacts found a trust Prentice set up for Caroline Sawyer,” I said, watching carefully for a reaction.
The wheel of the car jerked to the left, and my shoulder slammed into the door, my skull cracking against the window and sending painful shudders down my spine.
“Interesting,” was all Cole Haywood said.
“Why didn’t you put Anna Novak in the well?” I asked.
West had spared me seeing the worst of it, but I’d heard enough—seen enough—before he’d pushed me out of the room .
Cole had done that.
Was that how he was going to kill me?
“I lost my temper. She had a mouth on her.” He shook his head. “If she hadn’t understood what she’d made and for whom, I might have let her live. But she knew exactly who Caro was. Who Prentice was. And what they were to each other. And she made the necklace anyway.”
“So, she had to die?” I asked.
Cole raised an eyebrow and met my eyes in the rearview mirror for just a moment—long enough for me to see the full flare of insanity in his vivid blue eyes.
“No, Avery,” he said deliberately, each word falling in careful measure. “She had to die because she had a smart mouth, and she pissed me off. And it seemed like something I’d enjoy.”
I looked away, unable to hold that gaze. I could tell by the light in his eyes how much he’d enjoyed it. It followed that he would probably enjoy killing me too. Was he going to stab me before he threw me in the well, or just toss me down into the wet dark to die of starvation?
I wasn’t wild about either option. I wriggled, shoving my hands down to feel my back pockets where I usually kept my phone.
Empty. Fuck. Okay, think , Avery. I knew Hawk could track my phone.
Was that all? I wouldn’t put it past him to have planted trackers on us.
But I didn’t know. Hawk could be sneaky.
Oh, please, Hawk, please have been sneaky .
Based on the woods outside the window, we were far out of town.
And even when they found out I was missing, without my phone, they wouldn’t know where to look or who I was with .
Despair rose in a dark wave, threatening to swamp me.
I wasn’t giving up. I just didn’t know how to fight while I was fucking zip-tied in the back seat of his car.
I couldn’t stop Cole physically—he was bigger than me, and strong enough to have carried me out of the brewery quickly, before anyone noticed. And I was restrained.
Panic welled, my throat tightening.
If Hawk was tracking me, and if they realized I was missing in time, there might be a chance someone was going to rescue me. And if that was the case, and Cole was feeling as talkative as he seemed to be, I should keep asking questions.
“Why?” I asked. “What did Griffen ever do to you, or Royal, or Vanessa, or Ford?”
“Your father stole my wife,” he said, “and killed her with that baby he put in her. He took them both from me. She didn’t want to have a baby with me. Did you know that?”
I shook my head. It’s not like Cole and Caro had run in the same social circles as me.
I lived in my jeans and brewed beer, while Caro had been high heels and ladies’ lunches—even though she’d also loved the outdoors and hiking.
We hadn’t been friends or even acquaintances.
I’d known her enough to make polite small talk now and then when I got roped into a family function. That was it.
But even I knew how much Cole Haywood had loved his wife. I had no idea she’d denied him the children he’d wanted.
“It must have burned,” I said, “when you found out the baby was Prentice’s—that she’d had a baby with my father and not you. ”
“That’s one way to put it,” Cole agreed.
“I don’t know why she thought my father would be a better parent than you, when he was pretty miserable at it,” I said.
“Agreed. But your father had a way of clouding the minds of even the best women. Look at Darcy.”
I sighed. Cole was right. I’d never understood how sweet, kind, loving Darcy had fallen for my father.
She’d been the closest thing any of us had had to a mother, and she’d had a heart as big as the universe.
Why the hell had she fallen for Prentice?
I didn’t know a more evil man, except maybe Cole.
As far as I knew, Prentice hadn’t murdered anyone.
That definitely put him a rung above Cole in the Ethics Olympics.
“When did you find out?” I asked, my heart twinging the tiniest bit at the thought of Cole finding out the wife he’d worshipped had betrayed him.
“When she died,” Cole answered through a tight jaw. “I thought the baby was mine.”
“I’m sorry,” I said—because I was. He was a murderous psychopath, but he’d loved his wife, and it sounded like he’d wanted the child. A discovery like that could make anyone lose their grip on reality.
“What did Ford do to you?” I pressed. “Why pin Dad’s murder on him?”
“Ford was the one who set them up.”
“Set them up? What do you mean? Like on a date?” I couldn’t make that picture work in my head.
Ford had his failings, but I couldn’t see him helping our father commit adultery with the wife of someone he’d considered a friend.
“I don’t believe you. Ford was your friend. He still thinks he’s your friend.”
“I’m not fucking done with Ford,” Cole spit out. “But he’ll know exactly where we stand before the end.”
“So, what do you mean he set them up?”
“The charity event they co-hosted. It was Ford’s idea,” Cole said, voice flat. “Ford was the reason they spent so much time together. Went hiking, had lunch?—”
“Fell in love,” I finished quietly.
“Fuck love,” Cole snapped. “Your father didn’t know what love was. He knew power and manipulation. He didn’t understand love—what it is to die for someone or kill for them.”
I’m not sure you do either , I thought to myself. But remembering his comment about Anna Novak’s smart mouth, I kept mine shut.
“Ford could be flattered into not paying attention,” Cole went on. “Your father—well, he’d do anything if it profited him. But Griffen was more complicated. I could already see it, even at twenty-two. Then he was out of the way?—”
“Out of the way of what?” I interrupted.
“Of whatever Prentice and Edgar, and I wanted to do.”