Chapter Three #2
Her dark eyes narrowed, and she pursed her lips. “Now I know how Mac feels when he shares words of wisdom. You’re not alone, Liam.”
A part of him always believed Chelsea blamed him whenever she wasn’t with Julia. He couldn’t fathom the level of her resentment now. “No one knows how I feel.”
“I do. I promise you.”
Liam glowered. “You can’t.”
She snorted. “Why’s that?”
“Because…” His fists balled at his side. “Because I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
Her dark eyes widened and jaw dropped. “Liam—”
“I should’ve been able to stop it.” He paced the small width of the bedroom with the day’s smiles and laughter mocking him. The celebration echoed in his thoughts, reminding him of pain he had learned to cope with over the past year.
“You can’t do that to yourself,” she whispered.
“I can.” He stopped. “And I deserve it.”
“Can you please cut the empathetic bull-cocky?”
“I don’t think I should.” He rubbed his temples and shook his head. “Leave. Before I say something I shouldn’t.”
She crossed her arms, and her jaw set. Dark eyes narrowed as though she might pounce. “Has anyone told you to shut up yet?”
His chin snapped up. “What?”
“Because maybe that’s what you need.” Her lips pursed. “Someone to tell you to stop with the selfish woe-is-me pity party.”
He drew back then shook off his shock. “You have no idea what I need.”
She stepped closer. “I know this wasn’t your fault.”
The hell it wasn’t. “Chelsea, go.”
She inched even closer. “You did everything you were supposed to do.”
“You have no idea what I did.” He never spoke about the shooting. The nightly news reports didn’t do justice in their condensed, minute-long explanation of the worst night of his life. Chelsea didn’t know what he’d said, what he promised. She didn’t know shit.
He stalked to the door and threw it wide. “Get out.”
Chelsea’s bravado cracked. He couldn’t pinpoint how.
Maybe he saw a minute detail like her eyelashes flutter or her frown deepen.
Whatever he’d noticed, for a moment, he saw past the unaffected woman ordering him to get over the past. Her loss, loneliness, and sorrow weighed heavily against his chest, and Liam deflated.
He tilted his head and urged her out of the bedroom. “I just need to be alone.”
She met his gaze like she wanted to read his mind, and her voice lowered, “You’ll always have her. Even when you stop blaming yourself.”
He didn’t know what to say.
Then again, he didn’t have to. She left as quickly as she’d come in, and he was left in the wake of her words.
Exhausted, he pivoted and noticed the manila envelope on the ground. He wanted to forget Chelsea’s unsolicited advice and scooped the envelope off the floor. After another inspection for a return address, Liam tore it open.
Paperwork slid out. His stomach turned as he caught a glimpse of a crime scene report. Sweat pricked the back of his neck, and again Liam checked the envelope.
Shaking, he moved to a small desk and chair by the window and dropped onto the seat, then like a sadist readying for a painful fix, he picked up the contents and knew the horror he was about to relive: photocopies of original handwritten accounts taken from the scene, an evidence list, and a bureaucracy’s worth of heartache from the FBI, DHS, Capitol Hill, and the Metro police. But he didn’t know why.
“Everyone has something to say.” He skimmed the first page then the second. For twelve months, he’d avoided most of the public reports and media, only sitting through necessary conversations with law enforcement.
Eyewitness accounts said as much as he’d expected. No one had pinpointed the older man as an additional shooter, and every agency known to man had assured him there wasn’t an old man with dark eyes and salt-and-pepper hair.
Liam flipped to another page. Uncertainty twisted in his stomach. A shadowy picture showed a person stepping from the depths of a tunnel. Scrutinizing the poor photo, Liam narrowed his eyes, but it was impossible to see details.
The next page was an enlargement, too blurred to do any good. Then Liam flipped another page. The shadowed figured stepped up a ladder. The following picture showed that he’d slipped off his coat and added a hat.
“What the hell…?”
He rechecked the back of the pictures but found no label, no detail on who had tagged them as evidence. But there was a time stamp and a platform location.
The pictures came in sequential order, seconds apart. He shuffled the pile of papers of the reports he’d skimmed. Police reports detailed each 911 call. Liam checked the time stamps. Two minutes had elapsed between the first call and the man emerging from the tunnels.
A chill spiked over Liam’s skin, and he scattered the pages on the desk, haphazardly sorting them into piles: police reports, threat assessments, eyewitness statements, and photographs.
This man in the photographs was the old man, the guy Liam was told hadn’t been on the train. He hadn’t given a witness statement because he must’ve stepped out at a previous station. At least that was what investigators told him.
He rechecked the piles—still no ballistics report. Why was that impossible to get a hold of? That would have proved that the man Liam attacked hadn’t shot Julia. His weapon hadn’t discharged, or some other idiotic excuse he’d heard.
There was another shooter. And suddenly the missing old man and these pictures confirmed his sanity. Maybe Liam wasn’t to blame after all.
But why…?
He grabbed the manila envelope and rushed into the hall. The house was quiet. He checked the dining room and the living room but didn’t find anyone, not even the Nymans. The side door to the expansive backyard opened, and he spun around.
Chelsea jumped then rolled her eyes. “Jeez, Liam. You almost scared the vanilla wafers out of me.”
“Where did this come from?” He held the envelope upright.
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?” He shook it as though she needed to look again. “Where it came from or who it’s from?”
“Both.” Chelsea walked to the kitchen sink and pulled open the cabinet. She pulled a new trash bag free and lined the can then slid the can back into place. “What’s going on with you?”
He searched the kitchen wildly as if it could offer answers. “Where are Linda and Frank?”
“I’m not sure you should bother them like this.”
“Like what?” He stared at his name on the envelope.
“Like you’re losing your mind.”
His jaw clenched. “Where are they?”
“Probably relaxing. Which you might want to consider.”
He ignored Chelsea and paced. Who would have this?
He could call the FBI agent who had taken his statement. Maybe he could call in a favor at work. But dammit, his contacts were rooted soundly in war zones, not in the city of agencies and red tape. He had absolutely zero connections in the United States.
Except for… he turned.
Except for Chelsea.