CHAPTER TEN #3
Eleanor immediately sank back onto the sofa, burying her face in her hands, overwhelmed by the sheer ugliness of the last hour. Arthur moved to sit beside her, wrapping a protective arm around her shoulders.
Grayson stood frozen in the center of the room, staring at the spot where Olivia had just been standing. He felt hollowed out.
"Well," Ryder said softly, pushing himself off the bookshelf.
He walked slowly toward the center of the room, his eyes fixed on his older brother. The anger he had held back in front of the Winters family was finally beginning to bleed through his carefully maintained composure.
"Grayson," Ryder began, his voice perfectly level, but carrying a sharp, dangerous edge. "Before we close this disastrous chapter, there is something we need to discuss."
Grayson turned his head, his brow furrowing at the tone. "What is it?"
"Why did you tell Olivia that you suspected Kennedy?" Ryder asked the question hanging in the air like a poised guillotine.
Grayson flinched. He looked away, rubbing the back of his neck, the shame instantly returning. "I was overwhelmed, Ryder. I wasn't thinking clearly. Olivia asked me if I suspected anyone, and… the name just slipped out. I tried to walk it back. I told her we had no proof."
"It didn't matter if you tried to walk it back," Ryder stated coldly. "You handed a loaded gun to a woman who was already convinced that Kennedy was the enemy."
"What are you saying?" Arthur asked, looking up from the sofa, his sharp instincts picking up on the sudden shift in his youngest son’s demeanor.
Ryder didn't look at his parents. He kept his eyes locked on Grayson. "Do you know what Olivia did with the suspicion you handed her, Grayson?"
Grayson’s stomach plummeted. The fear was sudden and visceral. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that after you told her your suspicions, Olivia drove to the Lockhart estate," Ryder said, his voice dropping into a lethal, quiet register that commanded the attention of everyone in the room.
"She marched into their grand foyer. She screamed at Kennedy.
She called her a criminal. And then, she slapped her. "
Eleanor gasped, her head snapping up. "She struck Kennedy?"
"Hard enough to draw blood," Ryder confirmed grimly, watching the color rapidly drain from his brother’s face. "Hard enough to split her cheek open with a ring. Margaret and John had to threaten to have her arrested to get her out of the house."
Grayson went terrifyingly still. The air vanished from his lungs.
She hit Kennedy. The words didn't make sense.
Olivia was gentle. Olivia was sweet. The idea of her committing physical violence against anyone was absurd, but the idea of her striking Kennedy—while Kennedy was innocent, while Kennedy was drowning in the trauma of his own accusations—was abhorrent.
"No," Grayson whispered, shaking his head, a sickening wave of vertigo washing over him.
"Yes," Ryder countered, taking a step closer, refusing to let Grayson look away from the consequences of his actions. "But that isn't the worst part."
Grayson’s heart hammered a frantic, painful rhythm against his ribs. "What?"
"The betrayal of you feeding her to the wolves, combined with the physical shock of the assault…
" Ryder paused, his throat tightening as he remembered Spencer’s devastated face on the portico.
"It broke her, Grayson. Kennedy collapsed in the foyer the moment Olivia left.
She is currently lying in her bed next door, unconscious. "
The news hit the Ashford-Wales like a physical detonation.
Eleanor let out a sharp cry, burying her face in Arthur’s chest. Arthur closed his eyes, a look of agonizing devastation settling over his aged features.
They loved Kennedy. She was practically a daughter to them.
To hear that she had been assaulted by the woman they had welcomed into their home, and that she was now lying unconscious, was unbearable.
But for Grayson, the guilt that had been slowly eating him alive was suddenly, violently obliterated, replaced by something infinitely sharper and far more immediate.
Fear.
Pure, unadulterated, blinding terror.
His legs gave out. He stumbled backward, catching the edge of his father’s desk to keep from hitting the floor. He couldn't breathe. His vision tunneled.
She is unconscious.
For the first time since the night of the anniversary party, Grayson wasn't thinking about Olivia. He wasn't thinking about the drug, or the betrayal of the Winters family, or the scandal that was about to rock their quiet coastal town.
He was thinking about the girl who used to race him on horseback. The woman who had laughed at his jokes when no one else did. The fierce, untouchable heiress whose spirit he had personally, systematically shattered.
Grayson stared at Ryder, his eyes wide and filled with a desperate, crushing horror, suddenly realizing that even if he spent the rest of his life trying to apologize, Kennedy Lockhart might never open her eyes to hear him.