Chapter 44
Kelsi
After McGuinness left, Kelsi and Sheridan sat for a few minutes in tense silence. Her limbs trembled as the adrenaline slowly faded from her system. Her head still throbbed dully, and exhaustion hit her like a sledgehammer.
She couldn’t allow herself to succumb to the lingering effects of the drug, however, with Sheridan still in the room and her bound to the chair, waiting for McGuinness to return and tell her what happened to Dylan.
Kelsi eyed Sheridan, taking in his hunched shoulders and defeated posture as he rested his head in his hands, elbows on the surface of the table. Gone was the confident, charismatic man she thought she’d known. How much of his persona with her had been real, and how much had been fake?
“It’s not too late, you know,” she said softly.
He raised his head, his bloodshot and red-rimmed amber eyes skating over hers. “Isn’t it, though?” He snorted a brief, dark laugh without any amusement. His head fell back on his shoulders, and he stared up at the ceiling.
“Of course it isn’t.” She scoffed at him, wanting him to look at her again.
For him to have to look her in the eyes while he told her he could do nothing to save her.
“It’s only too late when I’m dead and you can do nothing else to save me.
You can still escape charges for my first-degree murder that McGuinness is gearing up for, so long as you do something to prevent it. ”
Maybe a rational legal argument would get through to him, if he really thought his life was over. It was disconcerting talking so matter-of-factly about her own murder, though.
“I’m still in for the kidnapping and obstruction of justice.
” He sighed deeply. “Once you add in the countless instances of tampering with evidence, destruction of police records, and accepting bribes from him?” He shook his head as he tipped it forward to look at her once more.
His eyes were watery, regret shining brightly in them beneath the skylight.
“That’s probably a handful of felonies, multiple misdemeanors, and years in prison.
Losing my job wouldn’t even rank on the worst of my consequences. ”
“So, that’s it? You play the part of my friend, only to help kill me?”
He stared at her, his eyes begging her to understand. A single tear escaped, and her eyes traced its slow path down his cheek before she looked away in disgust.
“Kelsi, please believe me when I say I’m sorry, that I regret ever going to him in the first place. If I could go back, I’d do everything differently.”
“Don’t talk to me about regrets, Sheridan. If you truly regretted helping him, you would cut me free now and help me send his psychotic ass to prison for twenty to thirty. Minimum.”
“I can’t do that.” His voice was beseeching. “If I do now, he’ll ruin me. I’ll go down for helping him with everything. I’ll go to jail, and I have more enemies than him, K. I owe a lot of people.”
The use of her nickname while telling her he was going to let her die sent her rage spiraling out of control. “You disgust me,” she spat, enunciating every syllable at him.
He flinched.
Good, let him hurt.
“What did you give me to knock me out?”
“Chloroform,” he whispered.
“How original,” she deadpanned. “And your wife? Does she know any of this? If she didn’t know about you asking me out, I’m sure she doesn’t know about your helping a murderer.”
“She doesn’t know. She knows I have gambling problems. That’s why we separated in the first place. She left me when she found out how much I owed.”
“Wow, you’re a real winner, Sheridan.”
His shoulders hunched over as he folded in on himself, and she looked away from his self-inflicted misery.
They sat in silence again, before Sheridan released a defeated sigh.
He stood and slowly walked to the door. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him pause at the threshold.
His hand gripped the frame, knuckles white, and he looked back at her.
“It was you or me, Kelsi. And I was always going to choose myself.” He watched her for a long moment before he hung his head and walked out.
He returned not a minute later, a syringe in hand with clear liquid in the chamber. Although she struggled where she was bound, she couldn’t escape as he stuck it in her arm and pressed the plunger down, injecting her with the contents.
“I’m sorry. This will make it easier for both of us,” he whispered to her before leaving her alone.
All she had left was hope that Dylan and Abby would be looking for her and that someone would find her. Preferably before McGuinness came back.
She tried tugging on her zip ties once more, but the only result was her wrists chafing more. Every movement sent ripples of agony through her. She tipped her head back and looked out the skylight to a powder-blue sky, no clouds in sight. She thought to herself that it was a beautiful day to die.
Her head spun with the effects of whatever concoction Sheridan had injected her with.
And before her mind slipped into oblivion again, she pictured Dylan’s face the night before when they finally got the truth out in the open.
His smile at her when she left came to the forefront of her mind.
She only regretted that in their time together, she hadn’t told him the true depth of her feelings.
So she did it now, whispering to the blue-eyed man in her mind, who had taken up the majority of her life, I love you, before everything faded to black.