by Claire Raye
“Really?” Caleb snaps, already on the defensive. “Where were you when you found my father beaten to a pulp in the street? Where were you when the nurses at the hospital tried to tell you he was going to die because of his injuries? When they explained that he didn’t just fall down because he was drunk?”
Each question is delivered like a punch to the gut and I try not to gasp in shock. This is the first I’m hearing of any of this, but I don’t dare allow the officers to see my reaction. They know far too much about our private life already.
“We understand your concern and we apologize for not taking the threat seriously,” Thomas says, but there’s little sincerity to his words and if he’s trying to get us to trust him, he’s failing miserably. A part of me wants to call Reid and ask him what he knows, beg him to come over and help me with all of this.
“What makes you think you need to take it seriously now?” I ask, waiting for them to hit us with something to show they’re truly on our side, that they’re honestly looking to end the career of one of New England’s biggest loan sharks.
The room falls silent and Thomas looks at Greg, neither speaking and the tension in the room builds until it’s pushing on all of us. It’s making me feel like Caleb and I might snap, like we’ll admit everything we’ve held inside for so long.
Caleb knows far more than I do, but I don’t know who he’s protecting anymore. Our father is dead, Caleb’s a shell of his former self, and now that Reid and I are back, it puts us all at risk.
“Ray Bowen killed our father and he tried to kill my brother,” I spit out, Caleb slamming a hand down on the table, as his head whips around to glare at me, rage now burning in his eyes.
“Sienna!” he hisses, his word harsh and loud as it rings throughout the house. He wants to shame me, wants to tell me to shut up, but I see the defeat in his eyes, his shoulders nearly sagging with the weight of my admittance. He doesn’t have to carry it any longer.
“That’s all we needed to hear,” Thomas announces. “With what we have from Bowen’s son…” That’s the last thing I hear, my world suddenly going hazy as I realize the impact of what they just said.
Reid turned his father in.
Chapter Eleven
Reid
I’ve been at the police station for hours, the clock on the wall of the interview room telling me it’s now after seven p.m. There are no windows in this room though, so it’s hard to tell. I pull my phone from my pocket, but it’s switched off from when I came in here and I can’t be bothered to turn it back on. I’m sure it’s going to be filled with messages from my dad asking me where I am. Messages probably saying far worse if he’s been inside his office and discovered what I’ve done.
So, I leave it switched off, too fucking exhausted at this point to deal with his shit. I know it’s coming eventually, and I know it’s not going to be pretty, but for now, all I want to do is ignore him, get the fuck out of here and go see Sienna and Caleb.
God, I hope they are okay. The detective who made the call when I first came in here, assured me that someone would be with them at all times and they would be okay, but I hated being apart from them, not knowing for sure if they were safe or not.
I couldn’t bear the thought of something happening to them, something worse than what has already happened, which is pretty fucking bad. I’d never be able to live with myself if my actions today caused anything to happen to them.
“Okay, Reid,” Detective O’Connor says as he walks back into the room. “We just have a couple more things we need to ask you and then I think we’re done.”
I look up as he slides a can of coke across the table toward me. He’s been in and out of this room all afternoon, alternating between questioning me and going back out to talk to his colleagues or whatever else it is he needs to do.
He’s actually been pretty nice though, totally understanding of my paranoia to check that Sienna and Caleb are safe. I get the feeling my dad is pretty well known to him already and it makes me sick to think of what he might know that I don’t. Just how fucking bad is my dad?
They took all the stuff I stole from his office hours ago, but I notice this time Detective O’Connor comes into the room, he’s carrying the black leather book and the envelopes I didn’t look inside. They’re all open now and I have no idea what they could hold.
I let out a long exhale as I crack the tab on the can and take a long sip. “What is it you need to know?” I ask, scrubbing a hand across my jaw. I really need to shave; I don’t think I have since Sienna and I left Hawthorn, which feels like months ago now.
“These entries,” he says, opening to a random page and running a finger down the list of names and contact details. “Do any of them stand out to you? People you might know?”
I shake my head. “No, the only one I know is Mickey Parker,” I tell him. “I told you that, it’s why you need to protect Sienna and Caleb, they’re in danger in all of this too, especially after what—”
Detective O’Connor holds a hand up. “They’re safe, Reid, I give you my word.” I watch as he turns to the last page of entries in the book, his hand moving down the list until it gets to Caleb’s name. “So you don’t think your friend had any dealings with your father?” he asks.
I shake my head in frustration, shoving a hand through my hair. I have no fucking idea what Caleb has been up to in the two years since we left or in the two weeks since his dad died. “No, I don’t think so. Caleb isn’t stupid and he wouldn’t do anything illegal either.”
Detective O’Connor nods his head once before sliding the opened envelopes so they are in front of him. He searches through them until he finds the one he wants and then pauses, looking up at me. “I’m going to show you some things,” he says. “These may not be easy to look at, but I need you to confirm a couple of things for me.
I nod, swallowing hard against the bile that’s suddenly working its way up my throat.
Detective O’Connor offers me a sympathetic smile before pulling out what looks like a polaroid picture. He puts it face down on the table and moves it so it’s between us. “Do you know who this is?” he asks, before flipping it over.
I glance down at the picture, see the image of a bloodied man lying in a gutter. He looks older than I remember, as though he’s aged twenty years in the two we’ve been away. I nod.
“I need to hear you say it,” he says.
Taking a deep breath, I say, “It’s Mickey Parker. It’s Caleb and Sienna’s father.”
Detective O’Connor nods before pulling something else from the envelope, a slip of paper which he now puts between us. My eyes scan it, realizing it’s a loan pink slip, made out for a million dollars to Mickey. It’s signed at the bottom by him, dated almost five years ago. Underneath it though, is a new signature and date. It’s dated from the day before Sienna and I got into Providence.
“Is this Caleb’s signature?” Detective O’Connor asks, pointing to the second one under Mickey’s.
I shrug. “I don’t know,” I answer truthfully, not sure I’ve ever seen Caleb sign anything. “But even if it is, it doesn’t mean he had a choice.”
“No, we don’t expect any of the people in this book had a choice,” he says, offering me another sympathetic smile. “It’s not Caleb we’re after, Reid, I promise you. He’s safe in all of this.”
I exhale, knowing there’s only one man they are out to get.
“We actually think he was probably forced to take over Mickey’s debt when he died. We think the beating was a warning, a reminder of what would happen if he didn’t make the repayments.”
“Shit,” I mutter, elbows propped on the table as I bury my face in my hands. That date on the pink slip is for the day before Sienna and I got back to Providence. It’s like a knife to the heart to know that while we were having the time of our lives driving back here, this was happening to Caleb. We didn’t even take the quickest route possible, detouring along the way because we were having so much fun, not even thinki
ng about Caleb and what he might have been going through.
If we’d just come home sooner, maybe we could have…
“There’s one more picture, Reid,” Detective O’Connor says, interrupting my thoughts. I hear the sound of something sliding across the table.
I force myself to open my eyes, to stare down at the new picture that’s in front of me. It takes everything I have in me not to scream, not to get up and throw this fucking chair I’m sitting on across the room. I don’t need to look at the picture, because I walked into the live version of it six days ago.
Caleb, broken, bloodied and bruised. Lying on the floor of his house. His eyes swollen shut, his lip split, three cracked ribs and a broken wrist.
All courtesy of my father, Raymond Bowen.
“Your friend, Caleb, right?” Detective O’Connor asks, his voice low.
I stare at the photo, unable to tear my eyes away even as the nausea churns in my gut, as the nightmares of that night flash through my brain. I want to punch something, want to yell and scream and pound my fists. But most of all, I want to kill my dad for doing this to Caleb, for fucking up everything.
“Reid,” he says quietly, before he pulls the picture back.
“Yeah,” I eventually say, the word catching. “That’s Caleb.”
He nods, before slipping the two polaroids and the pink slip back into the envelope. “Okay, I think that’s enough for today. It would be nice if we had the weapons to go with all of this, but this is certainly enough for a search warrant.”
It takes a second for his words to register, but as soon as they do, I’m pulling my phone from my pocket and finally switching it back on. “There are weapons,” I tell him. “I didn’t want to touch them, but I took photos.” I pull up the camera app, scrolling through till I find the one of the second drawer. Turning my phone, I show him what else was in my dad’s office.
He takes my phone, his eyes widening a little as he looks at the picture. “I’ll need to take this,” he says.
“No,” I shout, snatching my phone back. “I’ll send you the picture, whatever you want, but you can’t take my phone,” I say, knowing this is my only lifeline to Sienna at the moment. Not just as a way to talk to her, but because it contains all the memories of the six days we spent on the road together too. And I can’t lose those.
“Okay,” he says, even though I get the feeling this isn’t what he wants. But he tells me his number, which I save in my contacts before texting him the photos I have of the second drawer and the jewelry in the safe, ignoring the ten voicemails that now pop up on my screen. All from the same number.
When his phone confirms the received text, he nods once before slipping it into his pocket. “Alright,” he says, pushing back his chair and standing. “We need to get you some place safe.”
“Wait, where?” I ask, standing. “I need to see Sienna and Caleb.” My words are a demand of panic and fear and desperation. “I can’t—”
“You are not going home, Reid,” he says, cutting me off. “Your father is going to be arrested, your house will be searched and there is absolutely no way I am having you anywhere near that situation.” There’s a firmness to his tone, like he knows I’m rarely told no and he stares at me, glaring and obvious. “I cannot underestimate how dangerous this situation is right now.”
“I get it,” I tell him, having no desire to be anywhere near it either. I’ll go stay with Sienna and Caleb,” I add. “I want…” I exhale, trying to decide what I want to say. “I mean I need to know—”
“Reid,” he says, cutting me off. He waits for me to stop talking, his eyes meeting mine as he stands across the table from me, my father’s book tucked under his arm. “Caleb and Sienna will be taken to a safe house.” His words are measured as though he wants to be clear on what he’s saying here, as though there’s more to story, things he isn’t telling me. “They aren’t safe either, not with this information now out there,” he continues. “The police have been with them all afternoon and they’re being taken somewhere safe, somewhere your father can’t reach them.”
I swallow hard as the full implication of just how dangerous my father really is, hits me. It’s like a punch in the gut, winding me and I have to grab the back of the chair just to steady myself. “Are they there now?” I ask, my voice sounding strange.
Detective O’Connor shakes his head. “Not yet, but they will be soon.”
“And me, where…where am I…”
He smiles at me now. “We can take you to them,” he says. “Unless you’d prefer…”
“No,” I immediately say. “I want to be with them.”
He nods and before either of us can move, my phone suddenly rings, the noise startling both of us. I glance down at the screen, see my father’s name now flashing across it as the sound of his incoming call continues to echo around the room.
“Don’t answer that,” Detective O’Connor immediately says.
I shake my head, silencing the call before switching my phone off.
“Reid, if you want to hang on to that phone,” he says, leveling me with a hard look. “I suggest you keep it off at all times. I’m not sure what your father has access to, but the last thing we need is him tracking you down because I let you hang onto your phone.”
“I won’t use it,” I tell him, wondering if I’ll be able to keep that promise. Maybe if I’m with Sienna, then I won’t need to message her anymore.
Detective O’Connor nods once before making his way over to the door. “You ready to get out of here?” he asks me.
I let out a long breath, shoving my phone back into my pocket. “Hell yes,” I tell him.
He smiles now and gives me a look that almost gives the appearance of pride or something. “Okay, we’re going to have someone drive you over,” he says as he walks out of the room. “We’re going to need to keep your car here in the police garage for now. You won’t need it where you’re going and besides, you’re going to have to stay inside at all times,” he firmly asserts, glancing back over his shoulder at me. “We can’t have you going out and risk being seen by Ray or one of his men, got it?”
“Got it,” I say, nodding.
“This should all be over in a day or so,” he continues as we walk along a corridor to a large open plan office. “Once your father is in custody, you should be free to go back to your house and a normal life.”
I scoff, following behind until we reach his desk, where he dumps the stuff I’d given him earlier. “Not planning on going back there,” I tell him. “It was never a normal life in that house.”
“Back to school then?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say, taking a deep breath. “Soon as Sienna and Caleb are ready to go, we’ll head back to Cali.” The three of us this time, because there isn’t a chance in hell Caleb isn’t coming with us. We might have left him behind once, but not this time.
“Good,” he says, smiling. “You don’t need to be messed up in this shit.” He gives me a gentle slap on the back. “But for what it’s worth,” he adds, pausing as he offers me another smile. “You did good today, Reid. Not many people would have the balls to stand up to Ray Bowen like you’ve just done. You should be proud of that.”
I shrug, trying not to let him see how much his words affect me. “I did it for them,” I say. “They’ve always been my real family.”
“Okay, anything you need before we head over to the house?”
I take another deep breath before letting it out. As much as I want to see Sienna, am desperate for it, I’m also fucking starving. I haven’t had anything to eat all day, caffeine and adrenaline the only things getting me by at this point. “Can we grab some food on the way?” I ask, figuring I can eat it on the drive to wherever this safe house is. “I’m starving.”
He chuckles. “Yep, we can certainly arrange that. Come on.”
And then we walk out to the elevators, Detective O’Connor taking me downstairs to the basement parking garage. I notice my truck is already parke
d down here. I guess they moved it here when they realized what I was coming in to do today. As we walk past it, the detective takes a set of keys from his pocket, indicating a black sedan two cars down before sliding into the driver’s side seat as I hop in the other side. And as he starts the ignition, the low rumble of the engine echoing in the underground concrete parking garage, I finally relax into my seat, knowing that for now at least, I may have actually started to fix this fucked up mess.
Chapter Twelve
Sienna
The guilt eats at me and all this time I’ve spent hating Reid was all because of my own selfishness, my own belief that all people are assholes. I knew better, but I couldn’t convince myself of it.
“Did you know about this?” I ask Caleb, the shock of what the officers said finally wearing off, but still somehow hanging on. The question is asked with seriousness, with an air of understanding that Caleb may have known and waited for me to see that Reid is exactly who we always knew him to be.
Loyal.
Loyal to us.
I allowed the person he became at Hawthorn, arrogant and careless, to cloud the fact that I still knew who he was, still understood that no matter what, we would always have each other.
“I know Reid well enough to know he wasn’t involved. It was you who couldn’t see it,” Caleb says and his words are like a slap in the face. I never gave Reid a chance. I just immediately put him in that pile of people who suck.
“I didn’t because I’m so used to being screwed over and you can’t tell me that the thought didn’t cross your mind, too,” I shoot back, attempting to defend myself but knowing it’s fruitless. It was me who was being the asshole. All this time at Hawthorn when I thought he changed, it was me who saw him differently, because I couldn’t see how much he was hurting. He did what he did because living without me was killing him and now I’ve put him back in that same situation.
“It never crossed my mind,” Caleb states, a simplicity in what he says. “I know Reid and I trust him with my life.” He lets out a hard sigh, looking at the two police officers as they make their way back toward our front door. “I don’t know what happened between the two of you, but something changed, and you need to make things right again.”