by Darcy Burke
All color drained from her face.
“Consider your employment terminated, effective immediately. And don’t bother coming to pack up your desk. I’ll have the police do it after they’ve finished searching it.”
Her eyes widened, and for the first time he saw a spark of fear. Good.
He turned and left, slamming her front door behind him.
As he drove to the tiny Ribbon Ridge police station, he couldn’t stop thinking about what Natalie had said about Maggie and how much that had pissed him off. Why had he ever blamed her? Because they’d all needed someone to be angry at and she’d fit the bill. Because for them to be angry at the person who really deserved it—Alex—had been too hard to contemplate.
Plus, he hadn’t known her. Hadn’t seen her caring and compassionate nature. Hadn’t experienced first-hand the lengths she went to in order to help someone. He didn’t blame Maggie. His family shouldn’t blame her either. Yet they would, at least right away.
Dad was going to be devastated when he found out about Natalie. What would he be if he learned that Kyle was falling in love with Alex’s therapist?
Devastated wouldn’t even begin to describe it.
Chapter Fifteen
MAGGIE SET THE last book on the shelf in her office and stood back to survey the results. Another box empty. Another room nearly organized. She picked up her glass of wine from the desk and silently toasted herself as she glanced at the clock on her computer—just after nine. She was surprised she was still going strong after such a long, physical weekend, but she felt great. Better than she had in years.
It might have been the best weekend of her adult life if things with Kyle hadn’t imploded. Or whatever they’d done. He’d come back to the cottage this morning and helped out, but by noon they’d finished everything they could without starting the sprinklers, and he’d taken off with everyone else, which had surprised her.
She’d texted him a couple of times, but he hadn’t responded. She was dying to know what he’d done regarding Natalie. Had he gone to see her after he’d left yesterday? What about the police? Was he okay?
She set her glass down and picked up her phone. No texts. With a sigh, she went to open another box. A sharp knock on her front door gave her a shock of relief. That had to be Kyle.
Hurrying to the door, she smiled when she saw him, but her happiness quickly turned to apprehension as she took in the tense set of his jaw and the lost look in his eyes.
She gestured for him to enter and closed the door behind him. “I’ve been trying to reach you.”
“I know.” He walked farther into the living room.
She sensed his unease but didn’t want to scare him off. He’d come to see her, though, which meant he probably wanted to talk. She’d let him take the lead. “How are you?”
He ran his hand through his hair, the number one sign that he was upset. “I’m not sure the police are going to be able to prosecute Natalie.”
Outrage bloomed in Maggie’s chest and spread angry heat through her body. She went to stand in front of him. “Why not?”
He looked utterly defeated, like every bit of enthusiasm and charm that made him Kyle Archer had been sucked away. “The e-mails alone aren’t enough. Ideally, they want to find drugs in her possession or a clear trail of her activities.”
Maggie wanted to scream. “But Alex died from drugs she sold him.”
“That doesn’t mean they’re the ones he got from her—it’s circumstantial.” He sounded frustrated, hopeless.
“That . . . sucks.” It was a wholly inadequate summation, but it was nonetheless true. “You don’t think she has any drugs?”
“She says she stopped dealing them after Alex died, but who knows if she’s telling the truth.” His lip curled. “But by going to see her first, I alerted her to the possibility of the police investigating. If she had any drugs, she had to have gotten rid of them.”
Maggie stroked his arm, trying to alleviate some of his pain. “Hey, don’t blame yourself. You were upset, angry. You needed to confront her.”
“Not at the cost of not being able to prosecute her.”
She dropped her hand and twined her fingers with his. “I’m so sorry.”
He withdrew from her and walked to the other side of the living room. He stood next to the fireplace and leaned his elbow on the mantle. “I was thinking of gambling, so I came here.”
He wanted her to stop him, and she could do that. “I’m glad you did. Can I get you something? A beer or a glass of wine?”
“Sure.” His eyes were downcast. “No. I mean, wait.” He looked up, and the stark confusion in his gaze pulled at her heart.
This was dangerous. She always reacted to a patient’s pain, but this was so much more because of the way she felt about him. She could easily fall in love with him, if she wasn’t already. She heard her mother’s warning, you’re too emotional, and tried to keep her head.
“Tell me what you need,” she said softly.
He turned from the mantle to face her. “I’m trying to figure out how to make this,” he said, gesturing between them, “okay with my family.”
His family. And there was the cause of his worry. He might forgive Maggie, but would they? And if they didn’t, could he choose to be with her anyway?
This conversation would be so much easier for her to stomach if she could go full therapist. So that’s exactly what she did. “You won’t know until you talk to them about it, until you open yourself up to them. You have a lot of unresolved issues with your family—and I’m not the primary one.” She didn’t say it, but she meant his addiction. It was part of him, and some of his family didn’t even know about it. And those who did were in the dark because he hadn’t discussed it fully with them.
His eyes widened with a flash of ire. “You’re saying that you’re not the problem here, I am?”
“No. I’m saying I’m not the first thing you need to address with them—your addiction is.” There, she’d said it.
His features relaxed. “You’re therapizing me again.”
Anger sparked in her brain. “Isn’t that why you came? You said you wanted to gamble but you came here instead.”
“Fuck.” He’d whispered the word, but she caught it. He turned to the side, looking toward the front window, which was covered with an outdated set of sheer drapes. “I came here to forget.”
Now he was just making her mad. “How? You wanted to screw instead of talk?” She took a deep breath, told herself not to react emotionally. “You want resolution. I know you can’t see it, but you do. Contrary to what you might think, I can’t fix you, I can only suggest how you can fix you.”
He pivoted, and she started at the coldness of his expression, the absolute ice in his gaze. “This is perfect coming from you. A therapist whose track record of fixing things, including herself, is abysmal.”
His words stung, but she reminded herself that she was counseling him and hearing the truth pissed him off. So, she smiled and quoted Amy: “Do as I say, not as I do.”
He stared at her a long moment, swore again, then started toward the door.
“Hey, where are you going?” She almost asked if he was running away again, but that would have been his not-quite girlfriend asking, not the therapist. And if she allowed herself to be his not-quite girlfriend right now, she was going to lose it completely.
“Coming here was a bad idea.”
She moved toward him, touching his elbow as his hand closed over the door handle. “You have this wound in your life from four years ago. Whatever happened to drive you away—it’s going to do it again unless you confront it and resolve it. Just make your peace with your family—with your dad and Derek—and move on.”
He didn’t turn his head, kept his body positioned toward the door in total flight mode. “You make it sound easy. It’s not.”
She moved around him and squeezed behind him and the door, pressing her back against the wood. “Tell me why.”
�
��I was in a lot of trouble.” He kept his gaze averted from hers. “I owed Shane a shit-ton of money.”
“How much is a shit-ton?” It really didn’t matter, but the more specific he was, the more honest he would be—with her and with himself.
His gaze flicked to hers. “Thirty grand.”
Holy shit. She exhaled and schooled her features to keep from showing a reaction. “What happened?”
“Derek knew I was gambling. He’d met Shane a few times. I was late with payments, and I ended up with a black eye.”
She lost the reins on her counseling for a moment as she recalled the beefy build of his former bookie. “From Shane?” How could he remain friendly with a guy who’d beaten him up?
Kyle shook his head. “One of his associates. Shane did everything he could to keep me safe, but it was too much money. Derek figured it out—the bruises, my behavior—and talked to Shane. Then he told my dad, who paid it off.”
She didn’t have to ask what had happened next. Kyle had been livid with Derek for telling his father. He’d struggled with being the Archer who just wasn’t good enough—no college degree, no successful career path, with or without the family company . . . and then this utter failure. He’d seen no choice but to run as far away as he could.
“You’ve never discussed this with them,” she said softly.
“No.” His voice was tight, strained. “I still get so angry.”
“Understandably so. Can I ask . . . what did you do in Florida? Did you get treatment at all?”
He let his hand fall from the doorknob. “I went to Gamblers Anonymous meetings for a while. That whole situation with Shane scared the shit out of me, and I never thought I’d do it again.”
“But you did.”
His answering nod was almost imperceptible. “When Alex died. I came home for the funeral and for the reading of the trust. Everyone was so sad and angry. It was like the situation I’d escaped had worsened, intensified.”
“So you went back to Florida and looked for a way to lighten the load.”
He looked at her like he had once before—like she was the only person who truly understood. “Yes.”
The relief in his voice made her want to hug him, but not yet. She was getting somewhere, and she wasn’t ready to stop. “How much did you lose?”
“I don’t know. It was fast—two months and I had to sell most of my stuff and then my car.”
“What about your trust fund?” She knew all of the Archer kids had one from their paternal grandfather—except Derek, as he’d joined the family after Benjamin Archer had died.
Kyle’s eyes widened briefly, and his nostrils flared. “You know about that?”
Crap. She shouldn’t have said anything. She’d gotten too deep into the therapy session. “Forget I asked.”
He exhaled sharply. “No, it’s fine. We all inherited at twenty-five—but you probably know that. Except me. Dad was the trustee, and he changed the terms of my trust. I get the money whenever he sees fit. Which means never.”
She couldn’t stand it anymore. She reached up and touched his jaw. “I doubt that. You have to talk to him. Tell him why you gambled, how you struggle with it in terms of your place in the family. Help him understand so that he can support you.”
He exhaled. “I don’t know if I can. And Derek . . . I felt so betrayed. I only ever wanted him to apologize, to understand that what he did hurt. We were best friends and brothers—nobody was closer to me. Nobody should’ve understood me more.”
She moved her hand to the side of his neck and then down, lightly massaging his shoulder. “Have you asked yourself what would’ve happened if he hadn’t stuck his nose in?” She purposely used words that Kyle would to characterize the situation—she didn’t want to lose him now.
His gaze darkened, and his mouth tightened. “I had a plan. I had the trust fund coming in just over a year. Shane knew he was going to get paid, and he was working on convincing the other guys. I didn’t need Derek’s ‘help.’ He completely fucked everything up, especially with my Dad, and he never even said sorry.”
“I don’t disagree that Derek owes you an apology.” At the very least, he could’ve told Kyle what he’d planned to do instead of going directly to Rob. “However,” she said, taking another deep breath, knowing there would be a storm coming, “you also owe him a thank-you. Whether you could’ve paid that money back isn’t the issue. Derek gave you a wake-up call that put a stop to your gambling, and he did it in the face of your denial. That is friendship, Kyle. That is family. That is love.”
He stared at her, his expression inscrutable, and she held her breath.
“You can wait forever for him to apologize, or you can be the one to end this rift.”
Finally, emotion entered his gaze, but it was anger. “I should be the one to make things right? Because I’m always the one in the wrong. I’m the fuckup. I’m so glad to hear that you’re no different than the others. Great therapy session. Thanks, doc.”
He pulled the door open, heedless of her having to jump out of the way, and strode through, slamming it behind him.
The vitriol in his tone pricked her skin like tiny razor blades. She was breathing hard, as if she’d run a mile.
His words rang in her brain: I’m the fuckup. But she wasn’t thinking of him. She was thinking of herself.
She’d endured a horrid relationship and chosen a career that she really didn’t like. And for what? Because she was a fuckup? No, because she’d been rebelling. Mom said Mark was awful, so Maggie embraced him harder. Mom said counseling would ruin her, that she’d never withstand the emotional strain, so she’d worked her ass off and graduated a year early.
You can wait forever for her to apologize, or you can be the one to end this rift.
Her advice came back to haunt her. It might not be a rift with her mother, but it was some sort of chasm—a space she kept between them so that Maggie could say she’d never be like her. But why? Maggie had grown up loved and cared for—unconventionally—but she hadn’t been abused or physically neglected. So her parents hadn’t always been there emotionally. Maggie had turned out all right. Did she want to spend the rest of her life holding a grudge, or did she want to try to find some common ground?
She locked the door and tried not to think of the hurtful things Kyle had said. He was angry, upset, and maybe—maybe—coming to terms with what he needed to do. She’d be here for him when he needed her.
If he still wanted her.
Chapter Sixteen
KYLE SPENT A mostly sleepless night after leaving Maggie’s. As he unlocked the door at Archer Enterprises and disabled the alarm, he yawned as if he could swallow the world. Exhausted, he double-timed it up the stairs to make some coffee.
He’d never been in the office this early. What was it, five o’clock? He glanced at the clock near the coffee pot. Just barely.
Once he had the coffee brewing, he turned and looked at Natalie’s workstation. He wanted so badly to search every nook and cranny, but the police captain said he preferred for Kyle to leave it alone until they could get here at nine.
Kyle had spent half of yesterday at the police station. They’d called him after obtaining a warrant and searching Natalie’s house. Unfortunately, they hadn’t found any drug-related evidence and couldn’t press charges against Natalie. They’d impounded her cell phone and laptop, both of which had met with tragic accidents involving water and extreme droppage since Kyle had stupidly visited her. And no, that wasn’t suspicious.
But given how lazy she’d been regarding her e-mails with Alex, Kyle was certain there had to be something incriminating on the Archer servers. The police agreed.
What the hell was he going to do for the next four fucking hours?
Talk to Dad, for one. He had to tell him why Natalie wouldn’t be here today—or ever again—and why the cops were showing up at nine. Was that all he would tell him? Or would he finally breach the topic he’d made forbidden?
Maggie h
ad made a compelling argument last night. He’d been a real jackass about it, too. He’d apologize to her. Later. He could only handle one crisis at a time.
By the time Dad arrived at eight thirty, Kyle had downed two pots of coffee. He’d staved off the exhaustion but now felt as jittery as if he held a full house, aces high, in the World Tournament of Poker. He got up from the couch in Dad’s office as Dad came inside.
Dad stopped short in surprise. “Kyle. I didn’t know you were in here.” He glanced back at Paula, but she shook her head.
“I’ve been here a while. Can I have a few minutes?”
“Sure.” Dad came further into the office and circled around his desk as Kyle closed the door. “Everything all right?”
“No.” Why sugarcoat it? Kyle steeled himself. “I’ve been working on something the last few weeks. Something I thought would help us—you especially—deal with Alex’s death.”
Dad’s face turned a bit gray. “I’d rather not discuss this.”
He moved closer to the desk. “I know, but hear me out. I wanted to find out who sold Alex the drugs.”
Dad’s eyes widened, and his pallor faded even more. He sank into his chair as if he simply couldn’t bear his own weight any longer. Kyle wished the worst wasn’t yet to come.
“And did you?” His voice sounded like a croak.
Kyle sat in one of the chairs on the other side of the desk, his body tense. “Yes. I wish it had been someone else, but—”
“You’re not going to say it was you?” Dad went fully white. His hand covered his mouth.
Kyle blinked at him, uncomprehending of what he’d said for a moment. Then it hit him like a fist to the gut. Repeatedly. Over and over, the accusation swung at him like a merciless heavyweight going in for the knockout. “No.” The word was barely audible.