“Are you more worried about Shelby or your wife?” Reece asked softly.
“Both. I knew going into this marriage they’re a package deal, so don’t make me choose between my wife and my brother. It’s not a road I want to walk. Get your shit together, and do the right thing.”
With that, he stalked away. Several beats of silence passed.
“Wow,” Jude said finally. “I’ve never seen Cam get that angry.”
“I have,” Vaughn said. “And he has a point about Shelby. There’s something we need to talk about later, concerning the fire at The Bean Gallery.”
Jesus. He really couldn’t deal with anything more tonight. Not after the emotional sucker punch of watching his memories go up in flames, followed by that little sparring match with Cam. “Can we do it tomorrow?”
Vaughn gave one sharp nod, clapped Reece on the shoulder, and chased after his twin as fast as his walking cast allowed.
“What a fucking mess.” Reece coughed again and dragged his hands over his head. Soot rained down around him, falling loose from the strands. He stared at his hands. He was covered head-to-toe.
Jude stuffed his hands in the pockets of his leather coat and rocked back and forth on his feet. “Uh, dude. I don’t wanna make a bad situation worse, but…” He titled his head toward the road, where several media vans had gathered. “Looks like you’re going to be headlining the news tomorrow morning.”
Reece groaned. “Fuck me. That’s the last thing I need.”
“Hey, listen. I’m usually the last person to cast stones. People who live in glass houses and all that jazz.” He looked at their childhood home and winced, rubbing the heel of his palm against his chest. A bone-deep sorrow showed on his face for an instant before he smoothed out his features and glanced back at Reece. “But this whole sitch is seriously fucked up. Whatever your end game is—and I know you have one, because you always do—just make sure Shelby’s using the same playbook, all right?” And then Jude walked away, too, leaving Reece standing there on the sidewalk alone, watching the firefighters douse the last little bit of the blaze.
Chapter Eighteen
“All right. What the fuck is going on?”
Shelby flinched at the edge of anger in her sister’s voice. “Nothing.”
“This.” Eva waved at the burning house. “This is not nothing. This is so not nothing. Do you have any idea how much this is going to hurt the guys?”
Shelby glanced away from her, but her gaze landed on the four Wilde brothers standing on the sidewalk, bathed in the orangey light of their childhoods burning to the ground in front of them. She focused on Reece. The rush of relief that he was up and moving around was a fleeting thing, replaced by a gut-aching sorrow for him. She didn’t know about the rest of the Wildes, but he was hurting. That house had been his heart. His home.
And it was her fault it was gone. Her breath lodged in her throat. “This shouldn’t have happened.”
“Why did it happen?”
She looked into her sister’s face. A war of anger and worry and sorrow raged over Eva’s expression. Hurt, too, and when she glanced over at Libby, she saw the same battle. Both women were hurting because their husbands were. That was love, wasn’t it? A form of pain?
She rubbed at the heavy ache in her own chest and for one sluggish heartbeat, she considered spilling the truth, laying all her mistakes out there for the world—and her sister—to scrutinize. Could she do it? Could she finally tell Eva that years ago, she’d dated a pyromaniac who had set the neighbors’ house on fire, and her father had intervened in the worst way possible? Could she detail all the things she’d done for her father out of love, and then the things she’d done to him later out of fear? The things she’d done—and was still doing—to keep herself out of prison?
No. Eva would hate her. Likely turn her into the police—hell, maybe even arrest her herself. She’d lose her sister and the friendship she was building with Libby. Worst of all, she’d lose Reece. He’d never speak to her again, and she honestly didn’t know if she could stand rejection from him.
“Shelby,” Eva said softly when the silence dragged on too long, a note of concern in her tone. “What’s going on?”
“You can tell us,” Libby added. “We’re not here to judge you. Whatever it is, we want to help.”
But they would judge her. People had been judging her one way or another her entire life, to the point that she finally said fuck it and did what she wanted, wore what she wanted, and ignored the things whispered about her. So why would anyone stop judging her now?
Tears burned in her eyes, spilled down her cheeks. She let them fall, unable to muster the strength to hem them in. “You can’t help. I don’t know what’s happening.”
Eva stared at her for a long time. “Goddammit. You’re lying. You’re fucking lying to me. I thought we were past this. I thought—no, forget it. You’re the same as Mom. You’re never going to change.” Her voice cracked and she shook her head. Walked away without another word.
“Eva,” Libby called after her, but received no response. She sighed and spun on Shelby, a spark of anger lighting her blue eyes behind her glasses. “You’re hurting her—and the rest of us—by lying. But worse than that, you’re hurting yourself.” She started to walk away. Stopped. Whirled around in a burst of indignation. “Like it or not, you married into a big family, and families take care of each other. Once you get that through your head, you’ll know where to find us.”
Shelby watched her go to her husband and fold her arms around him in a move meant to comfort. Jude tucked her in against his chest, held her tight. In the moment before he buried his face in Libby’s hair, his expression crumpled with grief. Nearby, the twins were leaning on the hood of a police cruiser, arms and legs crossed in identical positions as they watched the house burn. Their body language was all but screaming “keep the fuck away from us if you want to live.” But when Eva approached, they scooted over and made room. She touched Vaughn’s arm in a gesture of solidarity, then sat between them, circled her arm through Cam’s, and rested her head on his shoulder. Cam kissed the top of her head.
Family.
They were family.
And Reece…
She scanned the crowd of firefighters until she found him again. He hadn’t moved, still stared up at the house, covered in soot. Alone. Did he realize he was only alone because he separated himself from his brothers?
She wanted to go to him, the urge to soothe him nearly overpowering, which was precisely why she walked in the opposite direction. Legally, yes, she had married into the family. Emotionally, she was a complete outsider. Even her sister was distancing herself from the hot mess that was Shelby’s life. Not that she blamed Eva for it. If it was possible to distance herself from her own life, she would do it in a heartbeat.
But that was impossible and, family or not, the Wilde brothers and their wives couldn’t help her. There was only one person who could, and she hated that fact.
She needed some privacy, so she climbed into the passenger seat of Reece’s car, which had been backed out of the driveway to allow the fire trucks better access to the house. What she really wanted to do was jump behind the wheel and put the pedal to the metal until she left all of her problems in the rearview mirror. But adding grand theft auto to her list of misdeeds seemed like a very bad idea, so passenger seat it was. Besides, Reece still had the keys.
She locked the door and sat in the cold, silent darkness for several minutes. Working up the courage. Or, no, more like biting back the surge of intense disgust. The one person who could help her now was the last person on earth she wanted to talk to, and the idea of asking him for anything turned her stomach into an acid pit.
But what choice did she have?
She found her cell phone in the glove box where she’d left it during the cocktail party. Didn’t give herself time to rethink it and dialed Jason Mallory’s number. He answered almost immediately, and she didn’t waste time with pleasantries.
“There was another fire.”
She heard some shuffling on his end, and a door shut quietly. “Where?”
“Reece’s parents’ house.”
“I thought his parents are dead.”
“They are. He owns the house now. Or at least, I think he owns it. Or maybe all five of the brothers do, I’m not sure.” And she was rambling. It didn’t matter who had owned it. It had been more precious to them than anything, and now it was gone. Because of her.
She sucked in a deep, slow breath to calm herself and got to the point. “I thought Steven was gone.”
“I thought so, too,” Jason said after a moment. “Honestly, I thought he was dead. Figured they had killed him.”
Oh God. She’d thought so, too, and had carried the guilt of her ex-boyfriend’s death as a stain on her soul ever since. Steven hadn’t always been on the right side of the law, and her relationship with him had started out as another info-gathering job for Jason, but she’d stupidly fallen in love with him. Jason had been furious, had demanded she end the relationship or face consequences for reneging on their arrangement. So she had broken up with Steven. That night, the neighbor’s house went up in flames, and Steven had been the number one suspect. Her father had vowed to kill Steven for trying to hurt her and when her father made vows like that, he kept them.
Sure enough, Steven hadn’t been seen since.
And she’d been so angry, so afraid of what her father was capable of, she turned over every bit of damning information she knew about him.
“Except if Steven is dead,” she said into the phone, “who else is setting these fires?”
Another beat of silence on Jason’s end stretched into two, then three. She stiffened in her seat. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Jason hesitated. “Shelby.” More silence. “Is it possible you’ve been made?”
“You think they know I’m a snitch? Great.” She laughed bitterly. What else could she do? “Just great. I wish I could say it’s been awesome knowing you, but fuck that. I hate your guts.”
But, no, that didn’t make sense. If she’d been revealed as the snitch who put their leader and several other members behind bars, The Headhunters would kill her. Wouldn’t matter what her last name was or whose blood she had in her veins, they’d roll up to her house and put a bullet in her without a second thought. They wouldn’t set fires to the buildings she was inside of and hope for the best. That was a coward’s crime, and The Headhunters were not cowards.
“Shelby, listen. You’re doing great work. If you can just get the information we need about DMW Systems, we can protect you. We can see about relocation, maybe witness protection.”
She lifted her head and stared out the windshield, but she was so numb with disbelief, she didn’t see anything beyond the glass. “Are you serious?”
“Of course I am.”
“Protect me? What about Reece? He could’ve been killed tonight. He lost his childhood home, and it’s all my fault.” She’d known it, but hearing herself say it out loud was a devastating blow, and it took all of the air out of her lungs. “I have to tell him the truth.”
“You can’t,” Jason said with no remorse in his tone. “You know what will happen if you do. You need to play your part, and I’ll make sure you stay safe. You’re right. This is your fault. Your poor life choices led you here, so suck it up and deal.”
“You’re a bastard. How do you sleep at night?”
“Quite well. The law is on my side here, Shelby, not yours. Now,” he said, a whole lot of end-of-discussion ringing in his tone, “you had that cocktail party tonight. What did you learn?”
She shut her eyes. She wasn’t going to win this. She never did. And, although her stomach twisted, she was going to tell him. She always did. “If there’s dirty money coming into DMW, Reece has no idea. If he did, he wouldn’t be so worried about securing the partnership with Irving James. He’d just turn to the dirty money to keep his companies afloat.”
“All right,” Jason conceded, “you have a point. What else? Have you noticed anything suspicious going on?”
She decided not to tell him about Reece’s blackmailer. He didn’t need to know. “No. These people aren’t going to spill their guts to me—”
“People always do. You know how to read people, how to weasel your way into their good graces. That’s what makes you the best informant I’ve ever had. That was a compliment,” he added when she didn’t reply.
“I don’t want it.”
He laughed.
Shelby had to work to unlock her jaw. “I’m the woman their boss married on a whim. For all I know, they see me as a gold digger and nothing more.”
“Then you need to get in good with that circle. Show them you’re one of them.”
“But I’m not.”
“You seem to be doing a fine job of convincing Reece Wilde that you are.”
But Reece isn’t like them, either.
Except she wasn’t about to say that. Jason didn’t need to know how emotionally invested she had become, but she had to give him something, or he wasn’t going to leave her alone. “There is this woman, Lena Schilling. She was in charge of marketing until Reece fired her a few weeks ago, and she’s been extremely bitter about it ever since. She might be one to look at. And the head of development, Cliff McWilliam, was recently caught doing something that Reece didn’t approve of. I don’t know any more details than that, but could be something there, too.”
“See?” Jason’s smugness wafted like a noxious fume through the phone line. “I knew you’d already worked your magic. Don’t bullshit me like that again, Shelby. I’ll call back in three days. Have something more for me.”
And the line disconnected.
She pressed her head into the headrest and let loose the sob working its way up her throat. No sense in holding it in, since she was alone. It sounded unnaturally loud, bouncing around inside the vehicle.
She’d really screwed the pooch this time. And she couldn’t see an out that ended this nightmare happily.
She spotted Reece walking toward the Escalade and bit back another sob. She unlocked the door, closed her eyes, slowed her breathing. Feigned sleep because that seemed so much easier than talking to him right now. The driver’s side door opened and his pants rasped across the leather seat as he climbed in. The key slid into the ignition, but he didn’t turn the car on.
He sat there, unmoving, just breathing.
She’d gone nose blind to the smell of soot and smoke on her own clothes, but he brought the scent roaring back, stronger than ever. It clogged the air around them, somehow made the silence heavier.
“I know you’re not sleeping,” he said eventually.
“I’m trying to.” Oh God, her voice sounded like broken glass had scoured her throat. She hoped he thought that was from the smoke inhalation and not from a suppressed sobbing fit.
He still didn’t look at her. “Cam wants me to break off this thing between us. He’s worried we’ll hurt each other.”
A knot tightened in her belly, and she sat up straighter, finally facing him. He stroked his hands over the leather of the steering wheel in an up-down pattern of three. The tic was subtle, not anything anyone would notice unless they lived with him, but he often did things in three-peat patterns when he was upset or nervous or just thinking hard about something. A little touch of OCD rising to the surface, and she’d thought it was adorable.
Until now.
Now, that kind of intimate knowledge had the knot in her belly twisting into cramps that were equal parts guilt and panic. She didn’t want to fall for him and his silly tics. She had a horrible track record when it came to men and relationships and, although he was different from anyone she’d ever dated, he was also the first man she’d ever blatantly lied to. A relationship with Steven the pyromaniac had had a better shot at working than anything with Reece, and look how that had turned out.
A disaster. As usual.
Eva was right. She was a wa
lking jinx.
“Do you want to end it?” she asked, throat so tight she was barely able to squeak the words out.
“No,” he said without even a hint of hesitancy. “Do you?”
“I…” Her heart fluttered. Stupid thing. “I want to see this through. Help you catch your blackmailer.”
He said nothing for a long moment, then gave a sharp nod as if she’d confirmed something for him, and cranked the ignition. “Yeah. Right. It’s a business arrangement.”
Reece said nothing more for the entire drive home. At first, she’d welcomed the silence because her heart was too heavy with guilt to carry on a normal conversation. Besides, what was there for them to talk about?
But when he parked in his building’s garage and they got out of the car, the silence became grating. Strained. He was hurting and she was a bitch for not breaking the silence sooner.
She waited until their apartment door closed behind them. “Are you all right?”
“No.”
Stupid question. Of course he wasn’t okay. He’d just lost something invaluable and there was no way to ever get it back. “I’m sorry.”
“You keep saying that like it’s your fault.” He turned, met her gaze. “Is it?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “It could be. Indirectly.”
“How?”
She wanted to tell him. God, did she want to tell him, but Jason’s warning still rang in her ears.
You know what will happen if you do…
She shook her head.
Reece studied her for several long seconds, then pushed out a sigh. “I wish you’d tell me, but I know you won’t. For whatever reason.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop.” He held up a hand. “Shelby, just…stop apologizing. You’re pissing me off.”
“It’s not because I don’t trust you—”
“Doesn’t matter,” he muttered and strode into the kitchen. He snagged a bottle of Scotch on his way and splashed some into a tumbler without ice. “This is a business arrangement, nothing more.”
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