“I had to shoot them. To keep them from killing me,” he added. “And you.”
* * *
Skye hugged herself, keeping as much distance as she could between herself and Guy. His cabin looked clean and organized, despite the few pieces of destroyed furniture where there had clearly been an earlier fight. The acrid stench of gunfire lingered in the air.
He moved quickly through the house, pulling two duffel bags from a closet. He gathered things from various places stashed throughout the rooms. Extra guns, loaded clips, and computer equipment. His face was expressionless. Focused. Like running through a checklist in his head. His silence unnerved her even more than she already was.
There was no way this was about Vance. This was much worse.
“Who are you?” she asked.
He stopped, giving her a resigned look.
“When you said ‘partner,’ I assumed that meant police.” Her whole heart just collapsed in on itself. All her expectations were nothing more than assumptions. False ones. Lies. “You really are a secret agent.”
His lips thinned. Then he pulled something out of the inside pocket on the duffel bag. He handed it over.
The old leather wallet was thick. Cold. She opened it to find a shiny gold badge, with an eagle etched on the top. In a bright blue circle were the words U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Special Agent.
Her fingers tightened around the badge.
“I’ve been undercover for three years. Those men outside were from a Mexican cartel. If they found me here, more are coming.”
“What do they want with you all the way up here?”
He paused, his expression a little more cautious as if he didn’t know if he should tell her. “Last year, they killed my partner. I’ve been searching for the man responsible, and they’re trying to stop me.”
Her heartfelt heavy. A hundred more questions came to mind, but she didn’t know what to ask first. She sat on the arm of the sofa, still clutching his badge. “Is Guy your real name?”
He sat on the coffee table in front of her, his eyes softening. “That is the one thing I couldn’t be honest about. You called me Guy. I ran with it.”
Her heart dropped to her stomach. At the same time, he’d ripped the rug from under her love-stricken feet. She forced herself to ask, “What’s your real name?”
“Reed. Reed Monroe.”
She pressed her lips together. “You don’t look like a Reed.”
His cheek twitched like he was trying to hide a smile. “What do I look like?”
“Guy.”
Shit. She really wanted him to be Guy. Because she’d fallen in love with Guy. Had become addicted to sex with Guy. Could actually see a future with the short-order cook at Rock Road Diner. Once again, her heart had betrayed her. Fallen in love with a man who turned out to be completely different than her expectations.
He cradled her hands in his. His palms were rough but warm. “It’s still me, Skye. Same man from the diner, from the festival…from our picnic. Don’t pull away.”
She swallowed hard. He looked the same…kind of. He was harsher, colder. But who wouldn’t be after killing two people?
“Everything I’ve told you is confidential. You know enough to send me to prison for a long time.”
“Why did you tell me?”
He sighed and sat back. Gripping the edge of the coffee table. “I’ve been on my own for a year. Running from one thug after another, trying to stay alive. I didn’t dare involve anyone else because of how brutal these psychos are. Then I met you and had my first kind and genuine interaction with another human being. After all this time. With one as beautiful as you…I didn’t want to lose that.”
She watched his Adam’s apple rise and fall, and the square line of his jaw hardened. She couldn’t imagine being alone for that long. To the point where one craved a mere cordial interaction. Anyone else might’ve turned into a monster, living on nothing but animalistic instinct. Becoming the psychopaths that had chased him. But Guy hadn’t. Reed hadn’t. After all that time on the run, the harsh lifestyle, constant vigilance, and solitude, he was still this charming, funny, and personable man that everyone in town had come to like.
A man she’d fallen in love with.
Or was that all just a ruse? A fake persona to get her into bed? Why not, if he knew he wasn’t going to be here that long. Just hiding out long enough until he could lose whatever tail followed him.
“That’s why you never wanted your picture taken,” she muttered. “The holes in the side of your truck. And why you never brought me back here, instead of always staying at my place.”
He didn’t respond to that. Hell, he didn’t even have the decency to look remorseful or guilty.
The hopeless feeling in her abdomen churned into fury, over boiling and rising up her throat. Turning everything inside raging hot. And not the fun kind.
“Everything between us wasn’t real. You used me. You deceived me because you knew you were going to leave town soon.”
Finally, his stoic face changed to one of shock. “Skye, baby…”
“Don’t call me that. You were just hiding out long enough until you could lose whoever was following you. Why not enjoy a good lay while you’re at it?” Her voice rose with every accusation. “Never mind that you’ve put me in danger too. Why would you care? You won’t be here long enough to see the repercussions anyway.”
His shock turned to a wounded grimace. “No, Skye. That’s not—”
She tossed the badge at him, a little too harshly as it bounced off his abs and landed on the floor. She shoved herself to her feet and moved away from him, putting as much distance between them as possible. Even covering her chest with crossed arms.
“I do care. That’s the problem,” he urged, slowly following her across the room. “I didn’t expect to make any kind of connection with anyone. Tried not to, because of all this,” he gestured to the computers.
The computer screens and multiple keyboards covering the small table looked like something out of a spy movie, a makeshift tech space with security cameras angled at all areas of the cabin’s exterior. She hated it. What else had Guy—Reed—been watching while he was here?
What she thought had been a protector instinct was so much more. Much worse.
Everything about him felt like a lie. Even the kisses they’d shared. Down to the most intimate moments…
The kitchen… Our picnic…
Nausea started to replace her anger. Refueled it.
“There is nothing fake about you and me.” He gave the admission softly, almost a whisper.
Those words hurt. Actually pricked her heart like an icepick. Her vision grew cloudy.
“But you’re right,” he continued, resignation taking over his face. He shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “You should go. You’ll be safer that way.”
The pain etched across his face must have been done with the same icepick that had just stabbed her heart. They were tortured, cruel lines of anguish that he tried to cover with a resolute posture.
“Where will you go?” she dared to ask.
He shrugged. “I’ll figure it out.”
“Off to find another small-town waitress to screw?” The caustic words came out of her mouth before she could stop them. But it was the first thought in her brain. How many other waitresses had there been before her? How many stress-relieving escapades with a willing, naïve woman?
That wiped the expression from his face completely.
This was too much for her. Too much reality that was nowhere near as exhilarating as the suspense novels she’d read. It was nothing but confusion, pain, and pure rage.
“I know I don’t deserve this,” he began, in a subdued voice. “But please don’t repeat anything I’ve told you to anyone. I have a big enough target on my back already.”
“Who the hell would believe me?” she shot back harshly. She fiddled for her car keys from her pocket.
“You can’t tell the sheriff
either. Then these guys will know you were here. They have eyes everywhere.”
Her throat turned dry. Not calling the cops would be a crime. She’d seen two people shot and killed. Granted in self-defense, but still.
“Don’t feel guilty about that,” Reed pressed. “They were murderers; really evil men. I’m not just trying to keep myself safe, Skye…” His voice hitched. “I can’t bear the thought of you getting hurt.”
“Am I supposed to believe that now you actually care?”
She threw the door open and marched down the steps to her car. Not looking back was the hardest thing she’d ever done because she feared to see a blank expression on his face. If she did, he would see the tears pricking her eyes. Adrenaline was the only thing keeping her from crumpling on the rocks.
The stupid keys wouldn’t fit in the ignition fast enough, and they dropped to the floor. She shoved them back in, and the engine finally started. The gravel slipped and flew across the ground as she turned her car around and sped down the driveway. Just before the bend, she dared a glance in the rearview mirror.
Through her misty vision, Reed stood on the porch in his bare feet, hands still shoved in his pockets. Looking helpless and—she couldn’t be sure—dejected.
Paranoia replaced Skye’s relentless tears halfway home, and she glanced through her rearview mirror more times than she could count. Every face was suddenly suspicious. A potential assassin that had witnessed the shit at Reed’s cabin and had followed her every move. After several twists and turns—without using her blinker—she managed to make it home without anyone following her. She parked her car in the garage, turned off the engine, and sobbed into the steering wheel.
Her hands shook. Too much adrenaline from everything she’d seen.
So this was shock. She’d seen it in movies, described in books, but living it was completely different.
“Holy hell.” She glanced at her reflection in the rearview mirror. Her barely-recognizable face was splotchy with red eyes, a complete mess.
She needed to call Sheriff Wyatt. Any decent citizen who’d just witnessed what she saw would call the authorities. He would know what to do. She grabbed her phone and stared at the screen. But her fingers wouldn’t dial.
What about what Reed had said? The cartel had eyes everywhere and could find her. Hell, they’d found him. He’d asked her not to tell anyone, for her own safety.
She had no idea how Reed planned on dealing with those dead hitmen. Frankly, she didn’t want to know. He was law enforcement, wasn’t he? He knew how to handle things like that. This wasn’t her responsibility. None of this was her concern, and she should take this moment to walk away. From all of it.
Her phone chimed with a text message.
Everything ok? from Nayanna.
“Shit.” There was no way she could go back to the diner like this.
What do I tell them? If she didn’t reply, then Ralph would get worried, and he would call the sheriff. Which would bring the cops to Reed’s door in minutes.
Skye grimaced through texting a lie.
He wasn’t there. But I don’t feel well. Must have been Ralph’s egg casserole. I’m going home to sleep it off.
Then she called Lynée. She answered on the first ring.
“Good morning, sunshine.”
“Lynée?” Skye croaked.
“What’s wrong?”
“I…He…” She could barely breathe through the words. “He’s not real. It’s not real.” Please, let none of this be real.
“What do you mean? Are you hurt?”
“No, no. Guy didn’t show up for work, so I went to check on him.” She tried to block the images of the dead men out of her mind, to instead focus on breathing evenly. Focus on keeping her hands still. She relayed the events of that morning to her best friend, as calm as her frazzled mind would allow.
Lynée listened silently. When Skye finished, her friend finally asked, “Holy Moses. Are you at home?”
“Yes.” Will this woman ever curse? Even in a moment like this?
“Hold on.” The other end of the phone crackled, and a muffled voice came through. Followed by Lynée’s softened response. “Okay, I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Start a bath with that lavender bomb I gave you for your birthday.”
“A bath? You’re kidding, right?”
“You need to calm down, and warm baths are your favorite.”
How the hell her best friend knew exactly what to say to make her feel better, Skye envied.
After locking her door and checking every window throughout the house, she finally felt quasi-comfortable enough to start a bath. As much as she loved them, she doubted the flowery-scented steam and bubbles would work to calm her nerves. This was true panic-attack territory. But what else was there to do?
She sank under the water, her whole head absorbed in warmth. Her rapid heartbeat was the only sound, and she focused on it. Trying to slow it down.
After a few seconds, she came back up and scraped her hair out of her face. When the tears threatened to spill again, she breathed in the lavender air. Having zero effect, she tried again. This time forcing her lungs to expand.
Breathe, Skye.
She inhaled several more times, the whole time thinking about Guy—Reed. She was falling in love with him, and now…
A knock on her door made her heart jump.
A moment later she heard, “It’s me.” Lynée’s muffled voice came from the other side. They’d exchanged keys to each other’s places as emergency backups. But that was pretty darn fast. Unless Skye had taken longer to draw her bath than she thought.
“Come in,” Skye croaked.
The bathroom door opened.
Lynée’s face peeked in, her smile genuine, but the concern was easily visible in her eyes. “Hey, chica.”
Skye tried to smile back, but it felt more like a grimace. Honestly, though, seeing her face was soothing.
“I have lunch out here for you. Take your time. Come out when you’re ready.” She closed the door behind her. Moments later, music blared from her television in the living room, the uplifting and motivational channel she’d created for her workouts.
She’d lost count of how many songs passed while she was in the bath. When her fingers turned pruney, she climbed out and wrapped herself in her fluffiest towel. Then twirled her hair into a smaller towel piled on her head.
She stared at her reflection.
How did I let this happen?
Tears filled her red-rimmed eyes. Stop it, she scolded herself. He’s just a man.
Well, this wasn’t just any man. And the pain of the betrayal was enough to make her want to collapse to the floor.
She forced herself to leave the bathroom to get dressed. After donning her most comfortable pajama pants and an oversized sweater, she ventured into the living room. Her best friend had set takeout boxes on the coffee table, orange peel chicken ready for consumption, and two glasses of dark red wine filled all the way to the top. Despite the delicious smell, she had no appetite.
Lynée didn’t say a word. Just walked over, wrapped her in a tight hug, and didn’t let go.
The urge to cry threatened her again. But somehow, the embrace kept her from losing it.
Eventually, she pulled back and wiped her face.
“I brought the Baldacci book.”
Skye chuckled and then frowned. That was so Lynée. The book-junkie, who always brought a good read to cheer people up. Only now that particular book series just reminded her of Guy. Of Reed.
Which brought back all the horrible things she’d just witnessed.
“Come, sit. Drink and eat.”
Skye obeyed, and just let her mind go numb and let her friend be in the driver’s seat. The same thing Lynée had done all those years ago after the debacle with Vance. She’d always been like that. The sturdy rock Skye could cling to and feel secure again. They didn’t even have to talk. It’s like her friend knew silence could be just as comforting.
&nbs
p; They turned on Netflix and watched episode after episode of a new comedy series. Until Skye fell asleep. Tucked there on the couch beside Lynée.
When she woke up, she was wrapped in her grandmother’s quilt, still on the sofa. The sky had turned dark outside the window, and only the dim television lit the space around her. Lynée sat on the other end, her calm face watching the screen.
Skye sat up, wiping the sleep from her eyes. “What time is it?”
“Eleven. That was a great snooze. You must’ve really needed it.”
“I’m amazed I slept at all. Did anyone call?” Maybe Reed had tried to contact her.
Lynée sighed. “Just Nayanna. Ralph was concerned you didn’t come back. I told them you were sick and in bed. How do you feel?”
There were no words to describe how she felt. Fuzzy wasn’t quite right, nor was tired. How does one describe a shattered heart?
“Empty,” she finally said. “Scared.”
On a deep breath, Lynée took Skye’s hand. “Love is definitely scary.”
She scoffed. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Isn’t it?” she said softly.
Her mouth felt dry. She yanked the towel from her head and brushed her fingers through the still-damp strands. For some reason, it brought back the memory of Reed’s hands on her skin after he’d walked in on her from her shower. The way her body felt alive at his touch, that unmistakable wanton flooding her senses. A way no other man had ever made her feel.
“None of it was real.”
“Of course it was real,” Lynée replied. “That much was easy to see.”
“How can you possibly know that?” Her hands and feet felt cold; she pulled the blanket closer around her.
“The apple festival. It was all over his face. He never stopped looking at you. With that puppy dog, amorous expression. It was so cute, it was almost pitiful. Then how he handled Vance…” Lynée fanned herself. “That explains a lot.”
Skye licked her lips. That was the moment for her. Back when he was just Guy the cook, she’d liked him a lot, fascinated by him. But the second she saw his protective side in a way that still tried to display manners and decorum, that was the moment she’d fallen in love with him.
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