My Killer Vacation — Chapter 18

CHAPTER 18

Myles

don’t take her back to downtown Falmouth for iceI cream. There’s no chance of that. After doubling back three times to make sure we’re not being followed, I drive us to Wood’s Hole in Taylor’s Elantra. Where hopefully no one is trying to kill her.

When we walk into the ice cream shop, I barely resist the impulse to shout, “Everything. Give her one of everything.” I want to buy her a scoop of each flavor. Hell, I want to buy her the whole fucking shop and hang a sign on the front with her name on it. This does not bode well for my imminent departure. Not at all. By some insane twist of fate, I’ve gone from wrestling convicts to the ground, dodging gunfire and nursing injuries in motel rooms to holding this woman’s hand on an ice cream date. How in God’s name did I get here?

More importantly, how do I go back to thinking of me and Taylor as temporary?

Can’t seem to do it, no matter how much logic I shed on the situation.

Which is crazy when there are so many factors working against us. I live on the road. She’s in a stable routine in Connecticut. She wants a husband and kids.

And I definitely don’t want that.

Definitely not.

But while she’s leaning forward and smiling down at the heaping piles of ice cream on the other side of the glass, maybe…maybe I just let myself imagine it. Us walking into this place with a kid on my shoulders, their grimy fingers in my hair. Taylor with another bun in the oven.

Pregnant, because I got her that way.

It takes me a moment to move on from the imagesthat

brings to mind.

Okay. Way longer than a moment.

Would we make love as usual and just leave it to chance?

Or would she…would we fuck with the express intent of getting her pregnant? Christ. That would be… Don’t think about how satisfying it would be. Don’t think about looking her in the eye when I come and knowing it serves a purpose beyond physical pleasure. Don’t think of her wrapping her thighs tighter, tilting her hips and

praising me for my healthy swimmers.

Unless they aren’t healthy.

Then we’ll have to see a doctor. Do the whole fertility thing— Dear God, how did I get to a fertility doctor?

Back to the ice cream shop. There’s a kid on my shoulders. Probably in a Red Sox jersey. Since Taylor is

pregnant, she’ll probably have cravings and order something other than her usual butterscotch. She’d have extra napkins in her purse to wipe our kid’s face. I’d promise to rub her swollen feet when we get home.

Home.

What would that look like?

“Myles.” Taylor’s voice breaks into my thoughts. She’s looking at me funny. “Did you hear me? I asked if you wanted to stick with cookie dough or try the vastly superior butterscotch.”

“Cookie dough,” I manage around the prickle in my throat. I have to let go of her hand to reach for my wallet, but I keep an eye on it as I pay for the ice cream, so I can collect it again as soon as possible. I like holding her hand a lot. I’m not sure if I like her defending my honor to her brother’s friend, so much as it makes my chest feel…like sifting sand. It has been a long time since someone spoke up for me like that. My brother was probably the last person to say something nice about me. Out loud.

And for the first time in three years, I suddenly want to call Kevin.

I want to call him, tell him about Taylor and ask him what the hell I’m supposed to do about her. He had his own ups and downs with his husband, right? He’d probably be able to give me some insight. Really, I’d just like to speak to him…period. My parents, too. My old colleagues. I’ve been on the road, numb for three years and the thaw is wearing off.

On some level, I recognize what this means. The woman standing beside me is very good for me. She’s gotten under

my skin, challenged me, turned me on like nobody’s business. Now her apparent belief in me is forcing me to

examine myself, my life and actions.

I’m just not sure I want to do that.

I’m not sure I’m ready to face the past and do the work to overcome it.

The teenage girl behind the register hands me some change and I drop it into the tip cup. Ice cream cone in one hand, Taylor’s hand in the other, we leave the shop.

“You’re very quiet,” she remarks, her tongue dragging around the butter yellow scoop, slowly, making my fingers tighten around hers. “Are you thinking about the case?”

“Yes,” I say, too quickly.

God forbid she finds out I’m scheduling imaginary fertility doctors. Which is absolutelynot going to happen in reality. My imagination is just a lot more vivid than I realized.

“Yeah…I’m thinking about Evergreen Corp. Who could be behind it.” I scan our surroundings, parked cars, doorways, the faces of passersby, making sure there is no threat to Taylor. Since we left the house, ominous-looking clouds have moved in overhead, so there are very few people on the street. Store owners are dragging in sandwich boards from the sidewalk, diners are moving inside. Rain is coming.

Taylor seems to have that realization at the same time I do and we start to walk faster to where we parked her car, five blocks away in one of the municipal lots. We’ve only made it about a block when there’s a roll of thunder

overhead and rain starts to fall. Light at first, but slowly graduating into a downpour.

“Oh boy. No wonder we were the only two people in the shop,” Taylor says, letting go of my hand in favor of shielding her cone from the falling condensation. “Should

we make a run for the car?”

“With ahead injury? No.”

“You know what else is bad for a head injury? Being shouted at.”

Down the side street, I see the entrance to a Catholic church. Settling my hand on the small of her back, I guide her in that direction. “I’m sorry.”

She does a double take and almost slips on the rain- slicked sidewalk. “Oh, honey! You apologized!”

Honey?

A thousand pinwheels start spinning in my stomach at the same time.

“Don’t get used to it,” I mutter, trying very hard to stick to the mission of getting Taylor out of the bad weather, before she gets sick and has an almost-concussion. Not very easy to accomplish when she’s grinning at me and rapidly turning into what looks like the winner of a wet T- shirt contest. “We’ll wait out the downpour in here.”

She sizes up the heavy wooden door. “You think it’s

open?”

“They’re always open.”

“Oh.” I usher her into a dark vestibule. There is a dim glow coming from the church nave but a quick sweep of the place determines no one is inside. When I return to the vestibule, Taylor is leaned up against the stone wall

adjacent to the door, licking her ice cream in the shadows.

The heavy, outside rain echoes in the small space, no signs of lightening up. It’s like we’ve walked into a different world. Just the two of us.

You need to stop getting carried away before it’s too late.

“Let me try a bite of that,” she says, distracting me from that troubling thought. Flirty. Is she being flirty or am I imagining it? “And you can try a bite of mine.”

For a moment, I interpret that suggestion as sexual. At least until I remember the ice cream cone in my hands.

Approaching her, I hold the cookie dough to her mouth, my balls tugging when she licks it, then sinks her teeth in, leaving a lady-sized bite behind. “Mmm.” She winces. “It’s good, but too rich for more than one bite.”

“Lightweight.”

She laughs, low and musical. “Your turn,” she murmurs, lifting her ice cream to my mouth. “How do you know Catholic churches are always open? Were you raised Catholic?”

I nod, taking such a big bite of her butterscotch ice cream that she gasps. “Yeah, that was mostly down to my mother. She dragged us every Sunday. Made us wear shirts with collars and summarize the homily afterward. If she suspected we weren’t listening during mass, we didn’t get to play baseball with our friends afterward.”

“Your mom sounds like a badass.”

“She is.”She’d adore you. Everyone would. “You didn’t go to church growing up?”

“Once in a while on Christmas, since my parents traveled a lot. They couldn’t really get their…footing in the community where we lived. They were always kind of the odd ones out. People either decided they were bad parents for putting their lives at risk constantly or they were simply intimidated by the two art crusaders down the block.”

“Did that mean you and Jude had a hard time getting your footing, too?”

“Me, maybe. But not Jude. He makes friends wherever he goes. People are naturally magnetized to his ability to try anything once.”

“Sure. But you’re the one who gave him that confidence.”

Her ice cream pauses halfway to her mouth. “What?”

“Jude. Your parents were busy, right? You raised him.

And now…” I bite into my cone, sort of baffled by her confusion. She doesn’t already know what I’m telling her?

“You’re still his biggest supporter. I’ll admit he’s cool. I like him. But you basically act like he shits rainbows, Taylor. His confidence and bravery comes from you.”

“Oh my goodness.” To my horror, her eyes flood with tears. “What a beautiful thing to say.”

“It’s…I’m just speaking the truth.” Her dam breaks on a sob. “Jesus Christ.”

She sniffles up at me. “Should you be cursing like that in

church?”

“No. Please don’t tell my mother.”

Now she’s laughing. This is like watching a fucking tennis match, except the players are using my heart instead of a neon green ball. When we’ve been staring at each

other so long, I’m about to ask exactly how many kids she plans to have, I mentally shake myself. “Are you done with your ice cream?”

“Oh.” She seems to have zoned out, too. “Yes.”

I take the rapidly melting cone out of her hand and toss it into the nearby garbage can on the other side of the vestibule, along with mine. When I return to her, I’m already starting to breathe hard, because if anything, the rain has gotten more intense and we’re in this little dark room, removed from the world, and my hands are itching to be on her smooth, bare skin. I might have been able to last five minutes without getting physical, but her apples scent is mixing with the rain and her natural sweetness, turning my mouth dry. I’m gravitating back toward her like a higher power—ironically—is in control and she’s watching me approach with half-open eyes, her back arching ever so slightly off the wall. And so I just keep walking until my forearms are planted on the wall above her head, my mouth a few inches above hers.

“I meant what I said before, you do have a soft center,” she whispers.

Those pinwheels inside me start going crazy again, spinning frantically. “No, I don’t.”

Her palms ride up my chest. “Yes, you do.” That touch moves down, down, over my stomach and lower where she unsnaps my jeans.Fuck. This is happening. “When we met, I needed someone to give me rough. Maybe you need the opposite.” Her hand delves into my jeans where she strokes my cock with a feather-light touch. Just grazes of her fingertips. And yet I’m already grinding my molars together

to keep from spilling. “Maybe you need someone to give you slow and sweet. So you know you’re capable of it. So

you know you deserve it.”

I’m shaking my head. No.

I don’t know why, but I can’t letthat happen.

Somehow I know slow and sweet with this woman would be even more catastrophic than hard and mean. And yet I’m removing my gun, setting it on the closest ledge.

“Taylor.” Why is my voice ragged? “Let’sfuck.”

“Uh-uh.”

“No?”

She leaves my erection resting in the V of my jeans and slowly, God, too slowly, she winds up the sides of her dress in her fists, puling the material up to her waist and leaving it there. Naked thighs. Hips. Her pussythat much closer…

and covered in red lace panties.

She’s wearing the hookup panties.

In a church.

“You know I was only ever going to wear them for you, right?” she whispers.

I drop my face against the stone wall to the right of her head and moan. Louder when she starts jacking me off again, her hand moving a torturously methodical rhythm and my hips start to match it, grinding, rolling.

Stroke. Pause. Stroke. Pause. So light. Yet my rasping breath sounds like it’s coming from surround sound speakers in this stone echo chamber of a vestibule.

What is she doing to me?

“You make me feel safe and protected,” she whispers against my chin, then higher to my lips. “But at the same

time, you make me feel like I can protect myself. Isn’t that kind of amazing?” She lays kisses along my jawline. “Aren’t

you kind of amazing?”

She feels it.

The way my cock swells over her praise. Right there in

her hand.

God knows I feel it, too.

I’ve acknowledged it before. The fact that I need this woman’s admiration. Her trust. And it’s so generous of her to give me those things despite my nature. The way I act.

She saw through it all. She’s seeing me clearer than anyone ever has, right now, reciting a spell that is turning me to putty in her hands. I’m holding on to the wall for dear life, letting her wreck me one slide of her fist at a time. There’s a niggling urge to growl at her, tell her I don’t need compliments or praise. But I ignore it, teeth buried in my bottom lip, waiting to hear what she’ll say next.

Fine, twist my arm. I’ll start.

“You’re the amazing one,” I blurt. I’m not winning any awards for that one, but she likes it. The corners of her incredible mouth tilt up at the corners and she pumps me harder, making me hiss. “I miss you at night. When you’re

sleeping.”

Her chest heaves faster. “You do?”

“Yes.”

These admissions are a bad idea. They’re going to come back to bite me in the ass. But it feels too fucking good to tell this woman the thoughts in my head. I could lay all the shit in my head at her feet and she would make it better.

That truth is built of concrete. My feelings for her are even more solid. Titanium. No getting around that anymore.

Taylor rises up on her toes and brushes her lips over mine. Everything inside of me races around in anticipation.

It has never, ever been like this. Not even one percent. I swear to God, by the time she finally kisses me fully on the mouth, I would die having to wait another second. She doesn’t make me, though. She opens her sweet, butterscotch-flavored mouth and invites my tongue inside with a teasing lick of her own. And I go, hungrily, turning my head right and coming at her from an angle, groaning into the slick ride of tongues. The kiss is a slow, thorough entrapment like everything else she’s doing—and I let her. I let her fucking own me. I sign my soul over, signature on the dotted line.

“Sweetheart,” I break away to pant against her

forehead.

What am I asking for?

She knows. Sheknows.

Her right leg lifts and curls around my hip. Not easy with our height difference. Her left leg is still balanced on her big toe. So my arms automatically drop from the wall to support her. Left arm barred beneath her tush. Right hand holding her tits through the wet T-shirt, knuckling her pebbled nipples. “Move my panties out of the way,” she whispers unevenly, diving up into another kiss. Now there’s a worthy job for my right hand. Sliding my fingers from her breasts to the juncture of her thighs, I all but tear the red silk from her body in my haste to reveal that place,that

place that feels more like home than anywhere I’ve ever lived.

And while she drugs me with long, sensual writhes of lips and tongue, she rubs the head of my cock against her entrance, letting me feel how wet she is. How horny.

“Fuck, baby, that’s so smooth.”

She nods into our kiss. “You should feel the inside of it,” she says, razing my bottom lip with her teeth. “Want to?”

Good God. Taylor is dirty talking me.

Looking up at me from beneath her eyelashes while

asking me if I want to fuck.

No. No, make love.

Isn’t that what’s happening? It must be. Because this is like nothing I’ve experienced before. I’m tied to her by a million invisible strings. Connected to her every breath, every tick of her hips and shudder of her body.

“Yes,” I manage, hoarsely, pulling her panties more to the side, thrusting my cock into her fist, begging her to put me in. Right there.Right there. I could do it myself. I could throw her up against this fucking wall and have her screams of encouragement echoing off the rafters in seconds. But I can’t pretend this doesn’t feel good. Perfect.

This slow torture. It forces me to think, to savor, to be present instead of disappearing into my head—and she deserves that from me. “Please,” I growl, mouths flush.

“Condom in my pocket.”

Looking me right in the eye, she finds the foil pack, tears it open and wraps me up. So slowly I’m half delirious by the time it’s on and she’s dragging the tip of my cock through her soaked folds one final time, then pressing me to her

hole. Fuck me, I start to shudder. With responsibility, with excitement. Or maybe just because what’s happening is powerful and my body is acting accordingly. Corresponding to the tectonic shift taking place in my chest. I drop my face into her sweet neck and groan long and loud, while she adds more of my inches, her fist around the base of my shaft, working me in, her hips circling slowly, her wet sounds mingling with the falling rain.

We’re struggling to breathe and I haven’t even thrust yet. And Jesus, I want to, Ineed to. My balls are swollen and throbbing. But she’s got me trapped in this spell. This woman, this perfect woman, is putting me inside of her, kissing my lips softly, drawing back every few seconds to communicate something to me with her eyes. I’m trying to decode the message when she finally voices it out loud and ruins me.

“You’re in deep everywhere.” Her voice is reedy, gasping. She reaches down for my right hand, which is still needlessly clutching and yanking her panties sideways, placing my flattened palm between her breasts. “Not just between my legs.”

I don’t know what happens. I just sort of stumble into her, crowding her against the stone wall, inhaling and exhaling into her neck. She’s telling me I get to her. I’ve gotten to her. That’s terrifying as much as it’s a miracle.

“Taylor.”

My hand moves on its own, trying to yank up her other leg, get it slung around my hips. With her two thighs wrapped tight around me, there will be no more going slow.

We’re going to fuck like we’re possessed. But no, no, she

won’t let me. She pries my fingers off her knee and shakes her head, working me in and out of her slick pussy with teasing, excruciatingly hot rolls of her hips, instead. Slow.

Slow. My inches slide out, then she works them back in to the fucking hilt, clamps her walls around me and grinds. All

while looking me in the eye.

And I fucking give in.

I make love with her.

I slide my fingers into her damp hair and shudder through every up and down ride of her slippery pussy. Up my johnson and back down, down.Fuck. It’s so good. I’m keeping her elevated and balanced with my left forearm, but she’s still poised on the tiptoes of her left foot, grinding on me, right leg hugging my waist. I could come just watching her go. Witnessing her absolutely screwing me for life, my soul firmly in her possession.

As much as she’s trying to be in control here, her eyes are beginning to glaze over, her breath faltering. “I’m…”

Her hands fist in the front of my T-shirt and the pace of her ride kicks up a notch, nearly turning my knees to ash. “I’m sorry, it’s just that you’re the perfect size. Just…slightly too big. Enough to hurt a little but not badly.”

Consider me fucked.

No. No, I was fucked already.

This is something else. She’s tapping into my basest wants and it’s everything I can do to keep from peaking.

Just slamming that ass up against the stone wall, one good, deep pump and blast off. “You’re the right size for me, too, Taylor. A little too snug, but not enough to make me feel guilty about pounding it.”

She cries out, head falling back.

My hands drop to her butt and I yank her higher, roughly, my teeth bared against her mouth while she fucks me, rounding her hips with increasingly frantic movements.

“Even if we walk away, we’ll still belong to each other.”

Vulnerable green eyes lift to mine and my heart seizes

painfully. “Won’t we?”

“Yes.Yes.”

“You’re important to me.”

“Taylor,” I rasp.

Her mouth is all over my neck. “You’re big and sweet and proud—” I stamp my mouth down over hers to stop the flow of words. Not because I don’t want to hear them. Not because some deep down part of me needs them, craves them, but because I’m about to be gutted where I stand.

She’s either killing me or bringing me back to life. I don’t know.

“Enough, baby,” I breathe into our kiss.

“Let me finish.”

“No.” With my chest caving in and my body begging for release, I back her hard into the wall, lift that other leg and fuck her in the brutal way she loves. In the way that will distract her from her mission of dismantling me, bone by bone, brick by brick, word by word. “I’ve got that pretty cunt trapped now, don’t I?”

The sound that leaves her is half moan, half sob, green eyes blind, her back jolting up and down against the wall, nails leaving bloody marks on my neck, my back. “Oh my God, Myles. Yes, yes, yes.”

I drag my tongue up the sensitive slope of her neck. “I know what you like.”

“What about what I love?” she murmurs haltingly against my mouth, her eyes squeezed shut. “What about who I could love so easily?”

Brave. She’s braver than me. I stop thrusting. I crush myself against her, inhaling, dizzy from the excessive pace of my heart.

“You,” she says against my ear. “I could love you so easily.”

With those unbelievable words ringing in my skull, my body bucks without permission. Once.Hard. She whimpers and I come inside of her, my body depleting itself so swiftly, I struggle not to fall to my knees. Jaw slack, eyes unseeing, I reach between us and find her clit automatically, rubbing her out with the pad of my thumb, using the slickness of my come to circle that nub faster and faster until she’s shaking between me and the wall, her thighs trembling and clenching around my hips, her voice a chant in my ear.

“Myles, Myles,Myles.”

Her warmth rushes around the place where our bodies join and I heave a breath of relief. “Sorry. Sorry. I don’t know what happened. I—”

She shushes me, draws me into a kiss. Her legs drop from around my waist and I stoop down to prevent our mouths from separating. Or maybe to delay the moment I look her in the eye and confess the words on the tip of my tongue.I could love you so easily, too. I already do. God help me, Taylor. I’m not sure how it happened and I don’t know what’s the right thing to do.

If she’s brave enough to make her admission, I can damn well make mine.

She expects honesty from me and I want to give it to her. She believes in me.

I don’t know where the hell we go from here, but I can’t

let her get away.

“Taylor—”

Voices grow louder outside the door of the church.

Taylor sucks in a breath and our hands collide in our haste to fix her panties and dress. I pull off the condom and zip my pants one handed, crossing to the trash can and disposing of it. When I return to Taylor, she’s giggling and trying to collect her fallen purse at the same time. Before I know what’s happening, I’m laughing, too, collecting my gun and feeling lighter than I’ve felt in my entire goddamn life. She makes me a better man. A better human. She makes me so much better.

I’m opening my mouth to tell her that when the church doors swing open and two nuns walk in, stopping short when they see us. Behind them, I see the rain has stopped and sidewalks are once again full with the summer crowd.

How long have we been in here?

“Sisters,” I say, reaching for Taylor’s hand, gratified when she takes it in a way that suggests she was already reaching out. “We were just waiting out the rain.”

One of them raises a white eyebrow. “It stopped some time ago.”

“Did it?” Taylor has decided to feign innocence, a hand pressed to the middle of her chest. Over-the-top perplexed.

“We couldn’t hear through all that thick wood.”

“Oh boy,” I mutter, dragging a hand down my face.

I turn to find her turning crimson. “I-I mean…what I meant was the door is—”

“You’re digging yourself deeper,” I drawl, nodding at the nuns and pulling Taylor through the double doors. When we hit the sidewalk, I scan the street for threats. Windows, parked cars, people walking by. Nothing out of the ordinary.

She’s safe. So I finally let out the rush of amusement I’ve been holding in, laughing for the second time in as many minutes. “You just made a dick joke to a couple of nuns.”

“I didn’t mean to.” She winces, obviously replaying the encounter. “OhGod.”

“That’s who they’re talking to right now. God.” I sigh, patting her on the back. “Asking him to guide you off the dark path of sin.”

Laughing, she shoves at my shoulder. “Stop.”

This won’t be a story we tell the grandkids.

This one is just for us.

The thought is complete before I know what’s happening and my pulse goes haywire. I was seconds from being honest with her back in the church, before we were interrupted. Now that we’re in the daylight, it’s definitely more daunting because I don’t have a plan. Shouldn’t I figure out how a relationship between us would work before I start spilling my feelings like some kind of impulsive idiot? I wasn’t ready for a serious relationship in my twenties. God knows that. But I can’t for the life of me imagine a world where I don’t want to spend every second of my free time with this woman. I can’t imagine having an

argument with her and walking away without solving it. I wouldn’t. It would torture me.

I’m…different now. I’d be different for her. I have no choice when I feel like this.

As we turn the corner onto the avenue, walking in the direction of her car, Taylor smiles up at me into the sunshine and I forget how to breathe. Fuck it. I’ll come up with a plan later. “Listen, I was thinking…”

Not the most romantic opening, but okay. I’ve set the bar pretty low thus far in the romance department. It’s only

uphill from here, right?

“About what?”

My phone rings. Dammit. I fish it out of my pocket with the intention of silencing it, but Barnstable police are calling me. “This could be news on Evergreen Corp.”

She stops on a dime, urging the phone higher. “Answer it.”

“Yeah.” I still want to throw the device into the sewer, but I grudgingly hit talk. “Sumner.”

“Sumner.” A low voice reaches me, barely audible. “It’s Wright.”

Wright, I mouth at Taylor. “Why are you whispering?” I ask the detective.

“I don’t have long. Listen, Evergreen Corp. You’re not going to believe this. It’s registered to the mayor. Rhonda Robinson.” There’s a shuffle in the background and Wright says something about picking up a pizza on the way home for dinner, as if he’s talking to his wife, instead of me. A beat passes and then he’s whispering again. “The chief of police is a close friend of the mayor. I assumed we were

going to bring Robinson in for questioning, but the brass is behind closed doors now. I’ve just got a feeling…”

“That they’re going to bury it.”

“Yeah.” A door closes on the other side of the call. “You didn’t hear this from me.”

“Hear what?” Wright’s relieved breath filters down the line. “Thanks for letting me know.”

I end the call and guide Taylor down the road at a brisk pace, keeping my body between her and the road. My sixth sense is buzzing. I’m on high alert. One of the lessons I learned growing up the son of a detective and eventually becoming one myself is this. When there are politics and corruption involved in a case, there are inevitable casualties. And I’ll be damned if my Taylor is going to be one of them.

She has no plans to be left out of the loop, however. As soon as we reach the car and I’ve buckled her into the passenger seat, circled around the front bumper and climbed into the driver’s side, she starts peppering me with questions. Answering them comes naturally, I’m surprised to find. No barriers left with this woman. They’re all down.

“What’s going on? What did he say?”

“Evergreen Corp. is registered to the mayor. Rhonda Robinson.”

“What?” She huffs a stunned breath at the dashboard. “I did not see that coming. She owns vacation rentals and yet she’s leading the charge against them? What sense does that make?” There’s a long pause while the rest falls into place. Clues knitting together for her the way they did for me on the way to the car. “Oscar was threatening to expose

her as a rental owner. It would have derailed her whole campaign. Those warning notes were for the mayor.”

“Yup.” I back out of the space and gun the vehicle out onto the main road. “I’m bringing you home, Taylor. You need to stay put until I get back.Please.”

“Where are you going?”

“Lisa Stanley’s house.”

After a second, Taylor sucks in a breath. “Because Lisa is inheriting the properties. She’s got all of her brother’s paperwork coming today and…that knowledge makes her a threat to Rhonda. We need to warn her, get her somewhere

safe.”

“Right.”

“Don’t waste time bringing me home. Take me with you.”

An image of her lying on the floor of the library, bleeding from the head, creates a blinding pressure in my skull.

“Taylor, don’t ask me to do that.”

She opens her mouth to argue, but a buzzing cell interrupts her. “Oh my God, it’s Lisa,” she says, holding up her phone. Answering it on speakerphone. “Hello?”

For a long stretch, there is nothing but garbled voices.

Scratching.

And then the distinct sound of a door smashing off the wall.

“Get out!” Lisa screams. The line goes dead.

Taylor and I trade a look of pure dread.

With icy sweat forming a layer on my skin, I floor the gas.