Page 31 of Outlaw Ridge: Ryker
Charlotte huffed, waved the words off like they didn’t matter, but Emma knew they did.
“I don’t know,” Charlotte muttered, slumping slightly in the chair. “I really don’t.”
Ryker leaned forward. “Would Ethan do it?”
That lit the fire again.
“No,” Charlotte growled out, her voice sharp with hurt more than rage. “Ethan isdead.If he were alive, he wouldn’t do this to me. He wouldn’t let me grieve like this,alone.He would’ve reached out.”
Emma studied her, the emotion behind the words. She didn’t say what she was thinking, but the question pressed harder than ever.
Did Ethan really love Charlotte as much as she believed?
Because the Ethan Emma remembered was self-centered, volatile when cornered. Capable of love, maybe, but also capable of cruelty when it suited him.
Emma kept her tone even. “When was the last time you actually heard from him?” she asked.
Charlotte blinked, then reached into her coat pocket and pulled out her phone. She swiped through a few screens and then turned it so Emma and Ryker could see.
The message was dated four years ago. Sent late at night. Shortly after the blow-up at the wedding reception.
You really don’t get it, do you? You just stood there. You let Emma humiliate me in front of everyone. And you think I’m the one who needs help? I’m done. Don’t call. Don’t text. You chose a side, and it wasn’t mine. Watch your six, baby sis.
Charlotte’s voice was softer now, the fire flickering down to embers. “That’s how he ended everything. All his messages, texts, emails. It was kind of a thing between us.”
She flicked to another string of older messages, and sure enough, each one ended the same way.Watch your six, baby sis.
“That text wasn’t in the case file,” Ryker pointed out. “The police didn’t have this text.”
Charlotte’s eyes flashed, her whole body stiffening. “Because I didn’t give it to them.”
Emma watched her carefully, noting the flush that crept into Charlotte’s cheeks, not shame, butanger. Defensive and volatile.
“I didn’t want everyone knowing we argued,” Charlotte insisted. “That the last thing he ever said to me was…that.”
“You were worried it made you look bad,” Emma threw out there.
“Of course I was,” the woman snapped. “He wasmissing.People were already whispering that I must have known something. You think I wanted them seeing that message and assuming I drove him off? That I pushed him too far?”
Emma’s grip tightened on the edge of the table. “If you had shared it, the investigation might’ve taken a different direction. It might’ve helped us.”
Charlotte scoffed. “No, it would’ve helpedyou.You’d already poisoned people against me, Emma. They were looking at me sideways from the start. That message would’ve just confirmed whatever story they were already building in their heads.”
Emma exchanged a glance with Ryker, who didn’t hide the skepticism in his expression.
Whether Charlotte had hidden the message to protect herself, or to protect Ethan’s reputation, or because it playedinto whatever this twisted game had become, Emma couldn’t say.
But it was just one more secret in a long list of lies. And the truth, whatever it was, still hadn’t come fully into focus.
Emma watched as Ryker pulled another page from the folder, a printout of the photo from the wedding reception. The one that had frozen a moment in time and revealed far more than words ever could.
He slid it across the table toward Charlotte, tapping a finger on the faint reflection in the mirror.
“You didn’t just stand there,” Ryker said, voice low. “Youenjoyedit.”
Charlotte barely glanced at the photo before scoffing. “So what?” she snapped. “Iwasglad they broke up. She was all wrong for him.” Her eyes flicked to Emma, sharp and unapologetic. “You weren’t what he needed.”
Emma’s jaw tensed, but she said nothing. She didn’t need to. Ryker wasn’t done.
