Page 107 of Hold Your Breath
She blinked at him and swallowed thesorry, but I won’t hide you from the FBIhovering on her lips. “Uh…that’s a bizarre question.”
Stepping forward, he loomed over her. “Answer me. Do. You. Have. A. Will.”
Her mouth opened, but nothing emerged. All she could do was stare at the stranger wearing her stepfather’s face. His hair was rumpled, his comb-over flopping to the wrong side. There was a few days of patchy scruff on his cheeks and jaw. The most alien part of the man in front of her, however, was his intense, furious expression. The Richard she knew was remote and emotionless, not this rage-filled person standing in front of her.
His hands landed on her shoulders, squeezing hard enough to make her yelp. “Tell me!”
“No!” She yanked out of his hold and retreated until she collided with the back of the whiteboard. “Why would I have a will? The little I owned was burned by your psycho protégé.”
That seemed to calm him a little, although his eyes still looked wild. “Good. Okay, good. Let’s go.”
“Go?” Was everyone in her life losing their minds? “I’m not going anywhere. It’s been…uh, great seeing you, but you need to go now. Without me. Because I’m staying here.”
His hand slid into his coat pocket, and he pulled out a black handgun. She stared at it blankly for a long second, her brain refusing to make sense of her boring stepfather holding a deadly weapon. Her vision narrowed on the gun until it was all she could see. Her breaths were coming in rapid puffs, but she couldn’t get enough oxygen.
“No,” he said evenly, sounding more like his usual self. Weirdly, the normalcy of his voice calmed her a little, and she was able to suck in enough air to stay conscious. “You’re not. Now let’s go.”
Despite her pounding heart and the sweat prickling her skin, she tried to think. If she went with Richard, he’d kill her. It didn’t take a genius to figure that out now. If she stayed, she could be putting Callum at risk. It took a great effort of will not to glance up at the railing of the loft bedroom and give away his presence.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked, hoping to stall while her thoughts stopped racing and she could think of an operable plan.
“My assets have been frozen,” he gritted. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I don’t have a choice. There are ruthless men—really ruthless—who need their money. This is the only solution.”
“It’s not a solution!” Despite her efforts at staying calm, the words came out too loudly. “I told you—I don’t have any money. I work as a barista, for Pete’s sake! Killing me won’t accomplish anything.” Her voice shook, but she was too terrified to be embarrassed by her tremors.
“There are accounts under your name.” Richard dragged a hand over his head, disheveling his hair even more. “I needed that bit of insurance, in case something like this happened, but things got complicated. You were supposed to marry Brent. That was the plan. He’d have control of the accounts, and you wouldn’t have to know anything about it. But then you went crazy, broke up with him, and moved to this godforsaken place!”
Although her thoughts still spun like a hamster on a wheel, an idea managed to click into place. “You sent him after me.”
“And you killed him.” His tone was only mildly disappointed, very similar to the one he’d used when she’d gotten a B on a calculus test in high school.
“He tried to kill me first,” she protested, hearing the ridiculousness of the complaint even as it left her mouth. “Twice!”
“Let’s go.” Not even acknowledging her defense, Richard gestured toward the door with his free hand, all while keeping the barrel of the gun trained on her.
“I’ll sign the accounts over to you!” She rushed out the words, not moving from the back of the whiteboard. Maybe it was selfish of her to put Cal in danger, but she wasn’t taking a single step out of the cabin. She thought of HDG and how easy it was for people to disappear in the mountains. There was no way she was becoming one of those undiscovered victims.
“They’ll just freeze those as well,andthey’ll add charges of tax evasion and fraud.” It seemed as if the more scared Lou got, the calmer Richard was.
Because he has a plan, she thought.I need a plan. Think! Think! Think!
“Move, or I’ll shoot you here,” he stated flatly, completely obliterating any chance of rational thought in a wave of utter terror. “I’d rather not have to deal with a body, but I will if I have to.”
“AndIwill deal with your corpse if I have to.” The clipped words made both Lou and Richard whip their heads around to look up at the loft. The barrel of a shotgun was leveled over the railing, aimed directly at Richard. A mixture of relief and complete fear for Callum’s safety rushed through her, weakening her knees.
Richard set his jaw. “Action beats reaction. She’ll be dead before you can pull the trig—” A blast from the shotgun cut him off midword, and he stumbled back, the gun falling from his hand and spinning across the floor. Lou lunged for it, throwing her body over the pistol as if it were a live grenade. All she could think was that her stepfather couldn’t get hold of the gun again, or he’d shoot Callum.
There was another bang, and Lou wrapped her arms over her head, pressing her face against the floor.
“Sheriff! Down! Get down! Arms to your sides!” Although Rob’s words were louder and gruffer than usual, speaking faster than his normal thoughtful pace, Lou recognized him and raised her head. Her stepfather was facedown on the floor, and Rob had planted a knee in Richard’s spine as he handcuffed him.
“Sparks!” Callum’s shout had her scrambling to her feet so she could run to him. He’d beat her to it, though, and she made it only two shaky steps before he snatched her against his chest. The minute she was safely tucked against him, Lou burst into tears.
“I’m sick and tired of people trying to kill us!” she wailed against his shirtfront.
His arms tightened around her as he pressed his lips to the top of her head. “Me too, Sparks,” he muttered, his voice shaking. “Me too.”
“It would help if one of you would answer your damn phone once in a while,” Rob snapped as he hauled Richard to his feet. “An FBI agent called to let me know that they’d discovered Chilton had been funneling money into accounts in Lou’s name. He’d gone AWOL, so the agent figured he’d come here. I tried calling both of you, but evidently, no one answers a goddamned phone in this house.”
