Page 11 of Stone Deep
“I just need to talk. I need to know. And I want tocollect her things, her diary, anything that meant something to her.” I heard the edge of hysteria in my voice but couldn’t stop it.
“There’s nothing to talk about. Why do you need her stuff?”
“Because you are a fucking douchebag, and I don’t want you near anything that belonged to her.”
“I’ve got it in a box. I was going to dump it.”
“Holy shit, you’re such a fucking asshole.” A few heads turned from surrounding cubicles, and I shrank down in my chair. “You never deserved her.” My voice broke.
“Yeah, you’ve told me that before. But the truth is, Britton, you just don’t want to face the fact that your sister was a drug addict. And she died of an overdose because that’s what junkies do.”
His words were so cruel, so harsh, that I had a hard time absorbing them. He’d left me frozen with hatred. I wanted so badly to see him hurt. I wanted him to suffer like my sister had, like I had.
“Now, leave my brother alone. He’s just lucky he wasn’t with his buddies when they went after your friend.”
I sat up. “What friend? What the hell are you talking about?”
“You’re little stunt Saturday night triggered some ugly retaliation against your tattoo boy. He embarrassed Kyle’s buddies in their usual hangout, and they were pissed. They went after the guy.”
My hands were shaking so much I nearly dropped the phone as I sat forward. “What do you mean? What the hell are you talking about?” My coworkers were trying hard notto pay attention, but it seemed everyone’s ears were turned my direction. I lowered my voice. “What did they do?”
For a second, it seemed he might hang up on me. “Damn it, Damon, I won’t go near Kyle again. What the hell did they do?”
“Heard they stabbed the guy.”
I braced my free hand on the desk to keep myself upright. Every drop of blood drained from my face, and the Plexiglas cubicle walls seemed to swirl around me. From the corner of my eye, I could see Nina walking toward me. I was sure I would puke right there on my desk and on the day’s stack of files. Nina stepped inside and looked down at me with worry.
I lowered my face and voice. I didn’t want her to know anything that had happened. “Tell me, tell me right now, is he dead?”
The word ‘dead’ made Nina gasp.
“Don’t know. I just know they arrested Kyle’s buddies. Now stay the hell away from me.” He hung up, and the phone slipped from my hand and bounced on the floor.
“My god, Brit, who was that? Who’s dead? You look awful.”
I tried hard to slow my heart, but it was thumping wildly in my chest. It took me a second to gather my wits. “Uh, sorry to scare you, Nina. That—that was my mom in Iowa. My Uncle Charlie had a stroke.” Part of the story was true. My uncle had had a stroke—three Christmases ago. I couldn’t tell Nina the real truth without her thinking me horrid. And I was horrid. I’d pulled an innocent man into my insane obsession. I forced a smile, but I wanted to curlup into a fetal position on the floor of my office and weep. “Thanks for being worried, but I’ll be fine. He’s not dead, and the prognosis is good. It was just a shock to hear, is all.”
She didn’t look the slightest bit convinced.
“Really, Nina, I’m fine.” I put my shaky hand on the stack of files. “I need to get back to work.”
Reluctantly, she turned and walked back to her desk. I yanked the monitor around so that no one could see what I was doing. I searched for local news stories, and the first one to come up was the stabbing of a local fisherman. Again, I felt the room sway as I clicked on the article. I nearly melted into a puddle of relief when I read that he was recovering from the attack in a local hospital. I wrote down the information and jammed the sticky note into my purse.
I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes, hoping the dizziness and nausea would slow. Poor Slade. He’d stepped in to help, and he wound up in a hospital bed. When the hell had I managed to let my life get this out of control?
SEVEN
SLADE
Amy’s judgmental brow shot up the second she walked into the room and caught me taking a slip of paper from the very cute, very helpful hospital volunteer. I folded the paper in my fist. “Hey, Street. Hey, Jade, this is Bonnie.” I double-checked her nametag. “Yep, this is Bonnie. She just brought me a magazine to read. Freakin’ awesome room service at this hotel.” I winked at the blue-eyed hottie leaning over my bed. “Thanks, and I’ll see you later,Bonnie.”
My brothers squeezed into the room next, and Bonnie looked a little frightened as she scooted past them and out the door.
Amy glowered down at me.
“What? She was just bringing me a magazine. She’s here volunteering.” I grinned up at my sister-in-law. “She’s racking up those community service hours for college.”
“Bingo,” Amy said. “For college, which means she’s in high school.”
