Letting Go (Thatch #1)(52)

“Jagger?”

Kissing the top of Charlie’s head quickly, I backed away from her. “I have to get back to Grey. We need to figure out who this is. I’m sorry, Charlie.”

Her eyes widened. “Wait, what’s wrong? What just happened?”

“Whoever this is isn’t done. And they need to be stopped. I have to go.” Turning around, I left her room and walked quickly down the hall and into Keith’s room. After checking his closet and the kitchen pantry, I walked toward the front door and didn’t even look at my mom or her boyfriend as I let them know I would bring diapers and food the next day. As soon as I was out of the house and in my car, I pulled up Grey’s name to call her as I flipped my car around and tore off down the street.

“Hey!” she answered on the first ring. “Where are you?”

“I’m coming back to you, are you okay?”

“I’m fine, I just—did you find out who it is?”

I blew out a slow breath and shook my head as guilt filled me. “No, I didn’t.”

“Well, who did you think it was? My parents said you’d said ‘she.’ ”

As much sense as it had made earlier, I felt like a dick. No matter that everything pointed to Charlie, I couldn’t believe I’d accused my sister of everything that had happened. “Let’s talk about it when I get to you, okay? But tell me, has anything else happened since I left?”

“No,” she said slowly, drawing out the word when she noticed my eager tone. “Why did you ask like that? Should I be expecting something?”

“No,” I assured her. “No, I just needed to know. I’m only a couple minutes away, I’ll see you soon.”

There was a pause before she reluctantly said, “Okay. Be safe.”

I ended the call and sank deeper into the seat as I ran one hand over my head. I knew I’d have to tell her where I’d gone, and I knew in telling her this, I’d have to tell her about Charlie, and it was killing me. Grey hadn’t known that Charlie had been getting upset about us, or that she’d been mad at her . . . and right now seemed like the worst possible time to tell her. But I couldn’t lie to her. When I pulled up to a red light, I quickly tapped out a text to Charlie.

I have to tell her. I’m so sorry . . . for everything.

By the time I’d pulled into Grey’s neighborhood, Charlie had responded.

I know. Tell her I love her.

I replied with an I will as I walked up the driveway to Grey’s parents’ house and took a deep breath before knocking on the door and letting myself in.

Grey launched herself at me before I even had the door shut behind me, and I stumbled back a step. “Hey, you wanna go to the dock?” I asked into her ear; her only response was to nod her head against my chest. “Okay, hold on a second and we’ll go.” Unwrapping myself from her, I kept a hand on her waist as I looked up at her parents, both of whom were looking at me expectantly. “I was wrong, and I’m sorry I ran out of here. But do you mind if I take Grey for the night?”

“She is not staying with you overnight again. You’ll bring her back tonight,” Mr. LaRue said firmly, and I smiled.

“Of course, sir. It’ll only be for a couple hours.”

“Mark,” Mrs. LaRue hissed, and slapped at his chest. “Just bring her home whenever, Jagger.”

As I backed up with Grey in my arms and walked us out the door, I could hear Mrs. LaRue whispering harshly to her husband about how we were grown and he needed to lighten up.

“Are you going to tell me what happened?” Grey asked when we got in my car.

“When we get to the dock, but until then . . . I got this while I was gone.” Opening up the Facebook messages, I tapped on the one from Ben’s account and handed it to her.

A choked cry left her, and my face tightened from the pain I knew she was going through. “Why?” she asked softly. “Why are they doing this?”

“I don’t know. You still have that account blocked, right?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, well, they’ve already pretty much done everything they can. We’ll just hope they’re done.”

Grey looked at the picture of her and Ben for a little while longer before putting my phone down, and a broken sigh filled my car. Reaching out, I grabbed her hand and was relieved when she squeezed mine tightly.

“We’ll figure it out,” I promised.

“I know. It’s just hard, and it makes it worse because I still can’t figure out who would want to do this to both of us.” She said the last part to herself and stayed silent for the rest of the drive to the lake; the entire time I was dreading telling her about Charlie.

I tried thinking of a dozen different ways of telling her so it wouldn’t reflect badly on my sister. But by the time Grey again asked me where I’d gone, when we were lying on the dock, I still hadn’t figured out a better way to tell her, and I ended up saying it exactly as it had gone. From that first night in my place to how Charlie had reacted when she found out we were together, and then finally tonight.

It was safe to say Charlie had been the last person Gray had expected me to start talking about, and I hated how unsure of herself she looked, and confused about everything she’d thought she’d known. Like me, Grey hadn’t had any clue that Charlie had been in love with Ben, and everything my sister had confessed to me tonight seemed to hit Grey twice as hard as it had hit me.