Reveal (Wicked Ways #2)(103)

Other job? Does he mean Wicked Ways? How in the hell does he know about my other job?

I take a deep breath, hating the feeling that slides up my spine. Fearing what he’s doing here. Cautious how to play this.

“Joey? What’s the emergency?” I say the words, dreading the answer.

“You. You’re the emergency.”

“I’m not—”

“Come on, Vaughn. It’s me. The one who knows you. All of you.” He takes a step closer, and I freeze. “Sometimes when I know you’re at the club, I’ll come over here and just sit for a bit. I’ll look at your stuff on your desk.”

My stomach pitches. “The stuff on my desk?”

“Yeah. You don’t have to be ashamed about Wicked Ways or that you’re trying to get into college. You’re flushed right now. There’s no need to be embarrassed. It’s okay that I know. I support you in every way possible. I love that about you.”

It takes me a second to actually process what is happening. It takes more than that for me to comprehend that I’m not just being jumpy. The man is in my house.

“Joey, it’s a bit creepy that you come and look at my things.” It’s the understatement of the year, but it’s the gentlest way I can think of to say, What the ever-loving fuck?

“I just want to get to know you better is all.” He smiles softly, but to me he looks like he’s a man who has lost touch with reality.

“We know each other plenty.” I make a move toward the kitchen island where the knives are.

“You’re good right where you are,” he says, the tone of his voice irritated and edgy all of a sudden, and then it’s soft and coaxing when he speaks his next words. “When I sit at your desk, when I run my fingers over your penmanship, when I stare at all of your pictures on your shelves, I pretend like you’ve let me into your life. Like you love me how I love you. It lets me feel close to you.”

My heart revolts, and my eyes flicker over to my knife block again.

This can’t be happening.

Sweet Joey who takes care of Lucy and who has always been so kind can’t be doing this.

“Don’t you want to feel close to me too?” he asks, expression hopeful but eyes still dead.

I can’t take much more today.

“I’m not sure how that’s supposed to make me feel,” I say, taking a step slowly.

My cell phone vibrates on the counter.

“Let’s leave that there,” he says with a chilling smile. “Did he do that to you?”

“What?” My hand flies to my cheek, and I realize what he’s talking about. “No, it’s nothing. Ryker didn’t—”

“Don’t lie to me!” He picks up a glass that’s sitting in the dish rack beside him and throws it across the kitchen. It shatters into a million pieces when it slams into the wall beside my head. I shriek in reaction, my hands flying to cover my ears.

My pulse thunders. My hands tremble.

“Do you think you can learn to love me too?”

“Joey.”

“Just think of what a perfect little family we could be. You and me and Lucy. We could live here or move out to the country and live off the land. We’d need no one and nothing but us. We could even have a child together.” There’s a sickening smile that spreads on his lips, and I just blink rapidly as I continue to try to process what is happening right now.

I’m shell-shocked. Trying to understand. Trying to fathom. I take a closer look at him. At the sweat on his brow when it’s not hot in here. His jerky movements. “Is everything okay, Joey?”

“I wouldn’t hurt you like he does, you know.” But this time when he takes a step toward me, he pulls a gun from the back of his waistband and points it at me.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!

I have a hard time drawing in a breath as fear takes hold. One that is so very different and so much the same as the one I felt hours ago with Carter.

Was it really only hours ago?

This can’t be happening. That’s all I keep thinking to myself. This can’t be happening.

“Ryker didn’t hurt me. I—it’s too much to get into. It was a man named Carter Preston.”

“That’s what happens in abusive relationships, Vaughn. You lie to protect the abuser.”

“I’m not lying. It really was—”

“I love you more than he does. I love you, and yet I don’t see any of the things I sent you here. You kept two cards on the desk, but both are from him. Did you throw mine out? Am I not good enough for you?” Each word resonates with more anger than the last.

“Joey—”

“No!”

Another glass from the dish rack slams against the wall.

When I duck, I see my phone and know I need to get to it to call for help.

“Don’t tell me you don’t want me too. I know you do. Do you know how it felt to come and pick up Lucy and see all of the things I bought you on display like you were proud of me? Like you loved me?”

Mayday.

It’s the only word I can think of.

The one I have my girls text me when they’re in trouble.

The one Lola texted me that started all of this. Me confronting Carter. Me meeting Ryker. Me being here right now.