Bad Boy Brody(50)

His head bobbed back a centimeter. I had surprised him.

“You saw?”

Sensing my unease, Butter popped her head back over the stall door and began nuzzling my cheek. She was not only trying to soothe me but also seeing if I had an extra treat for her. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a small apple. I palmed it as she leaned forward, nibbling gently.

“I know what was on that hard drive. I saw where you paused it.” I was lying, but I didn’t care. I wished I had been the one to destroy it. I would’ve had the entire herd run over it.

He jerked back, his eyes rounding.

“You are here because I allow you to be here. You continue to be here because I allow it.”

I turned back to Butter, sliding my hand up her neck, my fingers running through her mane. “I won’t be spied on. By you or anyone else.” I faced him again in time to see him flinch.

“We were so happy to have you and Karen in our lives,” he said in an almost hoarse voice. As if that could excuse what he’d done.

I turned back to Butter, but he kept talking. “We lost our own mom, and our dad.” He exhaled sharply. “You know how he is.”

I heard the snap of the straw under his feet as he took a step closer. Only one.

I jerked, but I was remembering.

Peter Kellerman scared me. He always had.

“She softened him, somehow. And for a moment, I thought we could have a family. We all did. Us. Karen. And you. You were our littlest sister, and we all adored you.”

He was right. She made Peter Kellerman happy, but she made all of us happy.

Then she was gone, and I was back there that day.

I heard the pounding on the door.

I was running for the door until that sound, and then she screamed my name.

And like then, ice ran through my veins.

It was taking me away, pulling me back to memories I didn’t want to remember.

His voice drifted to me again, softer. “I can’t imagine what you must feel—”

He kept talking, but a buzzing sound drowned him out. It was growing louder and louder.

“Morgan,” she whispered, kneeling before me.

I saw the terror in her eyes, and that pounding kept going.

I gasped, silently, but Matthew didn’t notice. I slammed back to the present day, but feeling faint, I grabbed on to Butter’s stall. I was going to fall. Pressure pushed down on my chest. I felt my lungs shrinking in size, and I gasped silently, struggling to draw air in.

I couldn’t.

I was choking.

I was going to die.

I could hear his voice, a blast of bass sounding from the distance, but it was as if there were thick walls separating us and his words couldn’t penetrate them.

Then, while I clutched on to Butter’s stall, the pressure started to dissipate. I felt my lungs growing back to their normal size, and suddenly, I could breathe like normal again. My mouth opened wide, and I gasped in large mouthfuls of oxygen.

I grew light-headed and dizzy from the abrupt change.

My arm was shaking hard enough that Butter looked to see what was rattling her door. She began sniffing at my hand. My other had fallen, dropping the last little bit of apple onto the ground. She was searching for more.

I couldn’t move. My arm was too unsteady. I would fall completely.

“—that had always been my hope growing up, and you’ve grown into a beautiful woman. You’re smart. You’re strong. I know how much strength you have—”

My head felt as if it weighed five tons as I lifted it enough to look at my stepbrother.

He’d been watching me, talking, giving me his pitch, and he hadn’t noticed a thing.

Relief knocked my knees together, almost sweeping me down from the movement. I called for Shiloh. I had to. I let out a high-pitched whistle.

Then another.

“—can do so many things. You don’t have to waste your heart on this man. He’ll break your heart. I know this. I know guys like him. You might not believe me now, but I want the best for you.”

What?

I opened my eyes wider, trying to see Matthew more clearly, but my vision was swimming. He was going in and out of focus. He just kept talking. He just kept saying things, not seeing that I was struggling.

Was that a good thing?

When we were kids, he was always the one to protect me. He would have seen that I was struggling, that I couldn’t breathe, and he would have helped me.

He wasn’t that Matthew anymore. He changed over the years. I sensed the shift the night he had me sign the papers to approve this movie. He was desperate, hungry, and motivated. And angry . . . so, so angry.

It was there when they began the movie too.

Except his desperation switched. He had gotten what he wanted. He wanted the movie. He was going to use it for something, I didn’t know what. Fame? Power? Money? I had no idea. I didn’t care, but the movie was underway, and I stayed away. But Brody brought me in, made me feel safe and protected. Yet, there I was in the barn, experiencing an attack worse than any I’d had since I was ten years old, and Brody wasn’t around and Matthew didn’t care.

A whinny.

A lifeline.

I whipped around, almost drunkenly, and my shoulder slammed into the other side of Butter’s stall door. She was nibbling at my shoulder, only her lips. I managed to lift one of my hands to pat her on the nose, to reassure her I was fine and that I wasn’t hurt. She nudged me again before shifting and stomping and moving her body in the stall.