Rebound (Boomerang #2)(69)

“If you mention my wife to me again, I will beat the living shit out of you.”

Graham’s thick eyebrows climb. “Such violence. That’s it, son. Throw a punch so I can get you on assault, too.”

Something snaps inside me and I’m striding to Graham. He flinches and steps back. “You’re a f*cking killer, Blackwood,” he says, moving to the front door. “But I’ve got you cornered. I think you know it already.” He reaches for the door handle. “Oh, there’s one other condition I forgot to mention if you’re interested in retaining your reputation and your company. Keep your hands off my daughter or I will destroy you.”

When he’s gone I head back outside, but I can’t sit down. I pace like a wild animal trapped in a cage. I can’t bring the glass up to my lips, either. Sky and ocean are everywhere around me, but all I see is twisted metal and blood. Then everything changes, and all I see is white snow. Ali’s long legs, stretched out all over the bed.

I grab the edge of the patio table and lift. The sound of glass shattering sounds wrong and right and perfect with the cry of seagulls and the crash of waves behind it.

I go to the key hook by the garage but I stop myself. I know better. I know not to get shitfaced and get behind the wheel of a car. I’ve learned at least that much in my life and her house is only a mile up the road. I pull on my Nikes and take off at a run.





Chapter 39



Alison


I trundle around the stable on my knee scooter, feeling perfectly useless and like I’m suffering the world’s first weeklong hangover. Luckily, my ankle’s only sprained and, now that it’s encased in a proper bandage and an orthopedic boot, it’s feeling better. But all of the rest of me feels bruised. No, broken.

The scooter and the bandages upset Persephone and Suede. I’m foreign to them. I must smell different, and I’m sure it’s like I’m a different creature—half girl, half machine. Suede backs up in his stall when I come over. He paws at his mat, kicking up shavings. His ears twitch like he’s on high alert.

“Come on, lovely,” I say. “It’s just me.”

I hold a palm full of oatmeal and raisins out to him, but he clomps around in his stall, turning his back to me.

“Great.” I’ll have to have Joaquin come in later and take care of them. Heat rises in my throat, and my eyes prickle. It’s ridiculous to feel personally rejected, but I do.

I start to wheel my scooter around to head back out of the stable when the door swings open, crashing into a wall full of tack and making a heavy iron rake drop to the ground.

It’s Adam. But not. He’s unshaven, disheveled. He’s wearing gym shorts and a band t-shirt. His brown hair flies everywhere, and his face is red with exertion. I’ve never seen him this way.

He stalks up to me, and I start to back away, but he seizes the handles of the scooter, anchoring me in place. The odors of alcohol and sweat waft toward me, and I can’t reconcile them with the person I know.

I feel suddenly, unaccountably frightened, and on this scooter, there’s not much I can do to protect myself.

“I will never give you and your father what you want, you hear me?” His gray eyes look darker, almost black, and they drill into me now with so much anger, it’s hard to believe I ever found tenderness there.

Calm down, I tell myself. Don’t let him rattle you. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I tell him. “But thanks for dumping me in the middle of a blizzard.”

“Come on, Alison,” he says, and every word comes out sharp and derisive. “I took you for a lot of things but never for a liar.”

“And I took you for a lot of things, too,” I say. “I guess we were both wrong.”

It hurts to see him like this. In some private agony I don’t understand. Part of me wants to rush in to try to make it better, but he doesn’t deserve that. He isn’t what I thought. He left me like I meant nothing.

Adam releases the scooter and steps back. Scrubbing at his scalp, he says, “I need to know whose idea it was. Yours or your father’s.”

“What idea? What are you talking about?”

“Please,” he says, and his jaw clenches. “Just answer me. I need to know what was real. If this was just some plan you had all along or if it happened later. You need to tell me. Now.”

“What plan? Adam, I swear to God I don’t know what you’re talking about! All I know is that we spent a night together that I thought—” I can’t say it. Can’t give it to him. I can’t tell him that I thought that night meant something. Meant everything. I can’t be vulnerable with him. Never again. He doesn’t deserve it.

“Thought what, Alison?” He comes back up to me again, and I see he’s unsteady, swaying. His eyes look glassier, and it’s like his body is draining of energy right in front of me. “That you’d make me feel like a complete *? Like the world’s biggest sucker? Is that what you thought?”

“No! Of course not. I don’t—”

“Really hope you’re getting the goods on Blackwood,” Adam says in a mocking tone. “Does that sound familiar? I’m getting everything I need.”

It does sound familiar, but for a second I don’t know why. Then it dawns on me. My cell phone. He read my texts. He thought . . .