All the Broken Pieces: (Broken Series Book 3) (16 page)

I’d wanted so badly to kiss her then.

I wanted to kiss her pretty much all the time these days.

And I wanted to help her, protect her from everyone and everything.

Isaac wasn’t the only obstacle for her, though he was the most dangerous. Given the way the people in this town felt about Lauren, news of her inheritance might cause trouble. I couldn’t be around to ward off every snide comment but I would damn sure make it known that it wouldn’t be tolerated anymore. Not in
her
diner. They would either keep their mouths shut or be sent packing. Be nice or kick rocks—plain and simple.

So far, it hadn’t been announced and Lauren seemed content to keep it that way at least for a while.

On the days she worked, I stayed at the diner. I kept myself out of the way, working on my computer and drawing up plans for Milly’s Mountain or one of the other projects I had coming up, anything to seem busy so Lauren wouldn’t feel like she was being babysat.

Luckily, Lauren only had those two days that first week. The rest of the time, we meandered around the build site and she chatted with Ali and Talia or we stayed at the cabin and she helped me out with some of the renovations I was working on there. She quickly became my favorite helper, and not just because of how fucking sexy she was in a tool belt.

We worked in silence a lot of the time but occasionally, one of us would plug our phone into the cabin’s integrated sound system. Today, it was Lauren’s turn to play something. She scrolled through her music for a while before groaning and throwing her hands up. “I give up. I couldn’t decide so I just set it to random.”

We’d been listening to my music all week, which suited Lauren just fine since my playlists were full of songs by her favorite band, Thrill of the Chase. I chuckled when the first ‘random’ song that played from her list was one of theirs. And so was the second.

We were both laughing by the time the third TotC song started.

“Obsess much?” I teased, reaching for another sheet of drywall.

She shrugged and pulled a tape measure from her belt, helping me measure for the cut. “I seem to recall several of their albums on your playlist, too. So don’t give me shit.” She stuck out her tongue and pulled her thin jacket closed. The weather was definitely making its decline from cooler to downright cold. After marking the cut-line, she pulled out her utility knife and made the cut as I held the square. Once it was cut to size, I grabbed it and headed back inside to install it.

The song ended and we both paused, waiting with half-smiles to see if the next song would be from the same band.

It wasn’t.

The first chords rung out and I immediately recognized the tune. “Time After Time.” A total eighties classic that, admittedly, I hadn’t heard in years. I looked to Lauren to comment but froze, seeing the starkly emotional look on her face. She swallowed hard as she glanced up at me, her watery eyes catching the light. “I forgot I had this one…” she explained. “It was my favorite song when I was little. I used to sing it all the time out behind the shed. For someone to feel this way about me, anyone really but especially my mother, that was my favorite fantasy. Someone waiting to catch me if I fell, someone to find me in the darkness. Someone to care.” Her eyes had taken on a faraway look and she blinked it away, squaring her shoulders and coming to help hold the drywall in place like nothing had just happened.

Like she hadn’t just given me a look inside her soul.

I didn’t push, didn’t try to discuss what she’d told me. Being her friend all these weeks had taught me to withhold comment when she showed me these little pieces of herself. She wasn’t asking me to fix anything, didn’t expect or want sympathy. All she wanted was someone to listen. So that’s what I did.

After a few minutes, another song started and we fell back into a rhythm. Measure, cut, install. Measure, cut, install.

We did all these things like we had been working together forever, falling into a routine without discussion. It was comfortable, being with her this way. We didn’t talk as much as we worked, didn’t feel the need, I guess. We were content in each other’s company.

Okay, maybe I would have been more content if we were both naked, but this was nice too.

For now.

A while later, I was getting ready to start mudding the drywall and Lauren decided she was hungry.

“You get started there,” she offered. “And I’ll run down and get us both a sub from the little sandwich shop that’s attached to the gas station.” I could tell from her voice that she expected an argument.

And she was gonna get one.

“No,” I told her, wiping my hands on the nearest rag. “I’ll go. You stay here and get cleaned up. I don’t expect you to do the mudding. It’s messy work.”

Her hand shot to her hip.

Oh, shit.

Here we go.

“First, look at me.” She gestured the length of her body and I tried to focus on what she wanted to point out, and not what my eyes were instantly drawn to. “I’m covered in drywall dust, I have paint in my hair from this morning, and there’s something I can’t even identify caked under my nails. What part of that suggests to you that I’m afraid to get dirty? I say bring on the damn mud.” She scowled at me, making me kind of want to run. “And the five minute drive to the gas station isn’t going to kill me. Neither is getting us sandwiches. It’s a twenty minute adventure that I desperately need before I go insane.”

She walked over and took both my hands in hers. “You know how much I appreciate you looking out for me, right?”

I nodded.

“Good. Please don’t take what I’m about to say the wrong way then, all right?”

Another nod.

“I need to go get the damn lunch because I haven’t had five minutes alone in a week and I’m starting to feel like a shut-in.” She heaved out a sigh and looked at me with pleading in her eyes. “Please, it’s a quick trip but it will do wonders for my disposition.”

“I like your disposition.” I offered sheepishly.

“Even after five straight days of it? You’re better than me then, because I can’t even stand myself at this point.”

This is a mistake. This is a big mistake. You’re fucking up, Matthews.
“Okay, fine. Go get the sandwiches. I’ll get cleaned up a bit and be waiting when you get back.”

She grinned, throwing her arms around my neck and kissing my cheek. “Thanks, warden. I’ll be right back.” There was a bounce in her step as she went to grab her keys.

“Hey, don’t forget…”

“No mustard on yours. I know, Weirdo.” She tossed over her shoulder as she walked out the door.

As soon as I heard the crunch of her tires on the gravel driveway, my stomach fell and I had to fight the impulse to jump in the truck to follow behind her, just in case.

I had a bad feeling already.

•••

Thirty minutes later, as my stomach roiled and my heart hammered, the feeling went from bad to worse.

I had my phone out, ready to call Lauren to check on her when it started ringing in my hand.

Clay.

I accepted the call with a groan, wishing I had just sent it to voicemail so I could call Lauren.

“Hey, man. I was just about to make a call. Can I hit you right back?” I didn’t even give him a chance to speak.

“Brant, wait… You need to come down to the Speed Mart. Now. Lauren needs you.” Clay’s voice was brittle-sounding, somewhere between angry and scared.

I was already moving, snatching up my keys and heading for the door even as he finished speaking. “What happened?”

He blew out a breath. “Isaac tried to snatch her. She cut him up pretty bad and managed to get away. He took off and she stumbled into the store, covered in blood and asking for you. There are EMTs here now but she won’t let anyone near her. Even me. I tried. One of our guys was in here on his lunch break getting lotto tickets when it all went down. He recognized her from around the site and called me. He didn’t have your number saved, just mine. Anyway, I was at the diner picking up lunches, so I got here pretty quick.”

Gravel flew as I spun my truck around in the driveway and put the accelerator on the mat. “Can you get close to her now?”

“Yeah but she won’t respond. I’ve tried to talk to her but it’s like she’s checked out. No response at all.”

“Tell her it’s me and put the phone to her ear.” I grudgingly slowed coming out of the driveway to let a passing car get by to avoid shooting out in front of it.

Fuck.

I turned the volume up on my phone and waited. After a second, I heard Clay talking and then a shuffling sound that meant he was trying to put the phone up to her ear.

“Lauren?” I called. No answer. “Lauren, baby, it’s Brant. Do you hear me? Talk to me, gorgeous, please.”

More shuffling sounds and then Clay came back on the line. “Dude, hurry. She’s shaking so bad her damn teeth are rattling. As soon as she heard your voice, she started crying. Only, it’s just the tears, she’s still not making a sound. It’s freaking me the hell out, brother. Get your ass down here.”

I whipped the truck into the left lane and darted past the car from a minute before, hands in a white-knuckle hold on the wheel. “Keep talking to her, okay? Tell her I’m almost there.”

An oncoming car honked at me and I realized I was edging into the other lane, not paying attention. I jerked the wheel and got my rig back into the right lane, looking up just as the car passed. A fleeting glimpse of a long jagged scar.

“Motherfucking son of a bitch!”

“What?” Clay shouted on the other end of the line. “You okay? Shit! Don’t you fucking wreck trying to get here. You hear me, Brant?”

I wasn’t paying attention. I was too busy staring into my rear-view mirror. “I just fucking met Isaac on the highway. He’s headed out of town in a green Honda Civic, older model. Get those cops on his ass right now! I can’t leave Lauren there and chase him down. Goddammit!” I punched the dash hard enough to nearly crack the damn thing, and my gaze flicked back to the mirror. I could hear Clay talking to someone urgently as I fought with indecision. “I want to go after him, Clay. I have the best shot of catching him.” My foot lifted off the gas as I fought to decide.

Clay’s voice was low and firm. “I know, trust me. But she needs you right now. We know what he’s driving and the cops are headed that way. State patrol is being called too, to try and head him off. I just gave them the description. They’ll get him. You come help her. You’re the only one who can.”

He was right.

In the flash of near-blinding fury I’d felt at seeing his face, I’d almost made the wrong choice. I’d almost let her down. I’d almost failed her just like I failed Zoey.

I stomped the accelerator again and sighed a few minutes later when the gas station came into view, several police cars shooting by me as I drew nearer, headed the way Isaac had gone.

I jumped from my truck so fast I wondered briefly if it was even in park, running into the crowded store and shoving past a couple of well-intentioned cops who thought I was a spectator.

“Brant!” Clay called from the far corner of the attached sub shop.

Lauren sat huddled sideways in the last booth, her back to the wall, knees drawn up in front of her as she rocked back and forth, shuddering as tears rolled down her cheeks in an endless stream.

Clay was telling the truth about the blood.

It was everywhere.

In her hair, across her chest, down her arms. Her thin, beautiful hands were soaked in it and I prayed like hell that none of it was hers. Images of Zoey flashed in my mind, throwing off my stride as that old pain coupled with seeing Lauren this way.

It’s the blood. Seeing the blood is messing with you. It’s not Zoey. It’s not too late. Please, God, don’t let it be too late.

As soon as I was in her line of sight, Lauren’s head jerked in my direction. She met my eye, that empty expression faltering as her face crumpled and her arms shot out. Sobs racked her body with such force that she could barely get my name out. “B…Br…”

There was no way to get behind the booth, so I grabbed the corner of the table and yanked it out of the way, sending it skittering across the room before someone caught it. A second later I was reaching out and plucking her from her seat. I picked her up under her arms and lifted her so that she was able to wrap her legs around me, which she did automatically. Her arms shot around my shoulders and she sobbed into my neck with such force that I was truly afraid she was going to injure herself.

I walked her over to the counter where the majority of the police still stood and rested her bottom here, leaving her wrapped around me as I nodded for the paramedic to come over.

Before I could turn back to try and convince Lauren to get checked out, my eyes locked on the screen behind the counter, the one playing back the surveillance footage from the attack. My blood turned to ice in my veins and my lungs seized up so that I couldn’t pull in any air.

Jesus fucking Christ.

There on the screen, Lauren was walking back to her car, two large bags in her hands as she looked down, pulling her keys from her jacket pocket. Isaac’s shadowy form was visible in the upper corner of the screen, concealed from Lauren’s view but not the camera’s. Quick as a flash, he darted from the side of the building, grabbing her from behind with an arm across her throat. The other arm wrapped around her torso and roughly fondled her breast as he said something into her ear. Bile rose in my throat as I watched him dragging her backward toward the side of the store, where I was sure he’d hidden his car.

Lauren dropped the bags and began trying to pull his arm from her neck, the look of panic on her face would haunt my nightmares for as long as I lived. After a few seconds of flailing, her right hand moved to her jacket and she frantically worked to pull something out of the pocket.

The utility knife!

She’d stuck it in her pocket instead of the toolbelt!

Oh, thank fuck!

I squeezed her body tighter against me as I watched, needing the reminder that she had made it through the ordeal I was witnessing on the monitor.

The Lauren on the video extended the blade and dropped her weight, feigning like she’d tripped. While Isaac was off balance, she spun and slashed with the knife. Repeatedly. Wildly. Jesus, the blood. Blood flew everywhere. She got him with every slice, from the looks of it. His arm, shoulder, hand… neck. After several wild swipes with the knife, she lost her footing.