Give in to Me (29 page)

Varo nodded, obviously shaken by the anger I no longer even tried to hide. As I pushed past him, I added, “And find out where the fuck West is!”

***

I stood on Kim’s front porch after making the three hour trip in less than two hours, my hatred for Kim fueling my driving with each mile. Not that it was entirely her fault. I knew that. I knew that I should have told Nina about Melissa, especially after I promised her I wouldn’t keep anything from her anymore, but how the fuck do you tell the woman you love about the woman who died as a result of your actions? I never found the right moment to explain that I’d been arrested and charged with the murder of Melissa, even though I’d been innocent.

Banging on the front door, I didn’t know what I planned to say. At every turn, Kim had fought me about Nina, but I’d thought that when I’d done everything I could to keep her and her family safe from Karl that she’d finally seen I wasn’t a bad guy. Obviously, she’d been saving the information about Melissa for when it would do the most damage.

Kim opened the door and immediately tried to slam it shut, but she was no match for me in my mood. I threw it open and brushed past her with little effort, intent on finding out how much damage she’d done. “Don’t bother trying to make me leave. I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what you did to make Nina run away.”

Closing the door, she scowled at me. “You can’t change things with your money this time. The truth can’t be stifled by any amount.”

“You just couldn’t leave well enough alone, could you?”

“And let my sister marry a murderer? No way. People like you get away with things every day. I hear my husband talk about getting people off all the time, and with your money, your father no doubt had to just flash a few big bills in front of some underpaid D.A. and that was it. No more problems for his baby boy.”

I shook my head at how in the dark she was. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. I didn’t kill Melissa. She overdosed.”

“I’m sure. How much does it cost to get a coroner to say that?” she spit out at me.

“I swear to God if Nina is hurt because of you, I’ll make your life a living fucking hell. You think I can buy whatever I want with my money? If one gentle hair on Nina’s head suffers because of what you’ve done, I’ll devote every last cent of what I have to making you pay. You have no idea what you might have done this time.”

Kim shrugged and shot me a sneer. “I told her the truth about you. If that causes you a problem, so be it.”

Balling my fists in rage, I tried to keep myself from hitting a woman for the first time in my life. “That man I made sure you and your family were safe from might have her right now. I don’t know where she is, and I can only hope that the Feds have him in custody or he hasn’t made bail, because if he has, he’s going straight for her. All of this because you couldn’t let her be happy.”

“I was just doing what I promised my father I’d always do for Nina—watching out for her. Your father made sure I had to do that.”

Suddenly, everything I’d been holding in exploded from me. “I’m not my fucking father or brother! I’ve done everything in my power to show you I’m not like my family. If I hadn’t made sure you were safe all that time, Karl would have killed you and your family. I’m not a murderer. All you had to do is have your husband do a little searching and you’d know that. Melissa overdosed. I’m not saying I wasn’t there or don’t still feel responsible in some way still to this day, but I didn’t kill her.”

Kim’s stood there in her living room shifting her weight from foot to foot just like Nina did when she was uncomfortable. She knew I hadn’t killed anyone and still she’d told Nina about Melissa. Slowly, she moved toward the table behind the sofa and pulled a sheet of paper out of her purse.

“My father believed you were a murderer. Just because Jeff found out otherwise doesn’t mean I have to believe him instead. All that lawyer talk just meant that they didn’t have enough evidence to overcome your family’s money.”

I took the paper from her hand and recognized it as the same kind as in her father’s notebook. He’d told my mother the truth. He hadn’t revealed everything he’d found about our family, just as he’d promised her. He’d intended on it never seeing the light of day. That’s why he’d sent her the information with that last letter he’d written.

Looking down at the sheet of paper in my hand, I read what Nina had learned about me. “Your father had decided not to disclose this information. Why did you think you had to do that now?”

“My father was a sentimental man who didn’t always think clearly. He was likely impressed with your mother, probably because of her money, and didn’t realize that the person he was friends with wasn’t that girl he knew in college but just the matriarch of a family of murderers.”

Never before in my life had I wanted to hurt someone like I wanted to hurt Kim at that moment. How anyone so petty and nasty could be related to Nina and her father baffled me, but I didn’t have time to ponder what had happened to make her so vicious and jealous. I stuffed Joseph Edwards’ notes into my pocket and left Kim to her misery, unsure of where I’d find Nina but sure that I wasn’t going to get any help there. I just had to hope I found her before Karl did.

On the way to my car, I felt my phone vibrate and quickly yanked it from my coat, hoping to see Nina’s name. It was only Daryl, though. Sliding my finger across the screen, I answered it and prayed he had some good news. “Tell me you found something,” I said as I opened the driver’s side door.

“Nothing yet,” Daryl said in a somber voice. “Do you have any idea why she left? Varo said you went to see her sister.”

I started the car and breathed a sigh of disgust, not only at Kim but at myself too. “Yeah. She found out about Melissa. Kim told her.”

Daryl said nothing for a long time, and then in his indomitable way, summarized my current problem succinctly. “Well, that was pretty stupid of you not to tell her, especially since you did nothing wrong.”

“Thanks. Just what I need. I know it was stupid, Daryl, but since I still think I was to blame, I just never found a way to tell her.”

“Water under the bridge now. We need to find your lady ASAP. So where would she go?”

Places raced through my mind, but none stuck out as the place I thought she’d go when she was upset. “I have no idea.”

Daryl made that clucking noise with his tongue he made when he was thinking and then said, “I’d suggest getting the word out to your hotels. She might go to one of them. I already checked the penthouse and no one has seen her there tonight.”

I headed out of Kim’s development toward home, wondering how much time I had. “What do we know about Karl?”

“What do you mean? I thought the Washington guys had him.”

“I have no idea if he’ll be held. If he’s not, how do I know he won’t find Nina before we do? And do you have any idea where the hell West is? Varo didn’t know where he was, and I’m worried he has something to do with Nina’s disappearance.”

“Whoa! I don’t think she’s disappeared, and what the fuck would West have to do with that?”

Putting my foot to the floor, I gassed it and began weaving through traffic. “I have no idea, Daryl. It just seems suspicious that Nina’s gone and West is nowhere to be found. I don’t care where he is if he isn’t with Nina, but if he is, he better fucking hope I don’t find him when I finally get to her, or I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“Alright, alright. Let’s not get crazy here. I’m heading out to the house now. Maybe Varo found something there or Jensen remembered something about the ride home that can help us. I’ll see you there in a little while, right?”

“Yeah. If you find out anything before I get there, call me. Do you understand?”

“I get it. Don’t worry. We’ll find her safe and sound.”

Chapter Twenty

Tristan

I drove like a demon over the roads and highways that led to the house I shared with Nina, my mind drifting back to the events that now made her run from me. Even though they’d occurred seven years before, the memory of them still ached like a fresh wound.

A haze of smoke hung heavy over the spacious room, a telltale sign of how long we’d been ignoring the outside world. Melissa giggled as she lay sprawled out across the bed while Sam smacked her on the bare ass. I guessed I should have been jealous since I was sleeping with her, but it wasn’t anything exclusive between us and I didn’t care if she liked to fuck him too.

Sex wasn’t what kept us together. Coke was.

Well, coke was what kept me there. Melissa didn’t like what coke did to her, preferring the more mellow high of pot or pills. But she was always good for what I wanted, knowing I liked it and eager to please me, no matter the cost.

I had no idea what the fuck Sam saw in any of this. True, he liked to smoke every so often, but nothing like how often Melissa did. I wasn’t even sure I’d ever seen her straight. Not that I cared.

“Tristan, come over here. I’m all alone and Sam won’t talk to me,” she whined in a voice that I found cute at times other than this. She knew it and used it anytime she wanted something from me.

Sam stood from the bed and pushed her away. “I won’t talk to her because she doesn’t make any fucking sense. Maybe if you’d get your head out of the clouds one in a while, Lissa, I’d be able to understand what the fuck you’re talking about.”

This was their usual routine when Sam felt like a third wheel. To everyone but Melissa, it was obvious he was in love with her. I had a feeling he hated me and wished I’d just disappear so he could walk off into the sunset with her, happy and high as a fucking kite. I would have been okay with that, as long as it didn’t interfere with what she and I had.

What that was exactly was hard to say, however.

I liked her well enough. I liked her even better when she spread lines out in front of me in an effort to make me happy. I didn’t love her, though, and she knew it.

That fact never stopped her from wishing it wasn’t true.

“Melissa, I don’t feel like talking. I leave that up to Sam,” I said with my usual curtness.

Lying there naked, she looked up at me with a stare that was supposed to make me want to fuck her. “Tristan, why are you so mean?” she cooed. “You’re always so mean to me.”

“You don’t want to see mean,” I said, hoping to put an end to her attempts to seduce me. Turning to look at Sam, I nodded my head toward her. “Talk to her. That’s all she wants.”

“I don’t want your fucking scraps, Stone,” Sam snapped before storming out to Melissa’s living room to sulk as he always did.

I let my gaze travel to the bed where Melissa lay pouting. I understood why Sam would want her. Perfect body, at least as perfect as money and a plastic surgeon could buy, lots of laughs, and not a lot of frustration. For many, she’d be the perfect girlfriend.

“Tristan, he’s gone. You don’t have to sit over there all by yourself anymore. Come over here on the bed with me.”

Leaning forward, I snorted the last line on the tray and shook my head trying to handle the sensation of the coke teasing the inside of my nose. “You should be nicer to Sam, Melissa. When I go, he’ll still be here.”

“Don’t say that! You’re not going anywhere,” she cried as she rolled off the bed onto her feet to come toward me. “I won’t let you.”

She knelt between my legs and gazed up at me with bloodshot blue eyes. I knew what she wanted, and if I hadn’t been so fucked up, I might have wanted it too. “Get up off your knees,” I ordered only to have her respond by shaking her head.

“Tell me what you want and I’ll give it to you. Whatever you want, Tristan. Tell me.” As she spoke, her hands slid up my thighs to the crease of my legs. “I could make you happy if you’d let me.”

I pushed her hands away, and she careened back into the table. “I have everything I need to make me happy.”

She looked up at me and frowned. “Then why aren’t you happy, baby?”

Reaching toward her, I smoothed her platinum blond hair from her eyes. “Don’t try to use what you learned in Psych class last semester on me, Melissa. It’s not going to work.”

“When I become a psychologist, you’ll see. I can be your therapist and solve all your problems.”

“That’ll be the day you’re a therapist,” I said casually without care for her feelings.

Her face fell as her eyes filled with tears. Why I was such an asshole to her I didn’t know. Even if I believed what I said, I didn’t have to say it. She’d never been anything other than completely devoted to me and I couldn’t even muster up enough feelings to be kind to her.

Closing my eyes, I tried to shut out the truth of how much a fuck I really was.

“This isn’t happy, Tristan,” she whispered as she lay her head against my knee. “This isn’t happy.”

“Well, it’s all we have. If you want happy, I’m not the person to be with. Stick with Sam.”

“Someday, Sam and I will be together. I know it. He’ll be in love with me still and I won’t be in love with you anymore, so we’ll finally be together. But then you’ll be all alone, my Tristan without a soul in this world.”

“Jesus, Melissa. Stop being so fucking maudlin. I have women all the time. I’m not alone.”