Thirty-One and a Half Regrets (30 page)

But I couldn’t just let Crocker hurt him.

Noticing my resolve, Mason crawled toward me, stopping at the edge of the creek. “Rose,” he whispered, his eyes wild and desperate. “I’m begging you to sit here and say nothing.”

Tears stung my eyes. “He knows where we are, Mason,” I choked out. “He’s going to hurt you.”

He shook his head, his jaw clenched. “No, he’s bluffing. He wasn’t even looking up here. Just wait.”

Mason and I stared at each other, separated by three feet of water.

“Rose!
” Daniel shouted in frustration.

Mason hurried back over to his vantage point, observing the scene below.

Tears made my already cold cheeks sting.

He turned back to me and crawled to the edge of the water. His eyes pleaded with me. “Rose, he’s leaving,” he whispered. “I promise. Then we’ll find a house somewhere and call the state police, okay?”

My jaw quivered even more as I fought to keep from crying.

“Rose,
goddammit!
” Crocker shouted.

I closed my eyes and cringed.

“I know she’s here! I can feel it.” Crocker’s voice carried through the grove below us. “Spread out and look for her! She’s got to—”

“Daniel,” another man’s voice interrupted. “They found their tracks south of here, heading down the creek toward town.”

I heard a loud smack and a grunt, followed by smashing leaves.

“Anyone else want to cross me?” Crocker growled.

No one answered.

Barking echoed through the trees and my eyes widened. Mason’s mouth parted, probably worried about how I’d react.

Muffy.

“That’s her dog. Miller—head south and see if she’s with Rose.” He paused. “You two head north. And you…go up that hill.”

Someone was about to find us.

Mason’s eyes widened and he crossed the water, keeping low and trying not to slosh. When he reached me, he grabbed my arm and pulled me with him toward his bag. “Promise me you won’t try and give yourself up to him. No matter what happens.”

“Mason—”

“Rose.” His face hardened. “If you don’t promise me that you’ll do everything in your power to hide, I’ll stand up right now and tell Crocker I’m here. At least then you’ll have the chance to run.”

I reached for him, my nails digging into the back of his hand. “Mason, no!”

He grabbed my face with both hands. “I can’t worry that you’re going to do something stupid like turning yourself over in an attempt to save me. We need to be united if we have any hope of surviving. Agreed?”

I nodded, choking on my tears. “I’m just scared for you, Mason.”

“And I’m scared for you, which is why I’ll do everything in my power to keep him from getting you, and obviously you’re willing to do the same for me. But we have to work together.”

I heard brush breaking on the hill below us.

“Okay.”

He gave me a quick kiss and then spun around to grab the gun and blanket I’d left behind, stuffing both into his bag. “Let’s go.” He slung the bag over his shoulder. Moving past me, he picked his way through the leaves, trying to keep to the bare spots. I followed his lead, having a hard time getting my numb feet to cooperate.

We moved quietly, heading for a cliff that rose ten to twelve feet.

“There’s nothing up here, Crocker!” a voice shouted from behind us. I resisted the urge to turn and look for him.

Crocker’s voice drifted up, faint. “Keep looking!”

The cliff edge angled back, creating a space hidden from the creek. Mason searched for a scalable section of the slope then reached for me, determination making his face hard. “Climb.”

I scaled the rocks, fumbling to find a foothold since I couldn’t feel my feet. The cliff was only about ten feet high in this section, but if we could get to the top and lie flat, Crocker’s man probably wouldn’t see us. However, I struggled to climb even three feet, shivering so hard that I couldn’t get a grip on the rocks above me.

Mason moved past me and climbed to a ledge four feet up, squatting before reaching down and pulling me up. He scaled the remaining six feet of cliff and slid over the top edge. He looked down at the creek and panic filled his eyes as he held his hand out for me. “Hurry!” he grunted.

I grabbed his hands and he jerked me up and over the edge, the rocks scraping my stomach. We scooted back, lying flat on our stomachs. My heart raced as I fought to catch my breath, my whole body still shaking. Mason rubbed my back in soothing strokes while he looked down below.

I listened for signs of the man who was tracking us and heard nothing, but the way Mason’s head was moving, I knew he was watching the tracker. We lay there for at least ten minutes. Each of my limbs felt like it weighed fifty pounds. Even my eyelids started to feel heavy and I succumbed to an overwhelming sleepiness.

“Rose,” Mason whispered in my ear.

I blinked, wondering why I was lying on the ground.

“Rose, wake up.”

He rolled me to my side and I looked up into his face. Tiny snowflakes floated around his head.

“He’s gone. We need to move.”

I blinked again. Where were we? Then the danger we were facing sunk in and I sat upright with a start but found myself clumsy and stiff.

He grabbed my upper arm. “He’s gone and they’ve headed south. Our plan worked. Partially thanks to Muffy.”

Crocker had sent Deputy Miller after her. Which meant that my vision about them had come true. I sent a silent prayer of thanks. “So we need to keep going?”

“Yeah.” He sounded worried. “How are you feeling?”

“Sleepy and cold.”

“You’re showing signs of hypothermia, but it’ll help if we get you moving. And I’ll give you back the blanket as soon as we’re off this cliff.”

We scooted to the edge. Getting down was going to be more difficult than climbing up had been, especially with my new lack of coordination.

Mason turned and lowered his legs before dropping to his feet. I mimicked him and he grabbed my waist, helping me steady my feet. He scrambled down the loose rocks, holding my hand to help guide me down.

“Do we have to go down the other hill we climbed?”

“No, not yet. We can walk along this ridge for a while.”

My feet felt like I was lugging bags of potatoes.

Mason opened his bag and pulled out the two blankets. He draped one around my shoulders, looking into my eyes as he did it. “We’ll try to find a house, like we talked about. We need to get out of the cold.” He slung the bag over his shoulder. After interlacing his fingers with mine, he began to walk. While his hands were cold, they felt warmer than mine and helped me regain some feeling in my fingers.

The hill was flat and mostly covered in pine trees, which helped keep us hidden from down below. After we’d traveled for thirty minutes or so, the land began to slope sideways. I started to slide, but Mason held me tightly to his side.

“I think it’s time to go down.”

He was right, but the incline was steep. As clumsy as I was, I didn’t see how I could get down gracefully.

Mason started the descent first, still holding my hand, but I pulled away. He turned to me in surprise.

“I’ll make us both fall. I have another way.” I offered him a smile in case he was worried I’d lost my mind. “Violet and I used to roam my aunt and uncle’s land, and they had some hills like these. We’d climb up, and then I’d be too scared to climb back down. Violet wasn’t, but she never called me a baby. She would just take my hand and say it was a slide and that we could slide down together.”

“So you plan to slide down on your butt?”

“Yeah. It beats falling flat on my face.”

He shook his head with a grin. “I have a better idea. How about you grab one tree and then reach for another?”

I smirked. “It’s worth a try.”

I reached for a tree several feet beneath me and wrapped my arms around it, picking out which tree to lunge for next.

“So Violet wasn’t always jealous of you?” Mason asked, standing by a tree next to mine.

I nearly slid past the next tree. “No, she used to be my best friend. I guess she always was until I met Neely Kate.”

Mason ran several feet past me and then looked back up at me.

“Show-off.”

“Were you
her
best friend?”

I lunged for another tree. “I’m not sure. I used to think so, but you know what they say about hindsight.”

“Despite everything, I know she loves you, Rose.”

“I know…” While I knew it was true, I still struggled with her behavior.

“Jealousy makes people do funny things.”

We’d made it down about ten feet with another twenty feet to go.

“She hurt me, Mason. All this time I thought she was helping me, but she was really trying to hold me back.”

“Maybe she thought she
was
helping you.”

“She’s always insisted that she acts the way she does to protect me. Joe told me that she was hurting me by not letting me face the world on my own two feet.”

Mason held onto the tree next to me, looking into my face. “And which do you think it was?”

I slid down to the next tree. “Maybe a combination. I really don’t think she ever set out to hurt me, at least up until she let everyone believe I’d stolen her money. But before that, I think she thought she was helping.”

“It’s all in the intent, Rose. When I file charges against someone, especially in murder cases, I have to look at the intent.”

“I’m not sure I can ever totally forgive her. We gave up everything for her and she’s still sneaking around and purposefully hurting me.” I reached for the next tree, realizing we only had ten feet left.

Mason followed behind me. “What do you mean
we gave up everything for her
?”

My mouth dropped open. Why had I let that slip? I couldn’t lie to him, but I didn’t want to hurt him. I hurried down the hill, not stopping between trees.

He reached the bottom before I did. “Rose, who is
we?
”

Mason deserved the truth, even though I worried about his reaction. “Joe and me.”

He blinked, all expression fading from his face. “What did you give up?”

“Mason, there’s something you don’t know.”

“Obviously.” There was no anger behind the word, but I could see a storm brewing behind his eyes. Not that I could blame him.

“You know that Joe’s father forced him to run for the senate, but I didn’t tell you how.”

“I always presumed his father had used his past against him.”

Now that we were standing still, the wind cut through my wet clothes, making me shudder.

Mason tugged my blanket more closely around me. “You can tell me while we walk.”

I shook my head and grabbed his hands. “No, I need to look at you when I say this.”

Worry pinched his mouth. “It sounds serious.”

I took a breath. “Joe’s father blackmailed him, but he did it by using me. And Violet and Mike.”

“What does that mean?”

“He fabricated evidence that Mike had bribed county officials to get contracts and permits for his business.”

His jaw clenched. “What else?”

“He had photos of Violet coming out of a motel with Brody MacIntosh.”

“The mayor?”

I nodded.

“What did he have on you?”

I inhaled and released a long breath. “He planted evidence that made it look like I hired Daniel Crocker to murder Momma. He told Joe that he would make sure I was arrested.”

Mason pulled his hands from mine. “So Joe had to break up with you and run for the senate to prevent his dad from releasing the information to the public?”

“No, he had to run, but his parents relented and said he could still marry me as long as I met their conditions.” Now didn’t seem like the time to discuss this, but it was too late to turn back. “I would have needed to dress and act a certain way. To disown Bruce Wayne and Jonah and probably Neely Kate. And all the while, I’d know that if I didn’t do everything they said, they’d release the information. They’d release it anyway if Joe didn’t agree to run.”

“And you couldn’t do it, right? But you told me that Joe broke up with you.”

I shut my eyes for a long moment before opening them again. “He asked me to agree and then ended it when he realized I couldn’t do it.”

Mason watched me. “If the information was fabricated, it never would have held up in court.” His voice rose. “Hell, I’m the assistant DA, Rose. I’d have to file the charges, and you know I wouldn’t do it.” His eyes widened. “Which means he must have found something true.” He paused and his voice softened. “Violet is having an affair with Brody.”

I didn’t answer.

“Okay.” He rubbed the back of his neck and looked away. “So neither one of you wanted to break up? You were blackmailed into it?” I heard the pain in his voice.

“Mason.”

He turned back to look at me, anger in his eyes. “I deserve an answer, Rose.”

“Yes, you do.” I reached for his hands and held onto him. “You’re right. Neither one of us wanted to break up. But after I started talking to Jonah, I realized something… Joe wasn’t strong enough to stand up to his parents and fight for me. I don’t doubt that his father would have carried through on his threats, but Joe was the one who got himself into the situation in the first place. And then there’s the fact that he always goes back to Hilary. Even after everything she’s done. That’s why I agreed to talk to him in the nursery. I knew he was engaged to Hilary, and when I saw them together, I knew they were sleeping together. I told Joe that I could forgive a lot of things, but I couldn’t forgive him for that. Not after what had happened to Savannah, and not after my vision.”

“What vision?”

“When I was in the hospital last month, I had a vision of Joe. I saw him winning an election, but he was married to Hilary and she was pregnant.”

He didn’t say anything.

“When we were at the nursery, he told me that he wanted me back. I said no, Mason.”

He still didn’t say anything and fear raced through my blood.

“Mason, I want to be with you. You have to believe that.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about all of this?”