Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
“Liar,” he hissed, his eyes igniting.
“I wasn’t happy with the ad,” I admitted. “But I was going to use it. Cam told me that we couldn’t run it. He said it would hurt the brand,” I told him. There was no false note in my voice because I was telling the truth.
Ritchie glared at me for a long moment.
“No. He would never.”
“He did. Why do you think he was there when I fired you? I don’t usually even do the firing at the company.”
“No… he wouldn’t do that to me,” he said, shaking his head.
It felt wrong to do this, to poke at someone’s clear mental health issues. But this was life and death for me.
“How soon after getting fired did you get this fancy studio?” I asked, looking around. “Looks like a guilt present to me.”
Ritchie’s own gaze moved around, and I could see the truth in his gaze, could see the timeline lining up.
“He said he believed in my art,” Ritchie said, and I had to fight against feeling bad for the sadness in his voice.
I couldn’t empathize with him.
That would make it harder to do whatever I needed to do to get out of this situation.
“Does he have any of it in your apartment?” I asked, knowing that he didn’t. Because abstract wasn’t Cam’s style. I’d been to many an art opening with Cam as my date. I knew what he liked. This was not it. He would do everything he could not to have it hanging in the apartment.
“Yes,” Ritchie said, chin jerking up.
“Really? Where?” I asked, having been to their apartment many times. “In the master bathroom? Where no one else would have to see it?” I added, really driving the knife in.
For a second, devastation crossed Ritchie’s eyes as he realized that Cam had been lying to make him feel better. Instead of actually loving his art.
To me, it was actually kind of sweet of Cam. To try to show support as best he could even though it wasn’t his cup of tea.
To Ritchie, though, it seemed like the ultimate betrayal.
The devastation was quickly replaced with anger, and I braced myself for the brunt of it.
It wasn’t long before it came…
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Brock
By the time I made it back to her apartment building, Cam was stumbling out of a cab.
“Brock,” he said, rushing forward.
“She wasn’t in her car. Mitchell was tied up in the trunk.”
“Oh, my God,” Cam said, eyes going huge.
“Where would he take her? Your place?”
“No. I mean… no. There’s no privacy there. I can go check, but I don’t. Oh…” he said as something dawned on him.
“Oh, what?” I snapped.
“The studio. I rent him out a studio for his art,” Cam told me.
“Get in the car,” I said, waving out toward where mine was still double-parked and creating a traffic jam, making people lay on the horns and scream at us out their windows as we finally climbed in.
“Brock, I… I had no idea,” Cam said as he frantically dialed his boyfriend again.
“I’m sure you didn’t,” I said, cutting off the traffic that was already pissed at me. It didn’t matter if they were late to lunch or a meeting. My fucking woman could be getting beaten right that moment. Or worse.
“He’s… he’s been off,” Cam admitted after giving me an address, clearly needing to talk. And I’d been around a lot of clients who got chatty when they were upset or nervous, so I couldn’t blame him for needing to talk it out when he realized his boyfriend was a fucking psychopath. “Since we fired him, he’s been weird. I thought, you know, that the studio would help. Let him see that I was supporting him. I never… he never talked about being angry,” Cam insisted.
“No one is blaming you, Cam. You’re not responsible for his actions.”
“If he… if he…”
“He won’t,” I insisted, because my mind refused to believe otherwise.
“I know she’s my boss,” Cam said, blinking hard. “But I love her.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, nodding. “Me too.”
I felt his gaze on my profile, but he said nothing.
“There,” he told me a few minutes later, pointing toward a building with glass windows painted in a bunch of colors. “That’s it,” he said as I swung the car into a spot. Right in front of a stop sign.
“Call the police,” I demanded as I wrenched my door open. “Call the cops, because I might kill him otherwise,” I insisted, rushing down the street and toward the building.
I hadn’t taken a life in a long, long while. I’d been dedicating my life to the lighter things, the happier things. I didn’t want to invite that darkness back in.
But there was no denying that it was darkness that was moving through me as I ran down the street toward the building, hearing the thrumming of music through the walls.