Page 2 of Billionaire Unexplained: Kaleb

What had happened to Shelby had been a huge wake-up call for me.

I couldn’t seem to shake off the guilt I felt every time I thought about the day of her kidnapping, and how it could have so easily been avoided. It was especially difficult when I saw her in person. It reminded me of just how close we’d come to losing her to a homicidal psycho.

“Wyatt has told you a million times that Ted Young would have gotten to Shelby somehow,” Tanner answered in an exasperated voice. “If not here, he would have eventually got to her back in San Diego. He was an obsessed lunatic, Kaleb. Had you been with Shelby in that barn, he probably would have just shot you and taken her. You couldn’t have protected her when he had a loaded firearm. He would have done whatever it took to get to her. Hell, we all thought she was safe here at home.”

“She wasn’t safe,” I corrected. “And bad shit can happen anywhere.”

I’d learned that the hard way.

Maybe crime was extremely rare in Crystal Fork, but no part of the world was isolated from crazy people, not even the small Montana town I’d grown up in.

It had been my responsibility to protect my younger cousin while she was here in Montana. Wyatt had trusted me to watch out for her in his absence, and I’d failed. If it hadn’t been for Wyatt’s risky rescue, Shelby wouldn’t have had that dream wedding we’d just attended.

“Look,” Tanner replied. “I know you’ve always had an overinflated sense of responsibility, but you have to stop with the guilt trips or those damn nightmares are going to eat you alive. Shelby is happy. She doesn’t blame you for what happened. Neither does Wyatt, and you know how protective he is. Shelby didn’t take the whole stalker thing seriously, either. She knows that she should have waited a few minutes so you could go out to the barn together. None of us took the stalker situation seriously enough, Kaleb. We thought she was perfectly safe in Crystal Fork. We had no reason to believe that a serial killer was tailing her. What were the chances of that happening? You’re the most rational man I know. Use some of that common sense to shake this off.”

“I think I really need to get all of my priorities straight,” I confessed gruffly.

I’d spent my entire adult life making work my priority.

Now that my two brothers and I were all billionaires and had found that success beyond what we’d ever believed possible, I was strangely…restless.

It wasn’t that I didn’t love my work and my business, but I felt like something important was missing.

At some point in my workaholic existence, I’d lost sight of what was important to me.

“You think?” Tanner asked drily. “We all work hard, Kaleb, but your life has revolved around KTD Remington since the moment you got out of college. We’re all dedicated to KTD, but it’s your entire life. There has to be life beyond work, brother.”

“Yeah, well,” I grumbled. “I guess I haven’t figured out exactly what a more balanced life is like yet.”

Family had always been important to me. I was a Remington. It was ingrained in my DNA.

Nevertheless, KTD had taken priority quite a few times when it shouldn’t have been that way.

“Then figure out what those priorities are, and bring your ass back home,” Tanner insisted. “Devon and I feel guilty about misleading Mom. She thinks you’re somewhere on a business trip. She has no idea that you’re drowning in guilt in her cabin.”

Technically, the cabin I was staying in did belong to my mother. My dad had bought it as a retreat for the two of them over a decade ago, and they’d used it often. She had decided that the cabin now belonged to her sons because she couldn’t bear to come back here after my father’s death, but her name was still on the deed. And it would stay that way.

“She’d worry if she knew I wasn’t on a business trip somewhere,” I reminded Tanner.

I didn’t take vacations or time off to relax.

Ever.

If I’d used the excuse that I wanted to get away for a few days for anything other than work, my mother would have been instantly suspicious and worried.

My brother released a long breath. “I know. That’s the only reason we haven’t given up your real location. She’d never buy the fact that you wanted to do some early spring fishing in the middle of nowhere during a massive snowstorm. She’d want to know exactly what’s wrong with you.”

I’d shared my guilt and nightmares with my brothers, but it was the last thing I wanted to reveal to my mother. She’d been through enough sadness and emotional trauma after my father’s death.

“I’ll be back once the storm clears,” I promised.

“What in the hell possessed you to take off like that when a huge storm was coming?” Tanner questioned.

I shrugged, even though he couldn’t see that action. “I didn’t check the weather. It was almost sixty degrees when I left Crystal Fork.”

It was a sad excuse, but it was the truth.

“Which really tells me just how eager you were to get away,” Tanner observed.

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