Page 72 of Awakened by Sin

She couldn’t deal with that right now, so she banked it. “I’ll be in touch.”

She got out of the car and walked past the valet who would retrieve her car. She didn’t register the smoke or the people brushing up against her. She wasn’t even aware of where she was going until a man stepped into her path.

“Carmen?”

Hands grasped her shoulders, and she looked up at Kody Singer.

“Kody?”

He frowned. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

He surveyed her for a few beats. “I’ve been calling you.”

“My life has been kinda crazy.” Understatement of the century, but she wasn’t going to elaborate. It felt like weeks rather than days since she went to lunch with him after the hospital event. Her life had turned on its head since then.

“I’m on my way out. Have a drink with me,” he said.

“I don’t—”

“Come.”

He led her to the nearest bar and urged her onto the high stool. She did so with a fatal sense of doom.

“What’ll you have?” the bartender asked.

“You still like mojitos?” Kody asked.

She didn’t really, but a drink order was beyond her at the moment, so she nodded. She surveyed the other people at the bar without much interest.

“What’s going on with you?”

She looked back to find Kody watching her closely.

“I—” No other words emerged. “I’m …”

“I asked you to go with me to Europe while I film my new movie,” he said, cutting to the chase.

“Right. I …” Her mind was a complete blank. “I can’t.”

“So you said before. Why not?”

He led a glamorous life, but beneath the good looks, he was a simple country boy. He was too good for her. She knew that when she had an affair with him.

“Maybe getting out of Vegas would be good for you,” Kody continued. “There was the shooting at the hospital, and now I heard a bunch of people are missing.”

“Missing?”

“Yeah, it’s all over the news. The governor, a judge, and gaming commissioner are missing. They’re saying even people from the police force have disappeared. Vegas is going to the dogs. Come on, Carmen. There’s nothing for you here.”

Her mom and Lyla had been her support system and now … Lyla had Gavin, who wasn’t going to be battling the underworld, and her mother had Marv. At one point, she was all they had, and now they had their own lives, and she had nothing. Everyone had moved on without her.

The bartender set the mojito in front of her. She snatched it and drank deep. Kody sipped his drink and watched as she downed hers without comment.

“What’s going on, Carmen?” Kody asked. “You were all over me at the hospital, and then you disappear, don’t return my calls … What’s going on?”

How would he react if she confided that she killed a man? That she lost half of her soul when Vinny died? That all she wanted was her father here, so she could run into his arms one last time and have him say she would get through this?

---