Page 111 of Between Now and Always

Given his sister peace.

Justice

CARTER

“How is she today?” my mother asks as soon as I answer the phone.

“She’s okay. They’re going to let us take her home tomorrow. But everything will depend on us getting the emergency guardianship approved.”

My mother lets out a relieved sigh.

“Joe is out of his mind. I can’t believe you asked us not to come,” she scolds.

“It wouldn’t have been helpful for Beth and honestly, it’s been a heavy couple of days without guests to worry about,” I rub a weary hand over my face.

A scream from the other side of the door carries out into the hallway and I wince and hold my breath, hoping my mother didn’t hear it.

No such luck.

“What was that? Carter, I thought you said she was okay? Who’s screaming?” she demands.

“It’s another patient. You talked to her yesterday, and you know she’s fine. But, I do have to go. I’ll call you as soon as we get the all clear to travel. Love you, Bye.”

I hang up, and drop my phone into my pocket. I grimace at the blood smeared on the front of my shirt before I head back into the room.

When we got to the house five days ago and saw the smoke billowing from the windows, I had nearly lost my mind. I jumped out of the car before it had come to a complete stop.

I ran into the house without thinking. Phil and Serena followed me. Thank God, because I don’t know how I would have found Beth’s room without her. The fire hadn’t spread to the upper floors and the stairs were passable. We burst into the room and found a scene that was something out of horror film.

The dead Wolfes, Dina who looked dead, lying on the floor with a gun in a her hand and my Beth, my baby, was lying broken, bleeding, on the floor.

I picked her up. Phil got Dina and Serena went up the nursery and got Cameron. When we got out of the house, the paramedics were there.

I handed her over and they told me she was breathing. My legs gave way under the weight of my relief. I lay there, sobbing like a baby, staring at the bright blue sky, smoke clogging my lungs. And then we heard that Fiona and Duke were both missing, that they had been responsible for what happened in that house, my rage nearly consumed me.

I didn’t let it. Beth was in bad shape. Her lungs were damaged from the smoke she inhaled. She had to be intubated to help her breath and to keep her choking on the extra mucus her lungs were making in a desperate attempt to heal themselves. Yesterday she came off the machines and is breathing on her own.

Her arm was broken at the elbow and she needed surgery to repair it. The least of her injuries was the gunshot wound to her leg. It was a clean through and through that only needed stitches.

I’ll never forget the things she said when I found her. She thought she was dying, she was saying goodbye and crying.

I haven’t slept since well since that day.

Because Duke Tremaine was still at large.

He tried to kill Beth and Cameron. Then the yellow bellied coward tried to run from what he’d done.

The police tracked Fiona to Waco the morning after the fire. She put a gun to her head and pulled the trigger when they knocked her door down of the hotel she checked into to hide.

It took us more five days to find Duke. He’d made it all the way to Etta’s house. She welcomed him in and called Phil, to let him know where he was. She found out that week that she was Susan Kendicott’s daughter. And since then, she’s been eager to help in the efforts to bring Drew Wolfe and his cohorts down.

She let us in and showed us to the room where he was fast asleep, lulled by a false sense of security. I woke him and told him I was there was to kick his ass. Man to man, with our hands as our only weapon.

Duke is laying on the floor, clutching his nose, blood seeps from between his fingers and his face is one big bloody bruise. That’s my handy work. It wasn’t really a fair fight, given how grossly out of shape he is. He got a few good swings in. But mostly he tried to run from the vengeance my fists were bent on delivering in the name of my woman.

I promised Serena we wouldn’t take justice into our own hands. But there are different kinds of justice and there’s no court in the land that give me the pound of flesh this man owes me. I took a small piece of it.

He deserves so much worse than an ass kicking. I want him to know what it means to suffer. And short of anything that would getmejail time, I can’t think of anything more fitting than him spending the rest of his life behind bars.

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