Page 52 of Blood & Loyalties
Idiot that I was, I had kept the secret inside for the past three months, and it was draining me.
Every damn time I had gotten the resolve to say something to one of them, a new note would come. A new warning. Each written in the same writing as before, each one terrifying me into submission. It was as if whoever was behind them was watching me, waiting for me to tell so he could wipe out everyone I loved, and I couldn’t let that happen.
That was where all of my anger came from—the feeling of helplessness. I had googled everything I could think of that dealt with the murder of Geo. True, he had died from a knife to his throat. True, dad’s trial had ended up being a mistrial, and nothing more had been said. True, the crime scene had been compromised. That was all documented. Regardless, what I wanted to see was the undocumented.
I searched for the officers who had been on duty that night and the ones who had investigated. Nothing came up with their names. It was like they had disappeared from the planet without a ‘good-bye’ or even a ‘kiss my ass’. The only options I could think of were they were in witness protection or dead.
The prosecutor in the case had ended up in jail from drug charges. Being so cutthroat had made him a lot of enemies. Before the cops could get him some inside protection, he had been murdered by inmates. Everything I had found was public record, available to all. If it were true or not, I would never know.
I couldn’t find any answers, and the only one I wanted waswho had sent this to me and why?
I hired a private investigator, Rusty. He only worked for me and didn’t answer to any of my family. I kept him under radar, only taking his calls on a track phone I had bought on a Target run since I didn’t know if whoever was watching me had tapped my phone.
Rusty had a couple of leads, but they had fallen flat. He was still looking, but I wasn’t holding out much hope at that point.
I had even tapped into our security system at home and searched the grounds, looking for anyone suspicious, but there was nothing out of the ordinary. I was quickly running out of options.
An even more colossal dilemma was believing the pictures. Had my dad really done that? He had told me that he hadn’t all those years back during his trial, and I had believed him. I had trusted him to tell me the truth. Trust was all we really had. If that was broken, I wasn’t sure how I could handle it.
I was at an impasse and didn’t know what to do, but there had to be something. The weight of this was too much to bear. I needed to tell my family, but fear gripped me that they would all pay for that decision. I couldn’t risk it, but God, I wanted some help. This burden was eating me alive. Beating myself up at work, killing myself at the gym, slamming and breaking innocent cabinets—something had to give.
I gathered up the pictures and notes, sliding them into the file that was in nowhere near the pristine condition I had gotten it in. By that point, it had creases from my grip tightening on it and pen marks from loose pens rolling around in the drawer. The flap on the outside was crumbled and worn. It didn’t matter what the outside looked like, only that the inside could destroy everything.
Slipping the envelope into the drawer, I locked it and pocketed the key.
Tomorrow was my birthday, and as much as I didn’t want it, I knew my family would all be stopping by at some point to tell me happy birthday, but I wasn’t happy. I didn’t think at that point I would ever be happy again.
“Happy Birthday!”Kiera screamed for the thousandth time that day as she came up behind me in the kitchen, making me gasp and jump.
Tension already laced my body from the amount of well wishes and hugs I had gotten from family and co-workers. Even my dad had come by the office, and he had immediately questioned the tension in my body when he had hugged me. He had been really good when around other family by not asking, but he had today.
I had smoothed it over by saying it was work. I really didn’t think he had bought it, but he had let it go. Inside, I had wanted to scream at him, ask him if he’d done such a terrible thing and why. Ask him why someone was sending this to me, targeting me. However, I had done nothing of the sort. I had kept my mouth shut, and each time I did, I kicked myself in the ass later. I was smarter than that. Why was the fear so gripping that I couldn’t tell? Because I didn’t know who it was, and I had no idea if they would follow through.
“Shit, woman, you scared me.” I turned around to a perfectly made up Kiera, and her deep brown eyes laughed back at me like she was happy with herself for catching me off guard.
“That was the point. Is that what you’re wearing?” She eyed me up and down, her brown eyes gauging me.
I looked down at my body, noting the jeans and long-sleeved purple shirt with frills on it. I didn’t think I looked bad. “What’s wrong with it?”
“No way. Let’s go.” She grabbed my arm and led me to my bedroom, not that I protested since I really didn’t care.
She pushed me onto the small bench that sat in the closet. I looked around at all the designer clothes and the top-of-the-line business suits. None of it mattered. It was all stuff. My family was what mattered, keeping them all safe.
I hung my head for a second then quickly pulled it back up, not wanting Kiera to notice.
Kiera rambled on about my closet and how I needed to organize it by color, not paying any attention to my inner conflict. I ignored her words, waiting for her to pick out something so we could get this night over with.
“This!” she said way too happily. The smile on her face was so big it had to hurt her damn cheeks.
I smiled back, but mine was nowhere near her caliber.
“Stop it. It’s your birthday, and you are having fun. Snap out of this mood now!” She waved a black skirt that was probably way too short for my curves and a sapphire top that would wrap around my boobs, holding them up nicely.
I didn’t argue, only grabbed the clothes and changed right in front of her. I couldn’t hide my grumpiness. It was like a black veil draping over me, sucking every bit of life out of me. I couldn’t escape it, and I didn’t like this lack of control creeping up inside of me.
Pulling the skirt up, I groaned as it left nothing to the imagination. If I were on the prowl for some dick it would have been perfect, but I wasn’t. I had too much on my plate to worry about stupid orgasms.
I threw on the shirt, slipping my arms in the slots then tying it around my body. I used to love this shirt because Jag said it brought out the blue in my eyes. I even wore it a few times when we Skyped back and forth. Now, it was only a sad reminder of him and what could have been.
