Page 41 of Claiming His Bunny
“Yeah, tell me about it,” I snort. “I have no idea how I even ended up being the maid of honor. I’ve literally known Beth for two weeks.”
Michelle avoids my look. “About that… That’s my fault,” she admits. “She asked me first, but I suggested it would look much better if she had someone younger by her side.”
“What?!” I gasp, playfully smacking Michelle’s shoulder. “Traitor. You threw me to the wolves!”
She just grins, faking a nonchalant shrug. “Tough world, girl,” she teases. “I thought that—Ohmygod! Isn’t that your car?”
I frown in the direction she’s pointing. It is my car, surrounded by a small crowd of onlookers. What the hell? I march closer, gasping when I see all the car windows are smashed, as if someone took a baseball bat to them.
“We didn’t see who did it,” a man from the crowd tells me as I approach. “We’ve already called the police, but you might want to get a tow truck, too. The tires are slashed.”
Icy dread seeps into my body, battling over control with seething rage. The rage momentarily wins.
Was this some drunk idiot throwing a temper tantrum? Was my car simply in the wrong place at the wrong time? Or was this him? My fucking stalker?! Is this his idea of escalating things?
As I look inside my poor, mangled car, the fury leaves me at once, leaving only dread behind.
There’s a dead animal on the front seat. A cat, probably. Butchered. Its blood is seeping into the cushions, gleaming in the light cast by the street lamps.
This wasn’t an act of random vandalism. This is a threat. A very real, tangible threat to my life. And unless my stalker has suffered a complete personality change in the past 24 hours, this was someone else. Someone who hates me and swore to take revenge on me.
Could Benjamin Adams really be this unhinged? Or did I make another enemy I’m not aware of?
Dammit. Why did I ever come to this stupid town?
Chapter 24
Ethan
I’ve been driving forhours, only stopping twice to take a piss and get a coffee. I left in the morning and it’s dark outside now, yet the GPS says I still have an hour to go before I reach Carl Oberman’s fishing cabin. A whole hour. He’s had Cynthia for over 24 hours now, and I don’t want to imagine what horrors the poor girl has been through. All because of me.
“Fuck!” I slam my fist into my steering wheel. My over-caffeinated, jittery brain keeps blathering that I’m a useless piece of shit and that I fuck up everything I touch. I couldn’t help Mia all those years ago, and now my negligence caused a little girl to end up in literal hell.
My phone dings with an alert, and I frown at the screen. The app I installed on Kayla’s phone is letting me know she’s making a phone call.
She’s made several throughout the day, most of them work-related, and I’ve listened in on every single one of them. The sound of her voice has kept me from losing my mind completely, even if all she did was discuss the school attendance of foster children with a rather unpleasant headmaster’s assistant or arrange food bank donations for a single mother with a few-weeks-old baby. Even the trivial conversations helped soothe my mind a little, just because it was my precious bunny talking.
Listening in also gave me a new appreciation for the work she and everyone in her department do. It’s incredible how many legal and procedural hoops they have to jump through to arrange something as simple as food for a struggling family.
But it’s Friday night, and this call is unlikely to be work-related. I really hope she’s only calling a cab or checking on her friend Amy, who, infuriatingly, still grieves over the abusive bastard I killed. People, right?
A glance at the screen of my phone has my blood freezing in my veins. Kayla’s calling a tow service. Did she have an accident? Is she hurt? Fuck! I leave her alone for a single day and she gets herself in trouble.
The phone rings twice before a female voice answers, “Billy’s Highway Heroes, Elisabeth speaking. How can we help you today?”
“Oh, hi. This is Kayla Reynolds.”
I heave a relieved sigh at hearing Kayla’s voice. She sounds a little shaken, but not like she’s in pain.
“I need someone to tow my car. It has been vandalized. The windows are broken, and the tires slashed. I’m currently in the parking lot on Schiller Street, near the Rusty Bucket. Can you send someone over this late?”
Vandalized? What the fuck?
“Of course,” Elisabeth replies. “I’m sending a tow truck to your location straight away. In cases like this, we also recommend contacting the police to document evidence.”
“Oh yes, they’re here,” Kayla says bitterly. “Documenting. They should be done soon. It was them who recommended your company. They said you also repair cars.”
“We do. Don’t worry, we’ll have your vehicle up and running in no time. We can even offer you a replacement car while yours is being repaired.”
