Chase Me (24 page)

I merely shook my head to let him know I wasn’t going to tell him. We didn’t talk for the next four hours, but Eddie held my hand the whole way. I knew he was angry I wasn’t being open or honest with him, but I made this mess I couldn’t drag him any further into it.

“
Can you come to dinner tonight? At my mom’s?”

“
Are you going to tell me when and where?” Eddie sharply replied. “Cause I would love to say yes, but you seem to only let me in when you want to.”

“
Eddie,” I started, but he cut me off.

“
I’m tired of this game Kate. The one where we use each other to scratch an itch, but we sit here and lie through omission to each other. I have tried to be patient, and be understanding. I let you push me away all the time, and hide things from me and now I’m done.”

“
Eddie,” I cried out, but he wasn’t finished breaking my heart.

“
I love you Kate, and I think I always will. I don’t know how the hell it happened and I don’t care how, but sometimes when you shut me out loving you is the worst thing in the world and I don’t deserve it. I will come to dinner tonight because I care for your mom and I would like to see her. I will smile and act like your boyfriend, but after that I’m done. I can’t be in a secretive relationship and I don’t want to be. I wanted to be able to share my life with you, but that requires sharing; something you won’t do.”

I sobbed as I climbed out of the car. I knew it. I would open my heart to him and he would leave me. I fell against the wall as the tears overwhelmed my ability to see and an undying need for comfort lingered in the air.

The ache in my chest grew larger as Eddie got in a cab and left leaving me with the two officers who stayed in the car. I tried to dry my tears and take a few steps only to wind up breathless and in a waterfall of my own making.

I finally got to the fifth floor and knocked on Mark’s door and when he didn’t answer right away I pounded on it and shouted his name.

“
Kate,” Mark opened the door looking like he just woke up. “I didn’t think you knew what the world looked like this early,” Mark joked, but I wasn’t laughing instead I burst into tears and wrapped my arms around him.

“
What is it?” Mark asked before the door was even shut behind me. He held me tight until I could pull my shit together.

“
Eddie broke up with me,” I rasped out through unshed tears waiting to fall.

“
Why?” Mark asked and then followed up with “I thought you two were perfect together.”

“
Because I wanted you, secrets, and safety, and wouldn’t tell him why,” I cried as the words all came out wrong.

“
Kate, I’m going to be honest I don’t speak woman, so I don’t know what the hell you are talking about.”

“
We made love, and then I asked for you, but I didn’t disclose why I needed you,” I tried again.

“
Kate, why did you want me after you had sex?”

I called my voicemail and pressed play on my messages, but there was nothing there.
How the hell?
I know I didn’t envision that message.

“
Eddie and I went to his parent’s vineyard last night and he was there,” I explained.

“
Who was there?” Mark asked.

“
Kurt,” I nearly screamed. “He watched us having sex, and left me a voicemail. I swore I saved it, but I was really shaken up I could have pressed the wrong button.”

“
Did you physically see him?” Mark asked and I shook my head. “Did you tell anyone where you were going?”

“
No, I didn’t even know where we were headed. The officers, Brooklyn, and my parents knew where we were.”

“
So, if he was there he could have followed you over here,” Mark rhetorically asked.

“
If,” I focused in on the one word. “If,” I repeated as I got angrier. My emotional overload had hit its capacity so rage was all I felt. “He was there Mark; he knew what we were doing!”

“
Kate, I knew what you were going to be doing, and I didn’t have to be there. You don’t exactly have a celibate record, you know.”

“
Do you believe me or not?” I demanded an answer.

“
I believe you Kate, but I have to ask you this; have you been drinking?”

“
No, I haven’t had a drink since I met Eddie months ago.”

My answer floored me. I hadn’t even had a glass of wine or beer since I met Eddie because I didn’t have a need to. He was all I needed and I was going to lose him because of this.

“
Okay I am going to get dressed, make a couple calls, and then I am going to follow you as you go home and see if I can catch him in the act. He has an open warrant, so all we need to do is find him. Most of the time when they spiral if we catch them the victims are safe.”

“
You said most of the time. What happens to the others you don’t catch?” I asked.

“
You don’t want to know,” Mark replied, but I did. He started toward his room and I pulled his arm and made him look at me. “Sometimes predators only stop, when they can’t see their prey because they are six feet down in a dirt hole taking a nap in a coffin.”

I started shaking and paced the floor while Mark got dressed. I called for a cab, and Mark explained how going ahead of me without the officers would lure him out, and that they would be able to see me in the sea of cabs on our way to my apartment.

I was never the type of person to fear anything, except intimacy and love. This was all new to me and I didn’t know how to handle it.

I got out of the cab and ran up the stairs to my apartment as if it were a marathon I really wanted to win. When I got inside I slammed the door and bolted it. I grabbed a umbrella from the stand by the door and peeked around every corner to see if I was alone.

“
Kate,” Brooklyn called out as she walked around the corner and I nearly stabbed her. “What the fuck,” she screamed as I threw the umbrella as adrenaline coursed through me.

“
Sorry,” I repeated until she could stand there, and look at me normally, and not like she wanted to throat punch me. “I’m a little jumpy.” I tried to explain, but it only made it worse.

“
Maybe if you told me what the hell you are waiting to attack with an umbrella I could help you and you won’t be so edgy.”

I had to force my nerves to slow down and explain the whole thing. Then Mike stepped out with a gun from the living room.

Chapter 21

“
Mike what the hell are you doing?” I shouted and he looked through me.
Our apartment was covered in boxes from Brooklyn moving out.

“
He was helping me move boxes,” Brooklyn spoke up for him. “Took some all the way to the dump last night.”

“
Daddy?” I asked, but he was somewhere else.

“
He won’t bother you anymore,” Mike whispered.

“
Dad, what did you do?” I asked as Mark broke through my bolts and aimed the weapon at Mike.

“
He hurt you,” Mike rasped out. “I left him in the park, but they saved him instead of leaving him to die like the other animals.”

“
It was you?” I asked. “You took me to the hospital?”

“
Your mom wanted me to pick you up and get some take out to celebrate your new job. I looked everywhere for you and then there was a bang in the speakers, and then I heard-,”

“
Oh my God,” I placed a hand over my mouth as I cried with the realization that when I hit the desk I hit the emergency intercom system and my dad had heard everything he did to me. I cried, and wanted to gag with the memory reel playing in my head. It was bad enough it happened to me, but my dad heard every gruesome growl and groan from the pain.

“
No one hurts my baby girl. She deserves the best.”

Mark tried to pull me back behind him, but I shrugged him off. Tears filled my eyes as my already broken heart completely shattered. There was blood splatter on my dad’s pants, and his hand.

“
I have the best, dad, because I have you.”

“
He should have been punished, but they let him go. I heard him he was going to kill my baby girl,” Mike explained to Mark.

“
I wouldn’t have let that happen, sir,” Mark replied.

“
Last night he was going to kill them both,” Mike stated with a shaky breath. “Karen went to the hospital and I wasn’t there because he was going to torture them.”

“
Where is he Mike?” Mark asked.

“
He could be anywhere. These two coon hounds came and drug him away,” Mike replied and I had to smile with mention of Lily and Bryant. Those two trouble makers would make sure no one ever found him.

“
Mike, you know they are going to want to take you to jail. As your counsel I advise you not to say anything further, but as your other daughter I say thank you for saving my sister,” Brooklyn whispered as she leaned in and placed a kiss on his cheek. “You really are the best dad she could have ever asked for.”

“
I have protected you, and watched you grow into a beautiful young woman. You are no longer partying, and Eddie is a great guy to step into my shoes and keep you safe. I have loved you your whole life, but now it is time I join your mother.”

“
Mark,” I turned to him and push his hand down with his gun. “Let him go say goodbye to my mom before you put him in prison, please.”

Mike looked at me with tears in his eyes. He wrapped his arms around me and let Mark take his gun. I didn’t know what was going to happen to him, but I know I would be there all along the way.

I tried not to think about what my dad had given up for me. I worked excessively hard to not think about the fact that my mom was in the hospital. I even tried not to think about Eddie, but it was all there lurking.

We arrived at the hospital, but the nurses weren’t smiling or happy to see us. Nurse Kelly had tears in her eyes.

“
Miss Huntington,” a young doctor called my name and took my hand. Then he began to explain that my mom was no longer my mom. The cancer had moved quickly and invaded her brain. She had drifted off to sleep while I was at the cabin, and couldn’t wake up.

He explained the cancer coma as a trip down memory lane. That I was to talk to her and let her remember all the good times because even though she couldn’t wake up and see me that she could still hear me. That the hearing was the last to go so I was to say everything I needed to.

I turned to Mike and held on tight as the news stole my air and my brain spiraled that I would never be able to talk to her again. The doctor spoke to Brooklyn and handed her a folder with my name on it.