by Eden Rose
“By the way, I gave her a sedative so she will be out cold for the next couple of hours. You should take a shower or something.”
Looking at the ashen face of Keeley has me shaking with anger. Someone deliberately went into her house and was looking for something. That something had almost cost her her life. Keeley is such a beautiful person, but I know that’s angry as well. Hell, we are all angry at what happened to her.
A few hours later and I still haven’t showered or slept, a few police officers come into the room. I know exactly what they are here for because it’s obvious, but I don’t want them to upset Keeley anymore than she already is.
“Someone ransacked your house. They were looking for something. Do you know what they could have been looking for?”
She shakes her head and then winces. “I have no idea. Did they… why did they shoot me?” Her head drops and I know she’s looking at her side.
I nod my head and place my hand gently on her bandaged arm. She silently shakes with her tears and it breaks my heart even more than ever. “Yeah. Keeley, it’s very important that you tell me everything that you know. The person that shot you was using a gun that is registered to your husband. They shot you through your left lung. A centimeter to the left, you would have died. That’s why you are bandaged. Are you sure you have no idea why they were looking through your house?”
“Why do you keep asking me that? I have answered your question a few times. I have no idea.”
The police officers are jotting notes down in their books and I can tell that they are getting frustrated.
“Wait! What gun are you talking about? The one that is in his safe in his office?” Keeley’s line of questioning is direct and forceful just like the attorney is.
The male police officer nods his head and then says: “We searched through the wreckage of your and his offices and I will tell you that we found a gun safe that was empty. The Glock and Ruger were missing.”
“I need to see the lab reports,” she whispers to me and I see the tears that are rolling down her eyes.
The female one speaks up next and sits down next to Keeley so they are on the same level. I know why she is doing that and it’s bull shit that she’s trying to manipulate a statement out of Keeley when she’s high off of all of these fucking pain meds.
She’s an older cop with the normal attitude of one that has been on the job too long. I hate her instantly and it’s not because she’s a woman. It’s the fact that she doesn’t trust what my girl is telling her and it’s pissing me the fuck off.
“We searched the remaining parts of both of your offices and I found that you have a safe as well. Do you mind telling me why you have thirty thousand dollars in twenties?”
Chapter 26
Keeley
“What the hell are you talking about?” I demand and sit up further in my bed. The mere factor that Wyatt is close to me does little to nothing in the realm of comforting me. I’m livid and like a live wire right now. “I do not have that much cash on me.”
A lawyer with money is one thing, but to keep all of that money in a safe is a different thing all together. I would never have that much cash laying around in my house. There is no telling what kind of shit could happen or anything.
Wyatt pets my hair and then looks at the monitors that are beeping behind me to warm me of my blood pressure rising. I don’t give a fuck about the blood pressure. Right now, I want to know why my husband had so much money.
“Mrs. Johnson. Is there anything that you would like to tell us regarding that money?”
The fact that they are insinuating that I would be a money launderer is atrocious. I would never do anything that carless and to jeopardize my career like that… That’s career suicide. Plus, I have to think about my father who is the one that has helped us out on a lot of things.
And then it clicked.
“Are you talking about the safe that was between the wall next to the closet door? The one that is cemented and bolted to the ground?” I ask them and then look over at Wyatt who is looking as if he’s witnessing some horror movie.
Which is probably true. I know I look scary as hell. Plus, I’m angrier than a hornet who has been swatted at.
The male cop nods his head and sits down in the chair to the side of the bed. I’m pretty sure that is what Wyatt was sleeping on before they brought him a cot. “Yes, that’s correct. You mean to tell me that you had that much cash in your house and you had no idea? Highly unlikely.”
The lawyer side begins to kick in. “Am I on trial here? Is this how you treat your victims that had just been shot? Should I be read my Miranda Rights?”
“That’s enough!” Wyatt says to the police officers who are getting too personal with me. “This woman has been through enough and it’s unethical for you to question her while she’s on pain meds.”
The female cop speaks up and looks pointedly at me while she does it. “Probably not a good idea to be taking that medicine. Don’t you think? Mixing your pills with that… Yikes. We will be in touch.”
And with that, I watch their asses as they leave my hospital room. Wyatt is trying his best to soothe me but it’s no use. The damage has been done and now Wyatt will understand just how crazy I am.
Chapter 27
Wyatt
Knowing that they are making her angry, I decide to leave my line of questioning. We aren’t going to get anywhere if she’s mad at them and not cooperating with me or them.
***
I stood by uselessly while the nurse, Tina, helped get Keeley out of her drab dressing gown and into the shower. I also stood by silently as I looked over every inch of her body to make sure that there wasn’t anything else on her body that shouldn’t have been there.
I listened to Keeley complain about the shampoo and conditioner choices and complain about the fact that the water wasn’t hot enough. In the few months that I have gotten to know this woman, I have never heard her complain about anything before. It’s unnerving.
When she steps out of the shower, I watch as the nurse struggles to help her out. Selfishly, I want to get my hands on her so I rush to the shower and pick her up. Her beautiful body immediately relaxes against mine and I hold her close.
Silently, she sobs against my chest and I walk over to her bed where I sit down first with her on top of me.
“Sir, we are going to need-” The nurse begins but I shut her off before she can start saying a bunch of things that have nothing to do with what Keeley needs.
“She’s fine right where she is.”
In the tone of my voice, I let it be known that I’m not changing my mind and that she needs to leave before I start getting mad. Keeley has been through a lot and the invasive line of questioning that the police had given her, didn’t help.
The nurse rolls her head back on her neck and then looks up at the sky before looking back at me. “You have a half an hour. I will be back then and I want her to be in her bed alone. I swear, do not do anything that will make me angry.”
Before either of us could respond, she spins on her heels and strolls out of the room.
I brush my hand over her wet hair and pull a little to get her to look up at me. “Sh, cupcake, it’s going to be okay. I promise.”
Something that the police said is beginning to bug me as I feel her jerk against me. “No, it’s not. I need to tell you something about me that you might not like.”
“I love you, cupcake. There’s nothing about you that could make me love you any less. It’s not possible.”
“I have Bipolar.”
I feel as if she had just punched me in the gut. “That’s what you are worried about? Baby, many people have that and are functioning just fine.”
She shakes her head against my chest and I can feel her tears as they soak my shirt. “No, it’s not just that. About five years ago, I had gotten a concussion at work. It was stupid and silly, but they gave me pain killers. Needless to say, one of my problems is that I have an addictive
personality.”
Something that Keeley is saying isn’t adding up. I don’t get why she was so scared to tell me that she had Bipolar. I wasn’t lying when I told her that many people have it and seem to be fine. The part of her sharing this information that has me questioning what she’s trying to say is the addictive personality. “What happened?”
I feel something in my bones as I try to calm myself from making a big mistake. I need to know what had happened to her so we could figure out how to make it better.
“I got addicted to the pain killers and almost went to rehab for it.”
And just like that. She dropped a bomb on me. “Okay, please explain to me what happened. I want to know everything about you and I don’t want you to think that I would love you any less.”
Keeley takes a deep breath and then says: “In college, I was pretty destructive. I didn’t want to take my medicine anymore and I didn’t like what it did to me. I refused to take it and it caused me to be unpredictable. Olivia and Shana found me one night and I was about to start dancing naked in a bar because I wanted to. But it’s weird… It’s an outer body experience to know that I was that out of control. It’s hard to explain and I don’t want you to think I’m crazy or something.”
I kiss her forehead and then down her cheeks to her lips. “I don’t think you are crazy. I think you just need someone in your life that is going to stick. How did you get addicted?”
“Oh, that’s easy. I was going out with Jerry at the time and he hooked me up with some Valium. I loved it and the Xanax so much. It calmed me down and it made it easy to function in public.”
“So, he’s the one that got you hooked on it?” I needed clarification as to how I was going to kill him. He honestly had no excuse about not knowing she’s sick. That she has something in her brain that is making her do this. And if he were going to tell me that he didn’t, I would kill him.
“No!” She immediately jumps to his defense. “It was me and I shouldn’t have done it. I started skipping class and not giving a shit about anything except getting high. Finally, Olivia and Shana cornered me and told me that I needed help. I started seeing a shrink who explained my disease to me.”
Even though I feel for her situation, I do not think for one second that Jerry didn’t have anything to do with her addiction. Not for one moment. “Okay, cupcake. I got you. How about you close your eyes and get some sleep.”
Chapter 28
Keeley
I’m exhausted after sharing with Wyatt how I am fucking crazy. I warned him in the beginning that I was though, so he doesn’t have anyone to blame but himself. My mother passed on the disease to me and it’s a good possibility that I could pass the disease on to my children and I wouldn’t want anyone to live with this.
Eventually, I’m going to have to tell Wyatt that I’m not interested in having children. Of course, I like the idea of having children and taking care of them, but I’m scared shitless.
Look at what my mother did. She killed her own daughter because she was going manic and didn’t even blink. It was no big deal that she had drowned my baby sister in the bath tub. Nothing. My own mother did that.
I’m somewhere between being awake and being asleep when I hear the door crack open a little. It’s probably the nurse or someone like that. I open my left eye and look over to the corner where Wyatt has been sleeping and he’s not there.
“Keeley. I know you are awake,” Jerry says for the doorway.
With a jolt, I open both eyes and immediately sit straight up to figure out why he’s here. “What are you doing here?” I demand. “I was shot in our home because someone was looking for something. I almost died!” I yelled a little too loudly for being in a hospital.
My soon to be ex-husband advances towards me and then stands just at the end of the bed. “I’m so sorry that had happened to you. You weren’t supposed to have been hurt. Everything was in the process of being figured out…” He holds his hands out in front of him as if he’s showing me that he’s sorry about what happened.
“What needed to be figured out?” I demand. In dramatic situations such as this, I always expected me to confront him with documented evidence about everything that he is doing. Unfortunately, I don’t have that evidence because I don’t know what the fuck he has been doing all of this time.
“I should have told you everything before I got into this with these guys.”
All of a sudden, everything began to make sense. All of the red flags that I have been ignoring and the secret phone calls and meetings that he has been going to. The fact that he didn’t want me to do our taxes this year. The money that was missing out of Olivia’s part of the business. The safe in his office and now the money in mine.
“You didn’t.”
I don’t know why I even said anything because it’s obvious that he has been hiding something bigger than having a child on the side.
At least he has the nerve to look upset about what he had done. His eyes are down casted in shame and his cheeks aren’t as red as they normally are. “I’m so sorry.”
“How much money are we talking about here?” I ask him and then I shake my head. “Is that why they came to me? Why they were searching my house?”
“Yes. And… it’s a lot of money. I owe them about three hundred thousand dollars.”
If I wasn’t laying down already, I would have passed out from the shock of what he had just said. “Why?”
There has to be a logical reason for him putting the both of us in so much danger. Not just because of money, but physical danger as well. Hell, I had gotten shot a week ago. I’m laid up in a hospital room trying to get better.
“Um,” he begins and then I hear the throat clearing of someone else.
Wyatt steps into the room holding a coffee cup. “Your time is up, I want you to leave. Nothing good is going to come out of you being in here with her. You have done enough.”
Why Wyatt believes that he can dictate our conversation, I don’t know. I’m confused as to why he even left but I’m happy that he did so I could begin to understand why Jerry did what he did.
I look between both guys and then down at my hands that are shaking in my lap. “I want answers.” Bottom line is, I want to know what the fuck is going on and where this all began.
“About two years ago, I had defended a man who was about to go to prison for the rest of his life. The guy that actually killed the man, not my client, had told me that if I throw the case then I would get a big settlement.”
“Why? We have never needed money. You have money and I do as well. There is nothing that we needed that we couldn’t get. What the fuck was so important that you had to risk everything?”
“I’m getting to that, Keeley.”
At this point, Wyatt walks over towards me and lays his body out next to me. It’s an intimate move but it’s showing so much more than support for me. Instead of killing Jerry, Wyatt is showing him that he could offer me something that he couldn’t. And that’s comfort. Wyatt has the ability to soothe me and to allow me to know that he cares about me enough to lay in a hospital bed.
Wyatt places his hand gently on my stomach and squeezes. “When was the last time that you had taken your pain medicine? I remember the doctor mentioning that it’s important to stay above the pain.”
Again, I know what he’s doing and I love him for it. He’s definitely showing Jerry that he cares about me and that he thinks it’s fucked up what happened. “I’m okay, sweetie,” I say with a sweet smile. However, the pain medicine is starting to make me nauseous and I could almost puke.
Knowing that Jerry knows the game, he clears his throat and then gives me the come-on look. “Are you guys done? I get that you are with my wife now, but you don’t need to act like horny teenagers in order to prove your point.”
Wyatt’s head snaps up and he’s glaring at Jerry to show him that he’s not going to deal with being told what to do and what to say when it comes to me. I already knew that Wyatt f
elt protective over me and he’s showing that while he’s not even talking.
Before I make my opinion known about Jerry’s impromptu visit, Wyatt leans in and whispers to me: “He knows I could fucking kill him, right? Like I would let someone tell me how I should treat my woman.”
I give Jerry a dead stare because quite frankly, I’m done with this. I want to get better so I can figure out what I’m going to do after this. “Get on with it,” I retort and wave my hand a little in the middle of us. The quicker I can get answers, the quicker he’s out of here.
Have you ever had one of those conflicting moments where you want to know something but then you don’t? Like when you had a pregnancy scare in high school or something. You pee on the stick but then keep your eyes closed as it processes. Uh, you didn’t do that?
Well… Then…
You know what I mean!
“I did my best to defend my client so I didn’t get the bar called on me for neglecting my client. However, I did leave out some important information that could have implicated the man that was trying to blackmail me.”
“Blackmail. In order for a blackmail to be successful, one has to have information on someone who doesn’t want that information spread. What was the blackmail?” I ask him and lean my head into the pec of Wyatt’s chest.
My eyes feel dry and I’m beginning to feel thirsty from all of the medicines that are in my blood. I can’t help but begin to feel out of control with this situation. I can hear my thoughts getting louder and louder inside my own head and I’m trying to quiet them down.
Fuck Jerry! He could piss up a rope or get stung by bees for all I care. Our whole marriage was a sham and I’m not going to let him act as if he was trying to help me or us. No! He’s not the martyr and he won’t be treated like he was one.
As if Wyatt knew how I was feeling, he rubbed his hand down my back gently and then rested it on my ass. With a playful grab, he grabbed a handful of the cheek and squeezed. Have I told you lately that I loved this man? Even though I’m beginning to feel out of control and about to freak out, he’s grounding me.
