Why Not? (Love Riddles Book 3)

by Carey Heywood

  Their focus is only on me and the fact that outside of a twisted ankle, I’m alive and breathing. I can’t handle them.

  “Can we go?” I whisper to Trip.

  He doesn’t argue, he doesn’t even warn them that he’s going to move. He walks, bumping into Heath as he goes. Everyone else gets out of the way.

  It’s not until we’re in my Jeep that he talks. “It’s a good thing you gave me your extra key. Walt can take the cruiser back.”

  “I don’t want to go to the ER,” I reply.

  “But your ankle,” he argues.

  “Can we just go home?” I plead.

  He holds my gaze for a beat before nodding. Our drive home is silent. He holds my bloodied hand the whole way and carries me inside once we get there.

  He takes me straight to the bathroom. Pulls his phone and his wallet from his pocket and sets them on the sink before stepping us both into the shower, clothes and all.

  Lowering me on my feet, I put all of my weight on my good foot as he undresses me. Up over my head goes my happy yellow dress. He tosses it in the corner with a thwap.

  The rest of my clothes, and then his, follow it. Once we’re standing naked, facing each other, he sits on the wooden bench that runs across the back wall, taking me down with him.

  I’ve already cried more in the last two hours than I’ve probably cried my whole life. That doesn’t stop a fresh wave of body-wracking sobs from hitting me.

  Nothing will ever be the same. I’m not even sure I can mentally handle going back to work. Stan will tell me to take all the time I need. Will there ever be enough time to get over something like this?

  I used to joke that Gavin was my work husband. We saw each other for hours almost every day. Apart from Kacey, he was the person I confided in and vented to whenever I got stressed out.

  Trip silently holds me as I let it all out, or let out what I can for now. The water runs clear, the shower having washed the blood away.

  Trip washes my hair and then slowly soaps my body. We’ve taken plenty of showers together. One thing normally leads to another. Not today, there is no seduction in the way he touches me.

  Once he’s done washing me, he carefully carries me to our bed. He dresses me in one of his shirts and leaves me, only to return moments later with an ice pack for my ankle.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to go get x-rays?,” he asks.

  I shake my head. There will be people there. If I could, I’d never leave this house again.

  I watch distractedly as Trip pulls off his towel. He gets dressed, pulling on a pair of faded jeans and a tee. I don’t feel here. I don’t feel real. I feel outside of my body and watching like an impartial observer.

  His phone rings and the words of his conversation wash over me. Julie is coming by and bringing me my purse. She asks if she can see me.

  Then another call, and another. My phone was sitting on my desk at work. People must have given up trying to call me and are calling Trip if they know his number.

  His mom calls, she’s coming down. He tells her not to. He tells her to give me time. From his side of the conversation, I don’t think she agrees.

  The doorbell rings, but I don’t move. Trip closes our bedroom door behind him as he goes to answer it. There are murmured voices, one of them female.

  Is it Kacey, Julie, or Sydney? If it was Kacey, she would have pushed her way past Trip to see me. It must be Julie.

  Should I go to her? She loved Gavin too. My heart tugs toward her, but my feet won’t move. Pulling the blankets up, I turn until I’m facing the door.

  When the knob turns, I freeze, nerves rooting me where I lie. As Trip walks in, I exhale loud enough for his concerned eyes to move to mine.

  “Julie dropped off your things. I have your phone hooked to a charger in the kitchen, but I turned the ringer off.”

  I nod. My phone is the last thing I want right now. He moves to the side of the bed and climbs on. I’m in his arms seconds later. The numbness that had stolen over me evaporates at his touch. My tears return. It hurts to cry; my eyes must be swollen and red. It hurts more not to cry.

  “I hate that we lost him, but I can’t help feeling so grateful that Tad couldn’t hurt you because of what he did.”

  This isn’t the time to ask him why I’m here and Gavin is gone.

  A thought enters my mind, making me bolt upright knocking Trips arms away.

  “What is it?” he asks, instantly sitting up as well.

  I grab at his shirt, fisting it. “Beast! Is anyone taking care of Beast?”

  His jaw hardens as he mutters, “Shit,” before leaving our bed to retrieve his cell.

  I’m not sure who he calls but when he hangs up, he asks, “Want me to go get him and bring him back here?”

  With watery eyes, I nod my head.

  There’s a key to Gavin’s place on my keychain, just like he has a key here.

  Stop thinking, Reilly. Stop it right now.

  I can’t though, I can’t turn off the endless stream of memories we shared. He’s gone because he was protecting me. He’s gone because of me.

  After Trip leaves, the doorbell rings and rings again. I can’t get up. I can’t.

  It rings again. The people that I love most all have a key so it can’t be any of them.

  The intrusion, even from outside is jarring. Why can’t they go away?

  When Trip returns, I can hear his shouts at whoever was ringing the bell. Moments later, a car pulls away. When Trip opens the door, I hear the excited click of Beast’s paws on the wood floors.

  Trip must release him from his leash because the sound changes from a dog pulling as he walks, to a dog dashing toward something with nothing holding him back.

  He bumps the door open with his nose and takes a flying leap onto our bed. He’s so excited to see me. My heart breaks all over again wondering when he’ll figure out that Gavin is gone and he’s not coming back.

  Trip’s return to our bedroom is slower. He pauses in the doorway, watching me bear hug Beast as I cry into his fur.

  It was my fault. The first time I saw the way he looked at her, I knew he wanted her. He’s the reason I went public with her last year at the pizza place.

  I was staking my claim in front of him. The way he watched her bothered me. It bothered me, but I did nothing about it. No, I was so distracted with getting her to admit her feelings for me that I didn’t check him out.

  If I had, maybe I would have figured out he was a few steps past “into” her. Standing in the spare bedroom of his house, I stared at a disturbing as hell wall of pictures of Reilly. I know he more than liked her. He was full on obsessed with her.

  She told me what flipped his switch. What was supposed to be a sweet surprise of her wanting to marry me lost a bit of its shine when I had to hear it during a police interview.

  Tad overheard her telling Gavin, and he lost his mind. From the investigation of his computer and apartment, he had been planning to wait until she had the baby before doing whatever he could to get rid of me.

  He wanted her all to himself, even had doctored up photos of the two of them working the anchor desk together. That was part of his obsession. That she was also a reporter.

  If I would have taken the time to look into him, I would have uncovered the producer he was sleeping with before she left town in a hurry. Left town because he was becoming increasingly violent and she was scared for her safety.

  She came forward after she saw what he did. She wasn’t the only one who did. There were interns and two other women he dated. One of them he was fucking while his obsession with Reilly grew.

  I was supposed to protect her. I’m the reason she hasn’t left our house in the last month. My take-no-prisoner Reilly Whitmore is now scared of her own shadow.

  She still eats and drinks, less for herself and more for our baby. Her doctor, out of sympathy for what the whole world knows Reilly went through, came to the house for our last appointment.

  She can�
�t go on like this. Nothing Jake, Kacey, Heath, Sydney, or I have done has snapped her out of it. With the exception of Gavin’s funeral, she seems hell bent on quitting life.

  None of us know what to do. I don’t want to force her to go outside. It will be a long time, maybe decades before people in town get over something as big as a double homicide practically on live TV.

  Every major network and newspaper has contacted us to get our side of the story. It’s all bullshit; they don’t care about either of us no matter how much they pretend to. No, people are fascinated by the macabre tragedy and they want to feed into that. Would they care as much if she wasn’t as beautiful as she is, or pregnant? Maybe it’s the fact that she’s my woman and it was my bullet that ended him.

  They’ve interviewed Stan, Gavin’s girlfriend Claire, and the family of the florist. They’ve tried to get our friends to talk, but no way would any of them sell us out like that.

  I walk into our bedroom and find her with her guardian, Beast. He’s stayed by her side, or as close to it as possible, since the day I brought him home.

  They’re both asleep but the moment I near, Beast lifts his chin. “Hey boy.”

  He tilts his head before lowering it back to the bed. Despite his movement, he does not wake Reilly.

  I decide to let her sleep and move away from our bedroom and towards our kitchen. Once I’m sure my conversation won’t wake her, I call my mom.

  “Hey honey,” she answers.

  “Hey back, Mom,” I reply.

  “How’s our girl?” she asks.

  Leaning a hip against the counter, I drag my hand over my face. “She’s the reason I called.”

  “Have you decided to give it a try?” she asks.

  My eyes shift toward the hall that leads to our room. “I can’t think of anything else to try.”

  “I’ll get a cabin ready for you. Should I expect you tonight or tomorrow?”

  “She’s sleeping now. As much as it’ll piss her off, I’m going to try to get her into my car before she wakes.”

  “It’ll be hard for her to argue coming once you’re already on the way,” she remarks.

  I don’t reply since she’s right.

  “See you soon, honey,” she adds.

  “Bye Mom.”

  Reilly isn’t going to get better here. She needs not only a change of scenery but some people to talk to about what happened. My mom’s place is secluded enough that we won’t have to worry about reporters sniffing around.

  There are people there that Reilly can talk to. My mom offers a whole host of therapy options.

  Quietly, I pack, not only for me but for Reilly and Beast as well. It’s a good thing my mom loves that dog as much as Reilly and I do. If he wasn’t welcome, there’s no way I could convince Reilly to stay.

  Once the car is loaded, I move Reilly first. Her eyes flutter but she doesn’t wake. Beast obediently follows us. When I loaded our stuff into my SUV, I left the back and passenger doors open.

  Beast hops right into the back and settles himself on the seat. He loves car rides.

  Reilly shifts as I ease her into the passenger seat.

  Once she’s buckled, I move quickly to lock the house before climbing into the driver’s side. We’re turning out of town when she startles awake, her hands shoot out to either side.

  Turning wide eyes to me, she gasps, “Trip.”

  Beast sets his front paws to the floor and sticks his head between the seats. He doesn’t bark or growl, it’s more of a quiet questioning howl.

  Her hand moves to caress his head. “Is everything okay?”

  “I didn’t want to wake you,” I reply, sticking to the truth.

  She rubs at her eyes and yawns. “I didn’t know we were going somewhere.”

  Her drowsiness has left her more confused than concerned. “It was supposed to be a surprise.”

  “Trip,” she murmurs, her voice hesitant.

  I squeeze her leg reassuringly. “Just a change of scenery. A cabin at my mom’s place.”

  She pinches her eyes shut, her hand stilling on Beast’s head. I hate seeing her hurting.

  “It’s peaceful. I thought it’d be good for you and the baby to get out of town.”

  She pulls in a breath and opens her eyes.

  Turning to me, she asks, “You think?”

  I rub her leg but keep my eyes on the road. “I do.”

  “I guess it can’t hurt.”

  Schooling my features, I celebrate internally. Even if our visit isn’t a complete success, the fact that she hasn’t begged me to turn around and take her back to the house is already progress.

  Our drive is uneventful. We make one stop for her to use the bathroom.

  “The baby seems to enjoy pressing on my bladder,” she grumbles as she climbs back into my car.

  “I don’t mind stopping,” I reply.

  She gives me a small smile as I back out of the spot. “Do you have a brother?”

  My lungs fall into my gut, or at least that’s what it feels like.

  “He,” she gulps then keeps going, “Tad told me to ask you about your brother. I forgot about before, before what happened. Why would he care about it?”

  There’s no sugarcoating it so, I keep my eyes on the road and say, “His death was my fault.”

  The air in the SUV goes wired before she asks. “What?”

  “It was my fault,” I repeat, the words no less painful a second time.

  “Trip, I don’t understand. How did he die?”

  “His name was Joshua, like the tree. We would go to Joshua Tree Park every year on his birthday. Well, my mom and I would. My dad couldn’t deal and took off when Josh’s problems surfaced. He was five years younger than me.”

  “I don’t remember you having a brother. Did he go to school in Ferncliff?”

  I shake my head. “He was developmentally delayed. He never went to a public school.”

  “How did he die?”

  It’s been years but the memory of that day is fresh as ever. “After my parents got divorced, we moved north to be closer to Josh’s school. My mom couldn’t afford his boarding anymore and even without the boarding his school wasn’t cheap. My mom had to work. It wasn’t like my dad helped out with money after he left. I was supposed to be watching him.”

  She stretches her hand out over the console to rest it on my thigh.

  “I was supposed to be watching him,” I repeat more to myself than to her.

  “Trip,” she urges.

  “He was playing on the floor.”

  He loved to play on the floor.

  “He had this train set. There were little magnets that made each car attach to the next.”

  I gulp, picturing him clear as day, pushing the trains around the track.

  “There was a railroad crossing bar with a bell. He would make it ding each time he passed it.”

  “Honey,” she murmurs, the warmth of her hand seeping through the fabric of my jeans.

  “I don’t know how many minutes passed before I noticed it wasn’t dinging anymore.”

  “What happened?”

  My throat tightens and I crack my window to get some air. “He choked on one of those magnets. Right in front of me, and I didn’t even notice.”

  Her hand spasms on my leg before she clutches it. “That was an accident.”

  “He was my responsibility,” I argue.

  “Like I’m responsible for Gavin and Leah’s deaths?” she asks.

  Fuck. “No, it’s not like that at all.”

  She moves to pull her hand away, but I cover it with mine, holding it to my leg.

  “He killed them because of me,” she whispers, her voice heartbreakingly small.

  “Reilly,” I start but don’t get far.

  “Did he think I’d break up with you because your brother died?” she interrupts.

  Grateful for the slight subject change, I reply the only way I know how. “He was sick in the head. We’ll never completely understand
why he did any of it.”

  “Have you ever gone back?” she asks.

  My brows furrow. “Back where?”

  “To Joshua Tree?”

  My throat burns as I try to swallow. “No.”

  The rest of the drive is quiet save Beast moving around in the backseat. He’s curious and moves from one side to another to look out the windows.

  I brought his leash but hope he’ll behave himself enough to not need it at my mom’s place. We’ve never had him out of the leash, so I don’t know if he’d roam.

  As devoted as he is to Reilly, if he stays near, it should be no problem. There are wild animals up there, both on and off her property. I can’t risk anything happening to him if he decides to start exploring.

  The sun is making its descent when we pull up. Sadie meets us in the drive and lets me know which cabin will be ours.

  “We’re not staying with your mom?” Reilly asks, as I pull away.

  “I thought it’d be nice to have more privacy.”

  She nods but does it with a confused crease between her brows. When we reach the cabin, she holds Beast’s leash as I unload. Each cabin on my mom’s property is decorated differently.

  Luckily, this one is one of her more neutral cabins. It would suck if we were staying in the purple one. That much purple gives me a headache after a while.

  “Hello kids,” my mom greets from the door.

  She’s met Beast on a visit down to our place since we’ve had him. He must love the smell of patchouli because he goes nuts when he sees her, jumping all over her.

  “How is my granddog?” she coos, offering him what she assures us is an organic treat.

  He wolfs it down before looking back up at her adoringly.

  “Granddog?” I ask.

  She shrugs. “It’s a thing.” Then she moves to envelope Reilly in a hug.

  It’s one of her long ones. My chest tightens until I see Reilly relax into her hold. My mom has a gift with making people feel welcome. I need her unique magic now.

  When she releases Reilly, she places her hands on Reilly’s stomach. “You’re carrying high and across. Makes it tricking to figure out if you’re having a boy or a girl.”

  “We’re waiting,” I say.