“It’s Herb.” Lincoln hits the button for speakerphone. “Hey, Herb, everything okay?”
The line crackles and belches with static. We’re only able to hear every few words from Herb, but he sounds agitated as his voice floats over speakerphone. “Listen, I – there as soon as I – bad connection, but – permits, and – dangerous – place is totally – out of there, before–”
Lincoln frowns as the call cuts off. “He sounded upset. I’d better call him back.”
Suddenly, I hear a strange shifting sound behind me. I whip around as an expensive vase slides across the surface of an end table, heading for the edge. The table tilts at a drastically uneven angle, but that’s not how I staged it, so what the hell is happening? The vase hits the floor and shatters before I have a chance to grab it. Lincoln and I stare at the fragments for a long moment, then the crooked table.
“Look.” His eyes widen, and he points at the wall behind it.
I follow his gaze, and my eyebrows shoot up. A giant crack runs from the floor to the ceiling, growing before our eyes. The whole house starts to make nauseating creaking sounds under us, the floor’s angle getting sharper beneath our feet.
“Oh no,” I whisper.
“It’s falling apart,” Lincoln barks. “Come on! Let’s get out of here!”
We start toward the door, but even though we both move as fast as we can, our limps slow us down. An apocalyptic crack echoes through the whole house, the sound of the earth breaking in half, and I look up just in time to see a wooden beam plummeting toward me.
“Chloe!”
Lincoln calls my name in agony as the beam comes down on my shoulder and sends me to the floor like a giant’s hand swatting a bug. I feel a wet snap in my collarbone, and the world fades to black.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Lincoln
An avalanche of cheap plaster rains down as I hear Chloe shriek and see her drop to the floor, pinned by a heavy-looking beam. Panic slices through my chest with the force of a thousand knives.
No.
This can’t happen. Not to her.
Not now that I’ve finally found someone I want to be with. Probably forever. God couldn’t be this cruel, could He?
I lunge over to her, grabbing the beam with both hands and pulling. But it won’t budge, and my sweaty palms slide against it helplessly. I may as well be trying to lift the Statue of Liberty. A shower of sawdust stings my eyes, and I blink it away. Chloe is so still. I rake my eyes over her body, looking for even the tiniest inhale. Her eyes are open but glassy – it looks like she might be going into shock.
As I clamp my hands around the edges of the beam again, I heft it upward with all of my strength. The ground lurches and breaks apart underneath my loafers, so I struggle to gain traction. My shoulders slump. I feel all the energy leave me like water draining from a tub.
Dammit all to everlasting hell!
I’m too weak. I’ve always been too weak. I could never take care of myself, and now I can’t take care of her either. I never should have let Nixon pay to have them fix me. I should have stayed in the damn chair. I should have accepted my limitations. That way, no one would ever expect anything from me that I can’t deliver. I wouldn’t expect anything from myself. I wouldn’t be the failure I am in this moment. I would just exist, alone, and I’d never have dragged Chloe into this, and she wouldn’t be trapped right now, probably breathing her last breaths.
I see Chloe’s eyes looking up at me, trying to focus on me, pleading with me to save her, and I feel a heavy iron door slam down in my mind, cutting off all the terror and insecurity like a clipped telephone wire.
No. Blast all of that self-pity bullshit. I’ve wallowed in it long enough, and it stops right now. I’m here now. That’s all that matters.
You can do this, Linc. You will save the woman you’re falling in love with.
And I am not leaving this deathtrap of a shitbox house courtesy of Dante Giovanetti and his twisted schemes without my Chloe.
My mouth floods with an acrid, metallic taste, like a handful of rusty pennies. White heat courses through my muscles, consuming them. As I tremble violently, my blood surges through my head, and my heart feels like it’s about to blast out of my chest like a cannonball.
I grab the beam one more time and pull.
It moves. It shifts. It gives me one small sliver of hope.
I. Can. Do. This.
The following shifts move slowly at first, maddeningly slow, but the more I plant my feet and shift my weight under it, the easier it comes. Finally, it knocks aside, revealing a huge, ugly red mark on Chloe’s upper chest. From the uneven surface of her skin, I can tell the severity of the impact fractured her collarbone. I silently thank God – who I’ve never prayed to before in my life – that it isn’t worse. It could have turned out so much worse.
Then I add it to the long list of reasons I’ll see Dante ruined if it’s the last motherfucking thing I ever do.
“Come on,” I grunt, bending over to cradle her. “Get up. We’ve got to get out of here.”
Chloe grabs my hand, then lets out a scream as she sits up. That broken bone must be agony, but we don’t have time to be delicate. A few more minutes, and this house will swallow us both.
I sling her good arm over my shoulder, propping her up and hustling her to the door as quickly as possible. Another beam drops to the floor, just inches away from us.
Thank you, God.
I realize these prayers make no sense, and it occurs to me that I might be entering a state of mild shock myself. I have to focus. I have to get us out of this hellhole. I kick the door open and throw us both outside, face down on the lawn. When I look over my shoulder, I see the house visibly sinking. The sod and turf around ruptures, and industrial sludge seeps out from the landfill below, like pus from an infected wound.
The fumes assault my eyes, burning them, and the smell – combined with the adrenaline taste in my mouth – almost gags me into vomiting as I bite back the bile. I help Chloe to her feet, walking her a short distance from the house so we aren’t both poisoned to death by the toxic ooze. She grits her teeth and hisses in pain, but she still lets me lead her away.
Herb’s truck barrels down the street, coming to a screeching halt in front of the driveway. He gets out and runs over to us, cell phone in hand.
“I’ve been trying to reach you,” he pants. “I went over the county records. The house isn’t safe. It’s built over a…”
He trails off, looking at the disaster behind us.
“A damn landfill!” I snarl.
“Guess you already found that out the hard way, huh?” he asks ruefully. “You guys all right?”
“Call 9-1-1,” I tell him urgently. “She’s been hurt. I think her collarbone is broken. A beam came crashing down on us.”
Herb makes the call, then hangs up and puts a hand on my shoulder again. This time, it’s a welcome gesture – it makes things feel less wobbly, more tangible. I can feel my thoughts snapping back into their proper order.
“Listen, that’s not all,” he says. “This morning, Dante pre-sold the last piece of property in this development. All in all, it looks like he’s netted over a hundred million on this deal. I checked with your brother Reagan, and he says the info from the preliminary inspection alone is enough to nail Dante to the wall.” He gestures at the ruined house. “This should definitely seal the deal.”
I sigh, relieved. “Then it’s over. We did it.”
Herb grimaces. “Afraid that ain’t the whole story, son. The Feds already sent agents to his home and office. He’s gone. And all of his accounts have been cleaned out. Looks like he’s in the wind.”
As blind rage surges through my body to replace the panic, I stop to think for a moment. “He’s got dual citizenship, right? He’ll be heading to Italy.”
Herb shakes his head. “They’ve got all the airports staked out. If he tries to fly out, they’ll nab him.”
My phone rings and Reaga
n’s face appears on the screen. I answer immediately.
“Hey there, baby brother,” Reagan says cheerfully. “Seems like you’ve been having a bit of an adventure lately, huh?”
My heart flips over as I struggle to organize my thoughts. “Reagan, listen. Dante’s trying to get away. We can’t let that happen. We have to tell them to cover the roads, the buses, the trains, just in case he tries to get a flight from somewhere else.”
“Whoa, slow down there, Tommy Lee Jones,” Reagan chuckles. “I hate to interrupt your big dragnet, but there’s no need. The FBI just busted the little prick at a small private airstrip outside of town, carrying over a quarter of a billion dollars in cash. Sounds like the IRS is getting in on the act too, with all that undeclared moolah.”
“You mean…?”
“I mean you did it, baby brother. He’s federally screwed. Bribery, extortion, criminal negligence, plus tax evasion and about a hundred building code violations. You brought down Dante Giovanetti for good, and from what Nixon tells me, you even got the girl. How’s it feel to be a hero?”
As the words hit my ears, I hear the obnoxious wail of sirens approaching. But a symphony wouldn’t sound as sweet. They’re here, and Chloe will be just fine. I know it. After everything my family’s gone through over the years, there has to be a happy ending for us. Life isn’t that cruel.
I glance at the sky because I know my mom and dad are up there, looking down on me and serving as my guardian angels. I thank them for helping me to heal. I thank them for the strength of our family. I thank them for giving me the tools to bring down our arch nemesis.
Most of all, I thank them for sending Chloe. The other half to my whole.
An ambulance pulls up, and medics hop out, running over to Chloe to inspect her injury. While they stabilize her, she looks in my direction, and our eyes meet.
I’m sure once the wonderful news of Dante’s demise sinks in, I’ll be celebrating. But right now, I don’t care about Dante, or heroism. My family’s allowed that man to be far too important for far too long.
All I care about is knowing Chloe is safe.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chloe
A week later, I lie on the couch in Lincoln’s apartment. I’ve been staying here since the house fell down on us.
Thankfully, the clavicle bones didn’t shift too much when the falling beam broke them, so I didn’t need surgery – just an arm splint, and a few weeks of physical therapy to get my strength and coordination back once they start to heal. I don’t need to be told twice how lucky I am. In my recent nightmares, I dream that I lost one of my arms to match my missing leg. A shiver runs down my spine at how bad it could have been. I could now be missing my life.
I’ve spent my entire existence waiting on the other shoe to drop due to my mother’s inability to cope with my bad choices. And now that it has, I’m not sure what that means. What it means when lies become the truth but then become lies again. But my worry about being shunned by Lincoln was just a ruse, designed to keep me inside the box when all I ever wanted to do was burst forth and stand in a pool of honesty.
It’s like I’ve stepped inside the vision I once held as the woman I was capable of becoming.
My mind drifts back to one of the first contacts I made once I started my convalescence. I again hear Benalisa’s shocked voice after she answered the phone. I explained how I came clean at the Helping Hearts & Hands gala. I explained how I needed to make amends in order to move forward.
I’ll never forget her calm words. “Chloe, I was drunk too, remember. It could have been me behind that wheel. Flip a coin and our situations could have been reversed. I want you to know that I forgive you.”
The other was to my mother. I don’t think I’m quite to the forgiveness stage yet with her, but I’m trying.
Someday.
A shiver rips through me at the treasured memory, hurting my shoulder. Since the accident, I’ve had trouble doing basic stuff like dressing myself, so Lincoln’s been helping me. The irony isn’t lost on me, either. He used to need the same kind of help, and now he’s the one dishing it out. But he seems to really enjoy playing nursemaid and being as useful as he can be.
I’m trying not to realize how at home I feel with him. At one point, after I’d been out for a walk, he surprised me with a home-cooked steak dinner. When I asked how I was supposed to cut it with only one working arm, he proudly displayed a plate with bite-sized pieces already cut.
“I’m not sure how comfortable I am with you cutting up my food for me,” I noted wryly as a warm wave of tender loving care flowed over me at his actions.
“Believe me, I know,” he said with a cheeky smile. He’s been smiling a lot more lately, and that makes my heart sing. We’ve settled into an easy rhythm. “I’ve been on the other side of this too, remember? I get that it makes you feel weird and self-conscious. But hey, at least for you, it’ll only be for a month and a half or so, as opposed to the years I had to deal with it. You can just lay back and receive my culinary gifts.”
He always seemed so serious before, so reserved. But with me, it seems like he can finally feel comfortable enough to let his guard down. I can’t believe I’ve been able to do that for someone. Be someone else’s impetus for healing. Plus, he puts me at ease too. I can’t think of anyone else I’d let cut up my meat into bite-sized portions.
Now, I grip the remote in one hand, channel surfing cable, when I see footage of Dante on one of the local news channels. Orange is not the new black for that douche bag. His flaming jumpsuit hurts my eyes as he’s being led from the courthouse to the jail by federal marshals. I sit up and turn up the volume.
“We’ve just learned that alleged mafia boss Dante Giovanetti, a longtime fixture of the Las Vegas gaming community, has refused a deal from federal prosecutors to testify against other suspected organized crime members in exchange for a lesser sentence,” the newscaster narrates. “This means that if convicted, Giovanetti faces a minimum of forty years in prison without parole…essentially, a life sentence for a man his age. The only way he’ll ever leave the penitentiary is in a body bag. Our chief legal correspondent, Matt Lampman, has reviewed the case and can’t understand why Giovanetti didn’t take the deal.”
As the news cameras zoom in on Dante’s facial expression, he turns and spits on them, causing the Marshal holding him to grab him by the scruff of the neck and manhandle him into submission. I can’t help but cackle. Serves him right.
Piece of human shit. Asshole. Motherfucker.
Lincoln comes in, narrowing his eyes. “What’s so funny?”
I point at the TV. He glances at it and smiles. “Ah. Yeah. Now that’s what I call damn fine television. Couldn’t happen to a better guy.”
His smartwatch rings, and he checks the caller ID. A bemused expression drifts across his face.
“Speaking of which.” He hits the speakerphone button, and I turn the TV volume back down. “Andy, what’s up?”
“Hey there, Lincoln!” Andy Cohen answers. “How are you guys holding up? How’s Chloe’s arm?”
“Still pretty banged up,” I say, raising my voice so Andy can hear me from the distance. “But hey, I’ve still got full use of two out of four limbs, so that ain’t bad. Makes me the most badass disabled person in Nevada.”
“Oh, good, you’re there too,” Andy chirps. “Glad you’re healing up.”
I lean closer to Lincoln’s wrist. “Thank you. Listen, I’m sorry all this stuff with Dante happened. It probably ruined the whole season of the show.”
He laughs incredulously. “Are you kidding? Our little home-selling show was linked to the arrest of a big-time mob guy. We couldn’t buy publicity this juicy. We’ll have to do some reshoots, sure, but overall, this is going to make our first season a smash hit. Which is what I’m calling you about, actually.”
Lincoln raises an eyebrow. “Oh? About what?”
“Well, between this whole mafia thing and Chloe’s speech at the charity ev
ent, you guys have a lot of buzz attached to you right now, and Bravo wants to put that to good use. So, we’re thinking, how about having you guys produce and host a spin-off show? You can help people with disabilities stage and sell their houses. It’s good press for your businesses, it’ll raise awareness of Helping Hearts and Hands, and it’ll help Bravo reach new audiences by being more inclusive. What are your thoughts?”
Lincoln and I look at each other, wide-eyed. We both nod in unison.
“Are you guys nodding? I, uh, can’t tell,” Andy chuckles. “Help a guy out here who’s stuck out in the ether.”
“Yes! Yes, we’ll do it, absolutely,” I reply. A warm flow of positive energy engulfs me. “And I have the perfect person for our first show. Benelisa Moorhead!”
I never thought I’d be in a position to do so much good in the world. To right my wrongs. Not with the dark cloud I had hanging over me for so many years. My shoulders lift along with my chin, and I want to ingest the words that will change my future. As I accept this new path my life takes, I realize that perfection is born of pain. I feel rejuvenated.
Andy chuckles. “Perfect! I’ll talk to the head of programming and have Bravo’s attorneys draw up the contracts. We’ll be sending them by courier, so keep an eye out, okay?”
“Definitely.” Lincoln’s smile lights up his whole face. “And thank you, Andy. This means a lot to us.”
“I’m betting when the Nielsen ratings and sponsorship offers start rolling in, it’ll mean a lot to us too.” And with that, he hangs up, leaving us in stunned silence.
“Our own show,” I whisper, as though saying it too loud will somehow make the offer blink out of existence.
And out of the ashes rises the Phoenix. I never thought this kind of a fairytale ending would ever come my way. How many times had I been molded into the image of a perfect world that could never really accept me? And now, I’ll be the one doing the molding.
On The House (Caldwell Brothers Book 7) Page 16
