Identical Threat

by Tyler Anne Snell

  Thank you for not letting a man die because I couldn’t hold on.

  Thank you for not questioning me when I needed you to do something.

  Thank you for coming back.

  Riley dropped her head against his chest, realizing how tired she was. For the second time since she’d met the man, he held her in silence for a much-needed second or two.

  Then she remembered why she was there in the first place.

  “There was a man in a suit here,” she hurried, rolling off him without an ounce of grace. “He gave me the saw when I dropped my phone and spray. He told me Marty was about to die.”

  Desmond’s brow knitted together. He pulled his phone from his pocket. He had Declan on speaker phone.

  “We’re almost there,” the sheriff yelled out. “EMT should be right on our tails.”

  Desmond reached over to check Marty’s pulse. He nodded to Riley.

  “Marty is alive,” he yelled to the phone. “I’m—We’re going to go get the other man to make sure he doesn’t escape.”

  Desmond pulled Riley to her feet and kept hold of her hand. Wordlessly they got into his truck near the open first floor of the construction site and then drove across the street. Riley was about to ask where they were going as they headed toward the back road they’d come in on when she saw a figure on the side of the road.

  “I hog-tied him with some rope I had from the barn,” he explained when they stopped. The headlights showed the man in all black lying on his stomach on the grass, his arms, wrists and ankles tied up behind him. “I wasn’t sure it would hold since I did it so quick.”

  He started to get out as the man ahead of them turned toward the truck.

  Riley sucked in a breath.

  Desmond stalled next to his opened door.

  “What is it?” he asked, voice already drowning in concern.

  Riley didn’t speak for a moment.

  There’s no way...

  “Riley?”

  A warm hand touched hers. Another grabbed her chin. Desmond gently turned her head.

  Riley looked into those crystal blue eyes, so blue she felt like she could swim in them, and said something she never thought she’d utter in Overlook.

  “That’s my ex-husband.”

  Chapter Ten

  Hitting something seemed too dramatic. The walls of Declan’s office in Wildman County’s sheriff’s department hadn’t done anything to Desmond. It seemed unfair to take out his anger and frustration there.

  Yelling also didn’t seem the best course of action.

  Declan and the uniforms who had shown up at the construction site now knew as much as he did. Cussing at them didn’t get anyone anywhere. Plus, it was rude.

  And not what the most charming Nash was expected to do.

  What everyone probably expected of him was to be a cool cucumber. Ready to go with an easy smile and a tip of the hat.

  But that wasn’t him.

  Not right now.

  Riley was sitting next to him in an old wingback chair that made her seem impossibly small. She had bandages across each of her palms and they were resting on the tops of her thighs. When she caught him staring, her smile was weak.

  Since the revelation that the man in black was her ex-husband, they hadn’t gotten a chance to be alone together. Definitely not talk in private. Now, after Declan had told them to wait in his office, was the perfect time to tackle whatever the hell was going on together.

  Yet for all Desmond’s fame of being the smooth one of the Nash bunch, he was finding that with Riley his words often were raw. He didn’t have a prepared speech or thought to share.

  He was at a loss and it manifested in nearly palpable hesitation.

  One that Riley broke, despite Desmond’s intentions to do it first.

  “Can we rain check dinner at the Red Oak?”

  Desmond offered a weak smile in return.

  “I’d be okay with that.”

  Riley nodded.

  “Good. Good.”

  Silence pushed between them again.

  Desmond glanced down at her lips. The same ones that had crushed his at the construction site.

  It wasn’t the time, the place or the situation to be thinking about them. Yet, there he was. Wishing he could have a do-over. He hadn’t kissed back because, honestly, he’d been too surprised.

  Now he wasn’t.

  Now he wanted to.

  Now wasn’t the time.

  The door opened and Declan walked in. His hat had been off since they’d arrived at the department. That usually meant business.

  “Marty’s husband and kids are at the hospital with Detective Santiago,” he said, going to his chair and taking a seat. “He’s hurt, but unless something changes, he’ll be fine. Eventually. Before you arrived it appears he was knocked out pretty hard. There’s a nasty cut on his scalp, explaining all that blood.”

  “What about his legs?” Riley asked.

  Declan looked unsure of what to say. Desmond spoke up.

  “Better off than if he’d fallen unconscious three stories, I can tell you that.”

  Riley gave him a look riddled with guilt. He wanted to wipe it away.

  “I know Marty,” he added. “Whatever injuries he takes from this he’ll gladly accept over the alternative. You saved his life.”

  Declan nodded his agreement.

  Riley visibly let a long breath out.

  Then it was back to business.

  “As for the man in the suit, we have a BOLO out on him based on your description. Caleb is also at the law offices looking at their security footage with one of the other partners.” It was Declan’s turn to let out a sigh. “Which brings us to the one man out of the three who can tell us what in the heck was going on out there.”

  Riley stiffened. Desmond, in response, did too.

  “Davies,” she said, anger threading clear through the two syllables.

  Her ex-husband.

  Desmond felt the heat of jealousy push against his gut. He tried to remember that it was her ex, but still, the thought of another man with her put fire in him.

  Not the time, he scolded himself, again.

  “That’s his last name, right?” Declan asked.

  She nodded.

  “He hates the name Evan so everyone calls him by his last name. It was the reason why I didn’t take his name when we married. He said it felt like I was stealing a part of his identity.”

  Desmond snorted.

  He’d be proud as hell for Riley to wear his name if she wanted it.

  Declan shot him a look and stood up.

  “I don’t normally do this but Marty is a well-established member of Overlook and, well, we’re coming up with a lot more questions than I’m comfortable with,” he said. “I’d appreciate if you could come observe the interrogation. You know this Davies better than any of us so you might be able to pick up on something we won’t be able to.”

  Riley stood. Hesitation lined her body.

  “He won’t be able to see me, right?”

  “Right. You’ll be behind a two-way mirror. We won’t even let him know you’re in the building.” Declan opened the door and waved a deputy over. “Can you take Ms. Stone to the viewing room? We’ll be there in a minute.”

  The deputy did as she was told and escorted Riley out of the room. Desmond stood but didn’t try to go after her. His brother was looking at him with an expression he couldn’t read, a rarity between the Nash siblings.

  “What is it?”

  Declan shut the door behind him. Then he was all big brother.

  “I’m not one for victim blaming so don’t you go putting that on me after I say this,” he started. “But I want to be a friendly reminder that she might be nice, funny and quick on her feet but the fact remains that you
don’t know Riley or her sister. None of us do. Not really.”

  Desmond felt his defenses flare.

  “What are you trying to say, Dec? Do you think she’s behind this?”

  “No, what I’m saying is that there’s something weird going on here. Brett Calder attacks her at random, you save her and then less than a month later you get her away from Geordi Green. Then, on the night you two decide to go out, her ex-husband is a part of some bizarre scene at your foundation’s construction site.” Declan made two fists. He shook one. “You—” He shook the other. “And her—” He put those two fists against each other. “Keep colliding together. And I don’t know why or how it keeps happening. Or who might be helping make it happen.”

  Desmond readied to combat whatever his brother was trying to say when Declan’s expression softened. He placed one of his large hands on Desmond’s shoulder and squeezed.

  “All I’m saying is you can let that heart of yours do what it wants, just make sure that head sticks around too. Okay?”

  Desmond nodded, holding back the staggering need to puff his chest out and fight for Riley’s innocence.

  “Okay,” he said, instead.

  * * *

  “JENNA MET RYAN ALCASTER right out of college.”

  Riley was standing across from the two-way window and trying not to look at a man she, quite frankly, despised.

  Declan and Desmond had come in but had given her space. Desmond was leaning against the wall next to the door, facing her, while Declan was in a chair with a notepad next to the window.

  He looked up from his writing, brow raised.

  “I thought we were talking about Evan Davies?”

  Riley sighed. She wished she could melt into the floor and forget every ounce of the story she was about to tell.

  “We are but I can’t tell you about my ex-husband without talking about hers.” Riley glanced at Desmond, then she let the look fall to the floor. A consequence of how much she disliked all of what she was about to say. Still, there were much worse things than telling a story.

  She could have lived through Jenna’s side.

  “Ryan Alcaster is the CFO of Macklin Tech, a company out of Atlanta that deals in technology revolving around memory cards and external hard drives. A business model that’s a dime a dozen, if you ask me, but since I’ve known of it Macklin seems to have been doing really well. So, whatever it is they’re doing, it’s working.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway, right before Jenna and Ryan met, I met Davies. When we first started dating, we were both struggling to find jobs within our fields. We were considering leaving Atlanta to save some money but then Ryan got Davies a job interview at Macklin. He and Ryan had become fast friends. Ryan honestly became like a mentor too. It was a friendship that connected to their careers. Davies was hired at Macklin within the year, and just as I was about to start my online marketing freelance business, he convinced me to take an office manager job there too.” Riley shrugged. “Not where I wanted my career to go but bills don’t care all about that. Plus, I really thought we were lucky. We got married and then became the married couple in the office. Sure, the commute was bad but at least I had a partner in it.”

  Desmond shifted his weight to his other leg. Pen scratched across paper as Declan kept up with his notes. The sound of the AC kicking on created a constant background noise. Riley continued, not meeting either of their gazes.

  “It wasn’t until Jenna had Hartley that Macklin Tech opened a second location in Kilwin,” she continued. “Nothing on the scale of the Atlanta office but strategically placed to work on a different region of the South. At least that’s what I was told. What it meant for Jenna was that she had to move with Ryan to Kilwin while Davies was promoted and we stayed in Atlanta. Again, not ideal, but Jenna and I kept in touch. We video chatted daily, spoke on the phone when we had the time and still managed to feel close... But then things changed.”

  Riley rubbed her thumb across the knuckle of her index finger. She was actively trying not to make a fist.

  “Jenna stopped wanting to video chat and then the phone calls stopped a little while after that. It was like pulling teeth to get ahold of her. I started to worry but Davies convinced me it was just Jenna getting used to being a mom and living in a new city. He convinced me to give her space. So, I did. But then one day she showed up at my door. She was acting weird and I couldn’t place it until I saw the bruise on her back.”

  “Ryan was abusing her,” Desmond said. His voice had gone cold.

  It matched how Riley felt at remembering.

  She nodded.

  “She brushed it off in the end. Worried that it was her fault and then citing our parents as a reason for why she had to stay.”

  “Your parents?”

  Riley finally met Desmond’s blue eyes.

  “We had a really good childhood and our parents often said that was because of their healthy marriage and respect for each other. It gave us stability.”

  “And she thought if she left Ryan that it would hurt Hartley,” he guessed.

  Again Riley nodded.

  “She went back home and I tried to convince her for weeks to leave. When she finally told me to stop or she would get a new number, I backed off and that night I sat Davies down.” That cold, hollow feeling was replaced by red-hot resentment and disbelief, even now. Riley turned to face the man she’d made an oath to stay with until death did them part. How foolish she’d been. “I guess I should have realized that me not telling him up until then was because a part of me didn’t trust him. But I didn’t know what to do anymore so I told him. I was so worried about how he would react. I was shaking. Ryan was his friend, his mentor, the reason in part for his success. Outing Ryan endangered everything Davies had worked for. But do you know what happened when I told him?”

  Riley directed this to Desmond. She couldn’t stand to look at the man of the story anymore.

  Desmond’s face was impassive.

  He knew it was a rhetorical question.

  Still, she paused for effect. She wanted—needed—someone else to feel an ounce of the impact of what had happened next.

  “I didn’t see any surprise in his eyes. It was that moment, that exact moment that I stopped loving Evan Davies.”

  Desmond waited a moment before he spoke. Riley didn’t realize how worked up she’d become. Her breathing was faster. Harder. Angrier.

  Somehow she knew Desmond felt it too. He might not have lived it but he understood the heat. The life-altering moment. The thing that cannot ever be undone.

  The end of something.

  Something that should have been much more.

  “He knew,” Desmond said, words soft. “He knew Ryan was abusing Jenna.”

  Riley nodded. Everything in her felt clenched.

  “He told me that even though she was my twin, my sister, that that didn’t give me the right to meddle in her marriage. Their problems were their problems. I would have filed for divorce the next day had I not gotten a call from the hospital in Kilwin. Apparently when Jenna moved there she changed her emergency contacts to me only. I flew out that night and got a hotel. The next morning I took my bruised and broken sister to the house of her abuser and helped her get everything we could before Ryan got home.”

  “And what did Ryan do about that?” Declan’s voice was angry.

  “He had a lawyer, a man who talked really fast and had a lot of expensive suits. He made a deal with Jenna. Ryan would let her keep all of her belongings and have custody of Hartley as long as she kept her mouth shut about the abuse. If not, he’d destroy her during their divorce. Take Hartley and leave her with nothing.” Both men growled in displeasure. “She agreed. That’s when she came to Overlook. She could afford the move and it was quiet. I stayed in Atlanta to get all of my ducks in a row and came out here once my divorce was finalized.”

  Ril
ey pointed to the two-way window. Davies continued to stare at his cup, unaware of the emotional roller coaster three people were going through that he had helped cause in the other room.

  “Davies tried to get ahold of me several times after that but I changed my number. No one other than my parents even knows I’m living with Jenna. He shouldn’t be here.”

  Desmond pushed off the wall. He walked over to Riley and stood so close that their arms touched. He stared through the window with palpable anger.

  “Then let’s find out why he is,” he said. “So we can get him the hell out.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Evan Davies was taller than Desmond. Obviously using the gym on a regular basis, he had a lean but strong build. His Facebook profile picture showed a carefree-looking man too. Messy hair but groomed beard trimmed short, his expression midlaugh and dark eyes with crinkles at the sides.

  Engaging.

  Harmless.

  He could hold his own in a tussle.

  That was the impression Desmond would have drawn of the man under different circumstances.

  Yet, as it was in Davies’s case, looks had most definitely been deceiving.

  “I’m not talking without a lawyer.”

  Davies had been singing that song since Declan walked into the room. Singing it without meeting his gaze once. He paid devout attention to the drink he’d been given and the cuffs holding him to the table. Those lines at the sides of his eyes that were earned by laughter had all smoothed out. That smile from his picture had sunk low. Any power his physique offered had been lost in the curve of his hunched-over stance.

  Desmond wasn’t a fan.

  Every aspect of the tight-lipped man spoke of cowardice and guilt.

  At least, that’s how Desmond felt as he watched Declan try to get Davies to rescind his request for a lawyer or just give them any clue as to what was going on.

  No dice.

  He kept his head down and what he knew to himself.

  It was infuriating.

  It had a mixed effect in the viewing room.

  Riley had gone just as tight-lipped. Desmond kept muttering beneath his breath, unable to keep his anger at bay. This man knew and possibly had a hand in what had happened to Marty, a good man who had only been trying to help Desmond. Based on that fact alone, Desmond was upset. Add to it the fact that he was Riley’s ex-husband and just so happened to be in the same town where she was currently living?