Either this was the worse case of shock in history, or I was only two feet away from the Hollywood bad boy himself.
“I’ll pay for the damage,” he said. “A tow truck, a rental car, all of the repairs. Anything you need until this is squared away.” He winced as if he hated himself for the situation he’d put us in. “Make your demands.”
I had a perfect excuse to overreact—to lash out, scream, or demand some kind of explanation. I’m not sure he would’ve blamed me for having a full-on temper tantrum. But I couldn’t form a word, let alone rattle off a list of demands. I was frozen.
The noises of the town drowned beneath the deafening beats of my heart, and as my pulse quickened, anxiety threatened to constrict my lungs. Air caught in my throat. Everything blurred. The glow of the streetlights swirled, and the darkness of the night taunted me. This was it. I was losing my mind.
I struggled to hold myself steady, but numbness crept into my legs, and I faltered.
“I can’t breathe.”
I stumbled forward, knocking into him, and his strong arms closed around me as I drifted. He held me to his chest, looking down on me with a protective gaze, and the world suddenly stood still. My breath steadied. The blurs of color came into focus. The cold rain poured harder, soaking us as his stare intensified, and for one fleeting moment, I was lost in a fantasy. His quick and deft reaction, his deep brown eyes, and the steady rainfall all around us . . . this wasn’t straight out of a dream. This was straight off the TV screen.
There’s no way this was real . . .
He guided me over to sit on the wet curbside, turning back to his barely damaged SUV to retrieve a bottle. He returned, passing the water to me.
“Is there anyone I can call?” He dipped down to catch my eye, but I never looked up. Was I crazy?
Avery Chase hadn’t hit my car, he hadn’t caught me midfaint, and he wasn’t in Sutton Woods. This was all some horrible nightmare.
“I’d feel better if you’d let me call someone,” he said. “Your parents, a friend . . . someone who’ll make sure you’re safe.”
“But my car . . .” It’s all I could say, and I was lucky to form even those few words. My lips were as numb as the rest of my body.
“I’ll take care of it,” he promised. “I’ll call for a tow truck.”
“Wes.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Wes Barrett.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat. His name was the only one I could think of. “He has a truck. Body shop. He can pick us up.”
“Right, I know,” he said quietly, as if I’d just offered him common knowledge. He pulled a phone from the pocket of his black jacket, turning to me. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name. Who should I tell him I’m calling for?”
“Roz,” I said, trying to lick my dry lips, but even my tongue was useless. “Rosalind Bingham.”
“Okay, sit tight.”
He took a few steps away and surveyed the damage on the two cars. After a quick assessment, he dialed a number and lifted the phone to his ear.
“Wes, hey. It’s Avery. I need you to bring the truck.”
He paused, reading the signs at the curb.
“Corner of Main and Elmwood. I’m with Rosalind Bingham.”
My head felt lighter; my chest tightened. It was happening all over again—the sudden onset of anxiety, blurred colors, and deafening heartbeats.
Wes, hey. It’s Avery.
Four words of confirmation and the final bit of air in my lungs puffed out with a gasp. Lightheaded and dizzy, I drifted sideways, unable to pull my body upright. One last jolt of shock sent me reeling, and my head slammed against the pavement. And then the whole world faded to black.
Chapter Two
“Wakey, wakey. Come on, kid. Time to get up.”
I stirred, rolling my face into a pillow.
“No,” I mumbled. I peeked my right eye open, shutting it at the instant sight of sunlight. It was morning, and all I wanted was to pull the blankets back up to my chin, turn over, and fall back to sleep.
“Roz?” he said, throwing the covers off me. “Come on; you’re freaking me out, kid.”
Finally recognizing the voice, I rolled over, shocked as I met a familiar wide-eyed stare. “Wes?”
“There she is.” He knelt down next to the bed. “Good morning, sleepy head. Glad to have you back among the living.”
I hadn’t seen him in so long that I barely recognized him.
Wesley Barrett was friends with my older brother, Stephen, back in high school when they both warmed the bench for the SWHS football team. Neither of them had been any good, so Stephen and Wes commiserated over their lack of athleticism, which drew them into a close friendship before my brother went off to college.
Wes looked a lot different now than he’d looked a couple years ago. Back then, he’d always been clean-cut, shaven, and well presented. But he’d grown the last two years—taller, and wider with muscle. What was once short brown hair was now long and pulled back in a ponytail away from his hazel eyes.
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
“Where am I?” I surveyed the strange room, suddenly feeling unsettled by the drastic change of scenery. I wasn’t at home. I kicked the sheets and blankets away. “Whose bed am I in?”
“It’s okay; calm down,” he said, placing his hands on my shoulders to stop the flailing. “Roz, I need to know that you’re okay. How are you feeling?”
He was a little rough around the edges now—callused fingers, grease-stained hands, and a gravelly voice. He was certainly easy on the eyes, in an unruly way that would scare anyone with a teenage daughter. A tattooed arm and a crooked smile were a little bit more than any conservative parent would know how to handle. But Wes’s gentle nature didn’t match his rough exterior.
I stopped fighting him and breathed a little easier.
“Roz?” He eased his hands off my shoulders. “Are—you—okay?”
Honestly, no. I was confused. I had no idea why I’d woken up in someone else’s home, wrapped up in someone else’s sheets. Why was I with Wes Barrett this morning when I couldn’t remember anything real after leaving the diner last night?
“My head hurts,” I said, feeling a bump above my right temple.
“I imagine so. You took a pretty hard fall on the pavement.”
I had to believe him, didn’t I? My recollection of the events that led up to the morning was hazy at best.
“Why am I here?”
“I called Stephen,” Wes said. “Your parents weren’t home; I guess they’re still upstate with Daniel after the championship game.”
“They stayed back to celebrate with the team.” I rubbed my head. “You called my brother?”
“He was stuck at school; he told me not to leave you at the house alone and not to call your family, so I brought you here to the farm. I didn’t know where else to take you.”
“Why not to the hospital?” I asked, touching the knot on my head. Why wouldn’t Stephen want him to call Mom or Dad? Why wouldn’t he advise medical care if I was passed out, injured, and suffering from unexplainable hallucinations of my former celebrity crush?
I had no idea what had happened, but a hospital seemed like a safer bet than sleeping over with a single man, on a remote farm, fifteen miles out of town—even if it was Wes.
He had a reputation for being extremely reclusive, especially as of late. After high school, his parents just sorta took off and disappeared, and while rumors always circulated around town, no one really knew where they’d run off. Some speculated it was just your average retired couple going south for warmer weather and happier days; I preferred the more scandalous rumors that claimed they’d gone into hiding after witnessing some heinous crime on the street. But Sutton Woods wasn’t running rampant with crime, so we entertained the wild rumors, but no one ever believed them.
I always wondered if my brother had the inside scoop as to where Wes’s family had disappeared to, but even when I’d aske
d, he’d never let on that he knew anything. Either he played dumb or he was just as clueless as the rest of us. Either way, he wasn’t saying a word.
And neither was Wes; in his parents’ absence, he’d simply carried on with a quieter, more solitary life. He’d taken charge of the family business on the farmland, picked up where his father left off, and continued the operation of the Barrett Tow Truck and Auto Body Shop. Years of work with his father had given him a solid foundation to run the place on his own—which seemed to be exactly the way he liked it. Alone. He was close enough to town for decent business, but far enough away to avoid any unnecessary interaction.
Far enough away to go unnoticed . . .
It scared me to think how long it would’ve taken for someone to find me here had I gone missing for any significant length of time.
“Your brother’s one of my best friends,” he said, as if he’d read my mind. I blew out a breath—I knew that. He wouldn’t hurt me. “You’re practically a sister. I wanted to take care of you.”
“You could’ve taken me to a doctor.”
“I didn’t know the circumstances, Roz. I only told Stephen what I knew: my friend said you were acting dazed last night on the street, almost as if you were high. We didn’t know if drugs or alcohol were involved, and I didn’t want to call your parents or take you anywhere at the risk of getting you in trouble. I thought it was best to let you sleep it off, whatever it was.”
Whatever it was? Did he really think so little of me that he’d accuse me of abusing drugs or alcohol? I couldn’t even stand the smell of beer, and I would never take drugs. I wasn’t the one with a drug problem, for God’s sake! Was he serious?
I wanted to ask him exactly what he knew about last night’s events, because he seemed to know more than me, but I couldn’t admit my version of the story. It would sound just as stupid out loud as it sounded in my head. Maybe it was the massive bump throbbing at my temple. Maybe I’d been in a car accident on my way home, and my entire recollection of the night had been nothing more than a coma dream. Maybe I’d gone crazy.
To spare myself the humiliation of saying anything too bizarre, I shrugged.
“How’s my car?”
“Totaled.”
“Totaled?”
“The repairs are going to cost more than the car’s worth. It was a hunk of junk. This was almost a blessing for you, really. At least now you can buy something that was manufactured this century.”
“It wasn’t that old,” I grumbled. It hadn’t been the fanciest thing on four wheels, and it hadn’t been brand new for fourteen years. And, truthfully, it didn’t always run as well as it should, but it was mine. I had to defend what little I had. But now I didn’t even have that . . .
How would I ever find a job?
“How did it happen?”
“He wasn’t paying attention—swung too wide to park,” he said. “Completely took out the side of your Metro.”
That lined up with what I remembered.
“And what about the other car?”
“Mostly cosmetic,” he said. “Some scratched paint, a tiny dent, and the front headlight was busted. I serviced it this morning—good as new. I had to disable the internal GPS, anyway, so I knocked it all out at once. Now we just need to figure out what to do to get you back on the road.”
I crinkled my brow.
I couldn’t even think about car repairs or replacements. I didn’t have money for this kind of setback. I didn’t have money at all unless I could count the jar of quarters sitting on my dresser at home, and that wasn’t going to fix any of my problems.
And what was Wes rambling on about anyway? What did GPS have to do with anything? Why would anyone with the luxury of built-in satellite want to get rid of it? Only someone in hiding would make such a bizarre request to their mechanic in hopes of staying off the grid, because it was the ultimate move to ensure an untraceable disappearance.
Suddenly, Carter’s voice echoed in my ears.
It has all the telltale signs of a man on the run. If he’s not popping up or checking in, then he doesn’t want to be found.
It’d been a little more than a week since Avery Chase had gone missing; friends, fans, and coworkers alike were all beginning to speculate. Rumors ranged from an impromptu vacation all the way to a suspected drug overdose, but no one could find evidence to prove any of their wild assumptions.
Given how long he’d managed to avoid the spotlight, even I had started to wonder if they’d find him miles from home, strung out on drugs, or possibly worse . . . dead.
But what if the initial report was right? What if Avery sought an escape, and he took the first chance he saw to run?
“Wes, what happened last night? Who hit my car?”
The corner of his mouth kicked up. “He’s in the kitchen making breakfast. Why don’t you get cleaned up, and then you’re free to confront the reckless jackass himself. We’ll eat, and then I’ll get you home.”
~
I’d never been to the Barrett Farm before, but the house was a lot bigger than it appeared from the street. The hardwood floors were old, and the ceilings were high. The flood of sunlight spilling in from the open curtains revealed the discoloration of the floral wallpaper around the bedroom. It was dated, but nice.
Wes dismissed himself, but not before leaving me a clean towel, change of clothes, and pointing me in the direction of the nearest bathroom. On the sink, he’d left a fresh bar of soap.
I didn’t linger in the bathroom; I couldn’t consider taking a shower. After waking up in a strange place with very little memory of the night before, all I really wanted was to get home to my bed.
Once I’d washed my face and changed out of my muddied and damp clothes, I made my way through the house, following the smell of food.
“How are you feeling?” Wes asked, standing at the center island in the kitchen, heaping a spoonful of scrambled eggs onto a plate.
“I’d be stinkin’ rich if I had a dollar for every time you asked me that this morning.” I ran my eyes over the spread of breakfast foods on the counter.
There was sausage and bacon, pancakes and eggs. Fresh fruit sat in a bowl next to a platter of bagels. The long spread ended at three full glasses of orange juice.
“Oh, great. You’re up,” another man said, and my head snapped in his direction. That voice—that was a voice I knew all too well. “Are you hungry?”
I stared at him as he stood at the stove and watched me as intensely as he had last night on the street.
That settled it.
All of those things I’d remembered, all of the dreams I’d convinced myself I’d had . . . they weren’t dreams at all.
As sure I stood there, so did Avery—only three feet away from me, looking as handsome as he had on the cover of the September issue of Sci-Fi Insider.
I couldn’t believe it, and yet it seemed all too obvious that of course this was happening.
This wasn’t completely inconceivable. Wes had tried telling me a hundred times—all those years he’d poked fun at me over my celebrity crush, all the times he’d teased me about liking his best friend, he wasn’t just screwing with my head. Wes Barrett knew Avery Chase.
“Hello?” Avery said, dipping into my sightline. “Hungry?”
When I didn’t answer, his eyes trailed downward, giving my outfit an appraising once-over. It wasn’t anything glamorous—just a pair of gray sweatpants and a hooded sweatshirt on loan from Wes.
“Wow. I’ve gotta say it—you make that look better than I do.” Avery grinned, and my eyes jumped from him to Wes.
It was only then that I realized the clothes I’d borrowed were far too small to fit my brother’s friend. While Avery was tall, he was no match to Wes, who towered at nearly six and a half feet. Wes’s legs were too long for the pants, and his arms and torso were too thick for the slender shirt I wore.
I blinked down, staring at the outfit again. These were Avery’s clothes. My eyes flittered back up to him.<
br />
He wasn’t hiding beneath a baseball cap this morning; his stark black hair was thick and curled on end, a few days past a haircut that would’ve maintained his camera-ready look. He’d only just turned eighteen over the summer, but his features were dark and tired, aging him several years past his youth. And even still, without the advantage of an airbrush artist or a makeup team, he was the most beautiful person I’d ever laid eyes on. I hated him for that.
I tried to swallow my nerves as I stood there under his intense gaze, but I couldn’t hide my frustration or confusion. What was going on here?
“Aves is an old friend,” Wes said, reminding me again.
It was a fact he’d always been eager to point out with every visit he made to our house. Wes couldn’t pass by my bedroom without giving me a hard time over all the posters I’d plastered on my wall. Back then I’d never taken him seriously. People were always playfully harassing me over my “obsession.” I’d never thought Wes was any different. Avery’s a good friend, actually.
Of course, it seemed like a stupid joke—something he’d say to get a rise out of me, but now I couldn’t believe how dumb I’d been not to believe Wes’s many attempts at honesty. I could introduce you guys next time he’s in town.
“Our moms were college roommates,” Wes continued, finally offering an explanation of where it all began. “We spent nearly every summer together growing up.”
“Oh,” I said, but it sounded more like a forced noise than a word.
“Roz,” Avery said, and I finally blinked. “How are you—”
“Don’t.” Something snapped; reality had finally caught up with me, and my patience was stretched as far as it would go. Avery stood only three feet away, working his innocent grin and southern charm, but this wasn’t going to fly with me. I’d be damned if I would let him stand there and talk to me like we were friends.
He was the reason I was in this stupid mess this morning. I’d had enough problems before he’d recklessly taken out the side of my car. And now, because of him, I had to try to figure out how to come up with $5,000 with no transportation to get me to or from a job . . . if I could ever find a job.
Where You Belong Page 2
