Watching You

by Leslie A. Kelly

  He finally looked at her, seeing what looked like shock on her face. “Did you hear what he said before?”

  “What?”

  “The girl. That night. She saw Harry on the porch—just fine—yelling threats after Raine as he took off into the night.”

  Steve didn’t react. In fact, he looked like he was in a daze, hearing only the echoes of long-dead voices in his head. But Jess’s intensity caught Reece’s attention. He tried to remember exactly what the other man had said.

  “Everybody knows Harry Baker was shot in the head,” she snapped. “Jesus, somebody leaked the crime scene pictures on the internet.”

  He swallowed hard. He hadn’t needed to see the pictures. He’d seen the gruesome reality.

  “Where did the gun come from? And if Raine shot him in the head, how the hell could Baker have gone out onto the porch and yelled at your brother as he ran away?”

  “We didn’t know he’d gone outside until today,” he murmured as the dots tried to connect in his mind, a new picture trying to form where the old one had scarred his memories. “Raine remembered a gun. Harry pulled it on him. We thought they’d struggled over it and Harry had been shot in that struggle.”

  “Now you know that didn’t happen. A man with a bullet in his head would not have been capable of walking, of going outside, of yelling threats. Come on, Reece. Think about it,” she urged. “They fought. Raine staggered down the lawn. Harry was fine, up and yelling threats after him. And when you came back later…”

  “He was dead. Shot in the head.” Reece took a step back as the ground beneath his feet seemed to spin, his head along with it. Could this be true? God, had all of them been completely wrong about what had happened that night six years ago?

  If Harry had been well enough to walk outside when Raine left, but so gruesomely shot dead when Reece and Rowan came back later, that meant something had happened in between. Something none of them had ever even suspected.

  Someone else must have been there. That someone must have killed Harry Baker.

  The implication made him stagger back two steps.

  Jesus Christ. He and Rowan had cleaned up the scene to protect Raine. And in doing so, they’d helped a murderer escape justice.

  “Steve, you have to give me the name,” he urged. “Please, tell me how to find her.”

  Steve still looked almost catatonic, physically there, but his mind far, far away. Maybe he was envisioning an alternate timeline, where none of this had happened, and the teenage Tiger Beat supercouple had married and lived happily ever after, starring in their own TV show, bouncing babies on their knees. No drugs. No rape. No suicide…or murder.

  It was a nice fantasy. God, how he wish they had gotten to live it.

  “Please, Steve, help me. Rowan and I fucked this up, and we have to try to make it right.”

  The man finally reacted, sounding almost uninterested. “Maybe it was the father of one of the girls he raped.”

  Maybe. That didn’t, however, stop the mental voice screaming, You helped a murderer go free.

  “Suppose it was. Don’t you think the truth needs to come out at last?”

  Even if it meant Reece went to prison for accessory after the fact.

  Steve shrugged. It was as if he’d already moved on from all of this and didn’t really care about anything else. “The girl found me. She’s a prostitute. I gave her cash. Don’t even know her last name.”

  “What was her first one?”

  His face twisted in concentration, and finally he said, “Marley. That was it. Marley.”

  “Do you remember anything else?”

  His brow scrunched. “She was pale, had blond hair, and a long scar down her right cheek. I wonder if my father put it there.”

  Reece closed his eyes for a second, trying to focus. “Is that all?”

  After a long moment, Steve nodded. “That’s all.”

  Reece’s hands fisted. It was a start, but he needed more to go on than a scarred, blond prostitute named Marley. So did his brothers. Damn it, now that he knew there might be another explanation for Harry’s death, he had to know the truth. More: he had to make it right.

  For six years, he and Rowan had believed their kid brother had killed a man, and that they’d helped cover it up. But they’d never actually asked him. Raine had been out of it, drunk, rambling, and confused that night. The next morning he’d left. He hadn’t come back to California for several years. And the three of them, trapped in secrets of their own making, had never mentioned Harry Baker’s name again.

  If they had…might they have learned long ago that they’d all made some very wrong assumptions?

  “Just don’t know anything else,” Steve mumbled. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay, Steve, never mind,” said Jessica, her voice once again sounding husky, like it had last week. “You know the truth about what happened. You understand, and maybe you can even forgive. Can’t we all let the secrets lie in the past and not drag everyone involved—dead and alive—through the mud?”

  Reece frowned, staring at the dried blood on the side of her face. He might feel sympathy for the guy, but there was no way he would forgive and forget that he’d tried to kill Jessica.

  She saw his reaction and quickly shook her head. “No, it wasn’t him! I fell, I swear it. I slipped and hit my head on the concrete. Steve saved my life by pulling me out of the pool. If he hadn’t, I would have drowned.”

  Although Steve didn’t even respond, looking almost catatonic, Jessica’s eyes convinced Reece she was telling the truth, not just trying to cover for the other man. Reece let out a slow breath, still angry she had been threatened and dragged out here, but a little more certain Baker wouldn’t actually have hurt her.

  Finally, Steve cleared his throat and lifted his head. His eyes had gained some clarity, though there were still tears on his cheeks. But his voice was steady as he said, “No police. I don’t want anyone to find out the truth.”

  He supposed it was natural not to want the world to know your father had been a monster.

  “I don’t want anybody to ever know what happened to her.”

  Rachel. Reece felt moisture prick his own eyes as understanding washed over him.

  His sister’s teenage sweetheart wanted to protect Rachel’s legacy, not her attacker’s. Steve wanted the world to remember her as a pretty, talented girl who’d made a serious mistake. Not a victim of her own boyfriend’s father.

  “All right,” Reece said. “Thank you.” He wasn’t sure if he was thanking the man on behalf of his brothers, or his sister, or his father, or himself. Probably all of the above.

  Steve shrugged, the same boyish, self-deprecating motion he used to make on Dear Family, when he’d been a goofy, wisecracking teenager who’d asked in every episode if he was adopted, and who had gone gaga over the cute new girl in school in season four, episode seven.

  “Reece?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I loved her, you know. I never stopped.”

  A lump thickened in his throat. “I know, man.”

  Steve had one more thing to say. “I’m sorry I burned down your house.”

  Reece thought he’d misheard. He opened his mouth to ask Steve to repeat himself, but before he could say a word, he realized the other man was gone. He had disappeared in one blink of an eye.

  Oh, God, Steve, no.

  He knew where he had gone, what he had done. Having found out the truth about what had happened so many years ago, Steve Baker had left the scene for good.

  Cut. That’s a wrap.

  “No!” Jessica cried, running to where he had been standing just seconds ago. She leaned over to look down, and Reece grabbed her around the waist to keep her from slipping on loose rocks and plunging a few hundred feet straight down.

  Whatever she saw made her spin around and bury her face in his shirt. She cried and cried, probably for Steve, but, he suspected, also for Rachel.

  They were who Reece cried for, too.
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  * * *

  Aaaand…she was back in the hospital.

  Jessica hadn’t wanted to be taken to the emergency room by ambulance, but she knew she had to go. She’d been knocked unconscious and had nearly drowned. A lump the size of a duck egg was growing out of the side of her temple. She probably had a concussion. And Reece couldn’t drive her in.

  He was too busy explaining to the police why Steve Baker was lying dead far below them, unable to be reached until specialists came with rappelling equipment.

  It was awful, so awful. She had hated being taken away, leaving him there to deal with everything, and was very glad when Rowan showed up. The brothers always stuck together, the twins especially. Rowan was a cop. He knew the entire history. He would help Reece through it.

  “Don’t you have a life?”

  Jess managed a weak smile as Alice, the brassy nurse she’d liked when she was here last week, walked into her room to check on her. When the ER doctor found out she’d just been released after another incident last week, he had insisted on admitting her for observation. She was now lying in a room not far from the one she’d vacated on Thursday, being observed.

  It was like the world’s worst case of déjà vu.

  “I guess I’m just accident prone.”

  The nurse turned her head to check the bulky bandage on her temple, and whistled. “Nobody did that with a bottle of bleach. I heard you almost drowned, too. You’re just determined to fill your lungs with the wrong element—liquid instead of air!”

  “Believe me, it’s not intentional.”

  Alice nodded as she changed the bandage, whistling again when she saw the actual wound. “That’s not a lump, it’s a bowling ball.”

  “That could be why I have a headache the size of Wisconsin.”

  Worse, though, was the heartache. The look on Reece’s face as he revealed what had to be the deepest, darkest secrets of his life, all to save hers, wouldn’t leave her mind. Her heart had broken, bit by bit, as he’d bared himself, and his family, opening himself up to prosecution, scandal, and condemnation. For her, just to get her out of harm’s way.

  She’d known there were things in his past Reece had not told her about. She’d even known they probably had something to do with his sister. The rest had shocked her completely.

  Alice checked her temperature, her pulse, and her blood pressure, working quickly and efficiently. When she finished, she glanced at the door. “So where’s Mr. Hot Stuff? Why isn’t he here with you?” She smoothed her hair. “Is he coming soon?”

  Knowing that if she was going to be a part of Reece’s life, she would have to get used to women always being interested in him, she shrugged. “He had some things to deal with. I’m sure he’ll be here later.”

  “Great. I’ll change into my blue scrubs. They flatter my eyes.”

  Winking, the woman exited, leaving Jess to go back to fretting and watching the door.

  “Oh, baby, oh sweet, sad man,” she whispered, desperate for news. She hadn’t heard a word from him, and the paramedics hadn’t let her bring her cell phone in the ambulance. So she had no idea what was going on up at the house.

  There was only one thing she knew: Reece was going to have a hard time facing her.

  It hadn’t been difficult to see and understand the shame he felt about the secrets he’d been keeping. He had looked at her as if he thought she would judge him or be repulsed by what he’d done in his past. As if she could ever look at the man she adored and hate him for doing whatever it took to protect his loved ones.

  She’d been shocked, yes. More than anything else, though, she had wanted to cry for him and his brothers, who had endured so much. And for Rachel. Poor lost Rachel.

  The door opened. She sighed, wondering if Alice was back to ask about Reece’s favorite color so she could find the right earrings.

  “Can I come in?”

  She swung her head around—oh, God, that hurts—and lurched up in the bed. “Reece, oh my God, are you all right?”

  He entered slowly, his steps almost tentative, a word she would never have used to describe him. “I’m fine. How are you? They admitted you?”

  She shrugged and rolled her eyes. “They’re overreacting. I’m fine. I think I’ll check out against medical advice; this bed is so uncomfortable.”

  “Like hell you will.” He strode over, his movements much more Reece-like, because she’d gotten him worked up. “You’re staying here until the doctors say you are one hundred percent okay to leave.”

  “Oh, all right.” She scooted over on the bed and patted the spot beside her. Reece looked down at it and frowned, but did not sit.

  “What’s wrong?” she whispered, suddenly afraid. “They’re not going to arrest you, are they? They believe Steve committed suicide, right?” She pushed the covers off her legs, struggling to get out of the bed. “I’ll tell them everything; they can’t blame you.”

  He put his hands on her shoulders and gently pushed her back. “Would you stay still?” Tugging the covers up and tucking them around her, he added, “Everything is fine.”

  “The police…”

  “You know the house has exterior security cameras. It was all right there on tape.”

  “Oh,” she whispered. She thought of those last painful moments. “I hope they won’t release the video of him taking me out there. Poor Steve…he doesn’t deserve to be remembered as a monster.” That was his late father’s department.

  Reece crossed his arms and leaned against the high back of an uncomfortable-looking wooden visitor’s chair, remaining a few feet away. “They won’t. Rowan has a lot of friends in the department. He’ll call in every favor he can get to make sure the details are kept quiet.”

  “Good,” she said, wondering what he wasn’t saying. She knew there was more.

  If that were all, if everything were really fine, he would be on the bed beside her, taking her in his arms, telling her how glad he was that she was okay, and that he never wanted anything bad to happen to her ever again. Or something along those lines. So why wasn’t he?

  “Talk to me,” she demanded.

  A beat. Then, “Jesus, Jess, I thought you were dead when I saw him kneeling over you.” He dropped his head forward, covering his eyes with one hand. “I thought he’d killed you, and I wanted to die myself.”

  Her heart clenching, she murmured, “It was just a fall, sweetheart. Just me being clumsy and falling. I’m so sorry I scared you.”

  He lifted his head and looked at her face, his mouth tightening as his gaze rested on her bandaged temple, but softening when he finally stared directly into her eyes.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  He didn’t hesitate this time.

  “I love you.”

  She sucked in a shocked, pleased little breath, a warm, happy thrill coursing through her. He’d said the words as simply and easily as if saying hello. Like it was natural, something he could say every day for the rest of his life. That would be just fine with her.

  “I love you, too.”

  He didn’t smile. He didn’t come over and take her in his arms. He stayed five feet away from the bed, his expression strained, his body tense.

  “I can’t believe you almost died because of me.”

  “I told you it was an accident.”

  “I don’t mean just the pool. You were shot at. You were attacked with chemicals. You were dragged to a cliff…”

  “Don’t overreact. He wouldn’t have thrown me off,” she said, waving an airy hand.

  “Damn it, Jess, it’s not funny.”

  “I know,” she murmured, chastened. “But I’m fine. I’m here, telling you I love you. Nothing really bad happened.”

  “Nothing bad?” He straightened, shoving the chair back, and stalked across the room, pacing like a caged animal. “Nothing bad?”

  She didn’t say anything. She could almost feel his anger, a living presence in the room. But she already knew it wasn’t directed at her. He was furi
ous at himself.

  “Nothing but bad things have happened to you since you met me. You’ve gone through hell for someone who isn’t worth a hair on your head.”

  She was shaking her head before he even finished. “Don’t say these things.”

  “I have to.” He stopped pacing and looked down at her.

  She saw the way he squared his shoulders, and his spine was as stiff as a board. Reece was steeling himself up for something. She had a dark suspicion about what it was.

  “Everything you heard—everything I said out on that cliff—was entirely true.”

  “I know.”

  He didn’t seem to hear her. “My life has been one nightmare after another. I’ve done awful things. Illegal, unforgivable things. I’ve lied about them. I’ve covered them up.”

  Swallowing, he came closer. His hand lifted slowly, reluctantly, as if he didn’t want to touch her but could not help himself. He eased his fingers into her hair and slid them down a long strand. She suspected he thought he was touching it for the last time. But oh, did he have another thing coming.

  “I’m not a good man, Jessica. You deserve to be with a good man.”

  She grabbed his hand before he could remove his fingers from her hair. Her grip tight, she refused to let him budge. “Don’t you ever say that to me again,” she snapped, hearing her own anger. “You might not be the textbook definition of good, Reece Winchester, but you are so much more.”

  He eyed her cautiously, probably wondering if she was finished.

  She wasn’t.

  “Okay, you say you can’t call yourself good. So what? Who cares about good? Call yourself noble instead. How about loyal. Strong. What about decent—where does decency rate when it comes to a person’s character?”

  “Jess…”

  “Frankly, given the choice between ‘goodness’ and any of those other things, I say goodness can take a flying leap.”

  “Don’t make me into something I’m not.”

  Jess knew where this was coming from. She knew shame when she heard it.

  Reece was haunted not only by what had happened to people he loved, but also by the things he’d done in response. His guilt had made him give up something he had really cared about—his acting career. His early retirement made so much sense now that she knew it had been about punishing himself.