Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 87155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Damn Ramsey and his big mouth.
“Yeah. I’m fine, why?”
He swept his hand down the hall, where two uniformed officers were standing.
“Miss Hull,” the older of the two men greeted. “Sorry to wake you. Can you come have a seat and maybe answer a few questions for us?”
I made my way to our small den, asking, “About what?”
“Ramsey Stewart.”
Yep. I was going to kill him.
I settled on the couch, while my dad and the officers stood around me. “What about Ramsey?”
“He told us that he was with you last night. Can you tell us a little about what you two were doing?”
I blinked. What the hell did they want to know what Ramsey and I were doing for?
“We…were, uh, we were just hanging out.”
“I thought you were with Tiffany?” my dad interjected.
The younger cop lifted his hand to silence him. “What does that mean, hanging out?”
Nerves rolled in my stomach, not quite understanding where this was going. If they knew about Josh, why were they asking me about Ramsey? “We have this tree on the Wynns’ property that we go to sometimes. We just kinda sit around and talk.”
“Drinking?” he asked.
My head snapped back. “No.”
“Mr. Stewart do any drugs while he was there?”
My pulse quickened. “No way.”
He stared at me for a long second, searching my face. “Okay. Then can you tell me about what time Ramsey left last night?”
Alarm bells started screaming in my head. Something wasn’t right. This wasn’t about Josh. Or at least not about what he’d done to me.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I don’t know. Can you tell me why you want to know?”
The cops looked at my father and I followed their gaze.
He was pinching the bridge of his nose. “Thea, please just answer the question.”
What the hell was going on?
“Not until someone tells me what the hell is going on.” Panic bloomed in my chest. “Where’s Ramsey? Did something happen?”
And then my dad spoke the words that ended my life as I knew it. “He’s in police custody, Thea. Josh Caskey was hit by a car last night. It was Ramsey’s car. Josh didn’t make it, so please, this is important. You need to tell them everything you know about what happened and where Ramsey was last night, because right now, he’s about to be facing some pretty serious charges.”
My heart stopped and my lungs felt as though I was breathing poison. I was safely in my den, but I felt the blowback of the entire world as it exploded.
“No,” I breathed, shooting to my feet. “That’s not possible. Ramsey wouldn’t…” Oh my God. After what Josh had done to me, there was no telling what Ramsey would have done. Tears sprang to my eyes as I stood there shaking my head. “You don’t understand.”
One of the officers stepped forward. “Then make us understand, Thea. We can’t help Ramsey if we don’t know what happened.”
Help him. They were going to help him. I was mortified about what Josh had done to me, but there was literally nothing I wouldn’t do for Ramsey. Not even burning at the stake to save him.
But as I frantically yanked off my hoodie and began showing the police my bruises while word-vomiting every disgusting, filthy detail of what Josh had done to me, I had no idea I was tying Ramsey to the stake beside me.
I found out later that Ramsey had told them that it was an accident and that he’d thought he had hit a deer that night. The police had no reason not to believe him.
That is until I had unknowingly handed them the gift of a motive.
It wasn’t my fault Ramsey went to prison. He’d made his own choices that night. But it was absolutely my fault that the prosecutor had been able to charge him with first-degree murder. The fact that he’d taken a plea deal, reducing it to voluntary manslaughter and sentencing him to sixteen years in prison, had not eased my conscience.
It clearly hadn’t eased his resentment, either.
“This is bullshit and you know it,” I rumbled at Nora. “I could get in trouble with my PO for having someone else living in the house.”
She rolled her eyes. “Relax. I reported her on the parole paperwork.”
“Just not to me though, right?”
She shrugged. “Pretty much.”
We were sitting in a fancy steakhouse Nora and I had been talking about since the day I got word of my release. It was my big celebration. Nora had insisted on steak and I’d agreed, telling her as long as it didn’t come from a can and wasn’t served on a plastic tray, I was game.
I was regretting everything about that conversation now though.
I’d just found out that my new home was Thea’s home too. Did I get a choice in the matter? Not fucking one. You’d think I’d have been used to that after so long in lockup.