Grip Trilogy Box Set - Kennedy Ryan Page 0,199

me? She humiliated me, and she should pay.”

“What am I paying for exactly, Parker?” I cross to stand in front of him, my anger propelling me just inches from his face. “Did I leak pictures of you drunk to the press? Did I drug you and lead you to believe we had sex when I was for all intents and purposes unconscious? Did I coerce you to have public sex to satisfy my own outsized ego? Did I plant drugs on an innocent man and blackmail judges to manipulate his case?”

“You chose him over me,” Parker says grimly. “With all I could give you, you wanted some rapper from Compton over me.”

“Even if it hadn’t been Grip, it would never have been you,” I

hiss.

“I think this has gone long enough,” my mother says from the same entrance Aunt Betsy used. “We have enough to prosecute you, Parker. Not for life, but you’ll serve some time. We’re only giving Officer James what he has on tape, but we have a never-ending stream of evidence from your father's safe. We’ll just keep sending it to Officer James until enough sticks to keep you behind bars.”

"You've already given us enough to free Marlon and clear his name." The tears gathered at the corners of Aunt Betsy’s eyes leak down her face as she contemplates her only son. “And enough to prosecute you.”

My heart breaks for her. I can’t imagine how she wrestled with this decision before settling on the right course of action to set an innocent man free. I set all the soft feelings aside, though, to step right into Parker’s face, my lips curling with deliberate wrath.

“If you ever, and I mean ever, you cowardly asshole, come near me or Grip again,” I say. "More of that information will come out. Call it our insurance policy. If Grip even has a suspicious paper cut, I'm coming after your ass."

“So will I,” a deadly soft voice says from behind me.

I look back and almost collapse when I see Ms. James leaning against the doorjamb, arms folded, lips set in stone, eyes lit with fury and indignation.

“My son is a good man.” Her eyes drift from Parker for a moment to me. “And Bristol is a good woman. Just try to hurt them again. You find a way to slip from the law, I got some street justice for you. Bet you won't get out of that.”

Greg steps into the fray before Ms. James can say anymore about “street justice”, whatever that means, and pulls Parker’s arms behind his back.

“Charles Parker, you have the right to remain silent . . .”

The Miranda Rights, the other cops streaming into my home, the flurry of activity all fade to the peripheral as I look at the three mothers who made my escape possible.

“Aunt Betsy, I'm so sorry.” I pull her into a hug, and she sniffs softly in our embrace. She did what was right, but Parker is still her son. Without the information she took from her husband's safe, none of this would have worked.

“No, I'm sorry.” Aunt Betsy pulls back, shaking her head. “The things he’s done to other women, to so many people all these years, we failed him somewhere along the way. He has to pay. I just hope he heeds our warning and doesn’t come after you again.”

“Oh, he won’t,” my mother interjects. “What he did to Marlon is child’s play compared to the things in that safe and the things your husband has covered up for him through the years. We’ll make sure he doesn’t forget what we have.”

“Thank you, Mother.” I’m not sure what else to say as our eyes lock and hold and soften. I know everything won’t be repaired between us in a day, but today was a big step.

“I do love you, Bristol.” Her voice doesn't waver, but her eyes, so like mine, for maybe the first time show me a little of what's in her heart. “I’m sorry Marlon believed that more than you did, but I know I’m to blame.”

The flawless red line of her mouth pulls into a grimace.

“I think it’s past time you joined your father, Rhyson, and me in sessions with Dr. Ramirez,” she continues. “If we ever hope to be a real family, that is.”

Her words ripple emotion through me, a tectonic shift in my own heart. I’ve disciplined my emotions over the last twenty-four hours, held in so much because I knew Marlon’s freedom depended on it. The