Southern Comfort - Natasha Madison Page 0,24

her, and she puts her hands to her mouth. Jacob just looks at me.

“You heard?” he asks, and I just nod my head.

“Derek just called me,” I tell them. She peels her face out of my neck. She turns her head, but doesn’t loosen her hold on me. And neither do I.

“Why don’t we run a bath?” Kallie suggests, coming to my side and rubbing Olivia’s back. “A nice bath.” Olivia looks at her and then at me. “We can use Casey’s big one.” I see the look she had in her eyes right before I kissed her is gone, and in its place is the shield, and I hate it.

“It’s never going to stop,” she whispers. “Why can’t I just be left alone?” When she releases me, I see the defeat in her eyes. I watch as Kallie takes her hand and walks with her to my bedroom. Only when I hear the door close do I look over at Jacob.

“I’ll kill him.” My eyes return to the spot I last saw Olivia. “I swear to everything, if I see him, I’ll kill him.”

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Jacob says. Walking over to the cabinet on top of the fridge, I take out my father’s whiskey. I open it, forgoing the glass, and take a huge gulp, letting it burn all the way down. “You may want to go easy on that.”

“Fuck you, Jacob,” I say. I know I shouldn’t lash out at him, but he’s the only one in front of me. My phone rings again, the ringtone letting me know it’s Derek. I put it on speakerphone this time.

“Derek.” I say his name. “Jacob is here, and you’re on speaker,” I inform him in case he has something confidential. “What did you find out?”

“From what I can gather, he was killed between one and three a.m. The cameras on his block coincidentally went off at twelve thirty and only came back on at four.”

“Coincidence, my ass,” I say, looking over at Jacob.

“The guard on duty says he did a check at one thirty and everything was okay. When another guard did a second pass through, he saw him hanging,” Derek says. “I’m already running a check on both guards, but so far, everything looks clean.” I hear him typing in the background.

“Everything is not clean,” I say. “Check their debt history.”

Derek then stops typing. “I think I know what I’m doing.”

“Yeah. Yeah,” I say, not sure I want to have this conversation with Jacob here. “I want to know everything about them down to the last time they took a shit,” I hiss. “Fucking everything.”

“I’m on it.” He hangs up, and I take another gulp.

“You need to reel it in,” Jacob says, and I glare at him. “You aren’t going to do her any favors by flying off the handle.”

I’m about to tell him to fuck off again when I see Kallie standing there. She holds the wall while she sobs, putting her hand in front of her mouth to muffle it. It takes Jacob two seconds to get to her. “I need water,” she says, her voice cracking. “She needs water.”

I open the fridge, and I’m about to take a bottle of water to Olivia, but Kallie stops me. “You can’t see her like that,” she says while she tries to stop crying, but her breath hitches. “She doesn’t want anyone in there. Not even me.”

I want to burst through the door, not caring, and then Kallie’s hand drops from my arm. “I just put her in the bath. I had to peel her off the floor. I’ve never ever …” She swallows. “She’s never been like this.”

“Go back in there,” I say to her. “I need to tell Mom and Dad about all this.”

“Casey.” She says my name. “Don’t do this if you aren’t sure.” She shakes her head. “I love you with all my heart, but if you hurt her, I won’t forgive you.”

Jacob must feel my anger reaching its breaking point because he kisses her, whispering, “Go take care of your girl.”

“I’ll be back.” I walk out of the house, and if I knew she wouldn’t hear me, I would scream out to the universe. I walk over to my parents’ house. They are both sitting out on the porch talking, but they take one look at me, and they both stop. My father gets up first.

“What’s wrong?” he asks. My mother is right behind him.

“The guy who attacked Olivia