bar.
Everyone was on guard. The two men turned halfway in Reid’s direction, Holden grabbed at the knife he’d settled on the counter, and Reid immediately put a hand in the back of his jeans, no doubt gripping a firearm.
It suddenly occurred to Thames as he watched the scene unfold, this night was not going to end calmly.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Charlotte
Penny had spent the night at Megan’s the day Locke came pounding on the door. It was two in the morning. When I opened the door, I found him hunched over, clutching his side, wheezing, “I texted you, I called you, Charlotte.”
Panicked, I wrapped my arms around him, helping him into the house. “Oh, my God, I’m so sorry, Locke, I didn’t know! I fell asleep.”
“I waited.”
“You waited there?” I didn’t want to say where. I felt sick thinking I’d left him alone in that place. “Please, please, are you okay?”
He stepped inside, his suit top coated in blood. He smelled like copper, his face looked gaunt and sweaty.
“What am I supposed to do?” I frantically asked, shaking. “Locke, you’re bleeding everywhere!”
“Take me to the bedroom, run me a bath. I have a card in my pocket. You have to dial it, tell the man my name and give him the address. He’ll be here to fix me up…”
Which meant…
Which meant I was too late.
Panicked, I helped him up the stairs and to the bathroom in my bedroom. He stripped as I ran him a bath. He refused the shower stall; it was the tub, only the tub.
“Hot or cold?” I asked.
“Cold,” he answered.
He was punishing himself.
I ran him a cold bath, sucking in breaths as my heart raced in my chest. I heard his suit plopping to the ground, heard him approach the tub. My eyes flashed to his body, wincing at the bruises and open cuts.
It was the first time he’d come to my house. It was not protocol. Which meant he was desperate and hurting.
I backed away as he stepped into the tub, naked. Instantly, his body broke out in shakes as he sat down, submerging his lower half in ice cold water. His face was pale, his eyes so dark, they looked black. The water changed colour, turning red around him.
As he sat frozen, I shakily dialled the number on the card he left in his suit pocket.
“Izzy,” the voice responded on the other end.
“Max Locke,” I responded robotically before rattling away the address.
“Give me thirty minutes.”
The phone went dead. I turned around to look at Locke, feeling my throat close as my gaze swept over his chest, lingering on the tattoo, the size of my hand, that stretched from his chest (right above his heart) and to his shoulder. What did it mean? I wondered.
“You need to take your watch off, Locke,” I told him, noticing it on his wrist.
He never took it off, though.
“Locke,” I pressed. “It’ll break otherwise.”
“It never worked, Charlotte,” he simply responded.
He washed himself in the cold water while I sat by his side, giving him company as he muttered things, horrible things he’d done. By the time the doctor arrived at the door, he was out and sitting on the edge of the tub. The doctor stitched his wounds shut, gave him painkillers and left like the professional he was, never saying more than he needed to.
Locke collapsed into my bed shortly after. His entire body sagged into the mattress, loosening.
Just before he fell asleep, he muttered, “I should have hidden under the slide.”
That wasn’t the first time he’d said that. Every time felt less painful than the last. Like…like he was poking fun at himself.
He slept for ten hours.
I fell asleep on the bed next to him, listening to his fitful nightmares, feeling him stir, unable to shake the tormented sounds he made.
“It’s okay,” I’d tell him. “It isn’t real. You’re having a nightmare, Locke.”
He woke up at one point and turned to look at me in the dark. I was already awake having consoled him.
I rubbed my eyes. “Are you okay?”
Ignoring my question, he tiredly said, “I looked into Billy.”
My heart jumped. Holding my breath, I pressed, “And?”
“And like Jem said, he came to you alone.”
I swallowed hard before stiffening a nod. “Okay.”
He didn’t blink. “You don’t believe me.”
“I want to believe you,” I softly responded.
I did. So very badly.
I turned to Billy, seated on the edge of the bed, staring sadly at me. He wanted me to believe him too.
But I wasn’t ready to.
Like the doctor had advised, I sat