Expired Getaway (Last Chance County #7) - Lisa Phillips Page 0,66

else was in the room. Butch actually lifted his front from the floor, up into a sit. She had to let go, and the sudden absence of the dog’s fir between her fingers felt like a scab ripped from a wound.

She cried out.

“Millie.” It was a man, his voice more than a moan, but not by much.

“I know.” Millie ran her hand over Bridget’s hair, from her forehead to behind her ear. “She wasn’t even like this when I found her on the highway.” Millie shifted closer and spoke quietly. “Bridget, what happened?”

She inhaled to gather the words. Her entire face crumpled, and Bridget rolled so her nose was smashed into the carpet and her body curled further in on itself.

“It must have been Clarke. But this… Why did Sasha tell us to come over if she’s not here?”

“I don’t know, Mill.” Eric’s boots squeaked as he crouched, and the movement caused a hiss of pain. “Stupid gunshot wound.”

“Go sit down, then.”

“You think I’m not here to help, just like you are?”

Bridget squeezed her eyes shut.

Millie petted her hair again and kept doing it. Imparting strength into Bridget when she had none left. She had nothing.

But she found the strength to say enough that Millie understood. “Sasha…” Neither said anything as she explained. When she was done, there was total silence.

Then Eric said, “I’ll go talk to him.”

Millie shifted. Her hands slid under Bridget’s waist and her shoulders. “Okay, here we go.” She sounded like she was trying to coax a feral cat from under a bed.

Bridget wanted to laugh, but her face wasn’t working. She sighed, and it emerged as a series of sobs.

“I know.” Millie sounded like she was holding back. Bridget heard the strain and spoke up. “I’m going to kill Sasha.” Millie leaned Bridget back against the wall.

Her body kind of sagged.

“We’re going to fix this. I know it seems like it will never be okay, but that’s a lie.”

Bridget started to shake her head.

“It is. Listen to me. Sasha did the wrong thing. I also want to stab her for what she did, and it might make us feel better for a second. But in the end, it would be a bad choice.”

Bridget pushed away thoughts of Benito Capeira that wanted to fill her mind. She didn’t need to be attacked by the same bout of lightheadedness that she got when she first saw Sasha’s wound, so she focused instead on Millie.

“There’s a lot here, but we’ll work through it. All right?”

Bridget still said nothing.

“I saw the baby. She looked…gray. After Sasha took her out of the room, I went with her. Because you were so distressed. She actually did stop breathing.” Millie swallowed. She looked uncertain. “You screamed, so I ran back to you. I had to choose. I thought the baby was good with Sasha. I had no idea she would do something like this.”

Bridget lowered her head and touched her friend’s shoulder with her forehead.

“I wonder, did she plan it, or did she react in the moment? Trying to free you from having to care for a baby. It’s a big thing, and she had no right. But maybe she just made a really, really, astronomically-bad judgment call. I’m not excusing it, but there has to be an explanation.”

Bridget wanted to be sick.

Millie was all about managing the fallout. It was what made her such a good boss—the way she always knew how to control any kind of breach. To mitigate pain for the client. At the same time, she managed to neutralize the threat, whether through misdirection or having the client simply…disappear.

Often for a second, or third, time.

Sasha? She’d always been a wild card, but this? Bridget would never forgive her. She lifted her head. “She was supposed to be my friend.”

Millie’s expression softened. “It’s possible that she thought this was her way of being exactly that for you. I hate what she did, but people can convince themselves of all sorts of things under duress.”

“You think she was coerced into it?” Had Clarke worked to undermine them, even back then? He hadn’t been hired on until later. But it was possible. Just the thought made her even more fatigued than the already drained feeling she was battling.

Millie tipped her head to the side. “I want Ted to look into Sasha and find out what else she might have done. With the FBI on board, and the police here in Last Chance, I have plenty of help. You can just concentrate