The Switch (14 page)

CHAPTER 18

Shelby

And it’s because I killed him.

THE DOOR SHATTERS
in a barrage of wooden splinters that explode in every direction. I practically fly up in my seat and hit the roof. The gunman barges in, and immediately I look at his face. I don’t know him. He’s wearing what I like to call the standard criminal uniform—black pants, black leather jacket, and black boots. Before he notices, I grab the gun from under the sofa and hold it against my side. If I shoot, it’s just going to cause a firefight, and I would like to wait if I can. Not that I’m such a good shot anyway. Considering my lack of ability with a firearm, I keep the gun out of sight.

For once, I’m trying to think before acting, and right now, all I can think of is Chase. He’s outside somewhere, doing God
only knows what. An imaginary weight sinks to the very depths of my stomach and settles in, making me nauseous. Chase has to be okay. Tears spring to my eyes at the thought. I just barely got him and cannot bear to think of a future without him. Without Chase, I may as well just give myself up to Victor.

The man, with his eyes trained on me, smirks at what I assume is my
deer-in-the-headlights expression. I know what I must look like, a girl alone in a cabin in the woods, terrified and without resource. What this goon doesn’t know can only help.

The man turns his head to the side and yells out the front door,
“She’s in here!” Then he spins back towards me. From his side, he raises the gun and points it at my head.

I wish I could say that after the last couple of days
having a gun pointed at me doesn’t still send me into a panic, but it does.

“Please don
’t hurt me!” I say the words as if I'm begging.

I want him to focus on my surrender and for him to not even consider I might not be here alone. While
I’m feeling I have the situation here in the cabin fairly under control, I know that’s not the case, and any moment Chase will hopefully be in here to rescue me. Where is he? I can only pray that whoever this guy was speaking to outside hasn’t found Chase and hurt him. And just in case Chase and the other guy are about to get into it, I want to keep things fair, and that means keeping him distracted.

I slip the gun into the waistband of my pajama pants only to realize
they’re too loose to hold it up anyway. Instead, I opt for having the gun settle behind my back. I don’t know what I’ll do if and when he asks me to stand up. I only know that for right now I have to keep this gun hidden.

“
Whatever you do, don’t even think about moving.” The guy smirks like this has been the easiest capture that’s ever happened.

A loud boom sounds outside from the back of the cabin
, alerting Victor’s guy to what I was afraid of—that I’m not alone. I try to calm the panic rising in my chest and tell myself I have firsthand knowledge of Chase’s wonderfully built physique. The last thing I need right now is to fall into a panic attack before I know anything.

The man with the gun stalks across the room, keeping his eyes on me and his gun
aimed steadily at my temple. I know at the very least he won’t shoot me. Victor feels like he’s been wronged and rejected. Whatever awful humiliation and torture he has in store for me, he’s going to want to save it for himself. Victor will not outsource my punishment. I’d also be willing to bet that since Chase complicated his plan and what I’m sure in Victor’s eyes looks like essentially stealing his girl, Victor has ordered them to bring Chase, and I doubt he cares that Chase carries a badge.

A guttural scream, full of anguish, rings out from the back behind the cab
in. My heart thrums in my chest. I’m terrified it might be Chase. But something inside me can’t bring myself to believe it. It doesn’t sound like Chase. Even if I don’t really know for certain, I just can’t imagine he would sound that way screaming in pain.

Through the closed side door, I hear screams, cursing
, and a “he’s getting away!” The voice sounds pained and slightly panicked. And I let out a sigh of relief because it’s not Chase.

My heart lifts
, and I nearly forget the gun pointed at my head. What little confidence I had about this situation has returned. There are a lot of things I don’t know about Chase just yet, and there’s so much to learn, but I know this—I know that more than just being a good guy, Chase is noble and takes his responsibilities to protect and serve very seriously. And while he might not love me yet, he cares for me—I have no doubt about that—and he would never leave me like a sitting duck.

The gunman pokes his head out of the cabin
, and redirects his gun out the door at what I presume is an approaching Chase.

Now’s my chance
, I think. I take the safety off the gun and raise it in the air. I train it at the man’s head and shoot. I’m not a great shot, unfortunately, and I miss him by couple of inches. This gets his attention, and he spins around quickly, ready to fire.

I stand from my position on the couch, gun in hand, and point it at his head, backing towards the front door. My hands are shaking, my heart is about to jump out of my chest, and I can feel the panic settling in. I need Chase here. He has to be a better shot than I am. He has to know what to do here.

The man rushes at me with the force of a hurricane. Panic seizes me and I freeze in place. The gun drops to level with his abdomen as he flies at me, his gun still pointed at my head.

“
You stupid bitch,” he says, practically spitting at me.

Less than three feet away, I begin to doubt whether or not this man gives a crap if Victor told him not to hurt me. I decide I
’m not up for testing his loyalty to Victor today.

I scrunch
my eyes closed and pull the trigger. My body ricochets, and I nearly trip on the splinters of wood shards that once were the front door.

His body jerks as if he’s been hit in the gut by a baseball bat and then he stiffens. Taking one more step forward, he coughs, and
his unfocused eyes roll back in his head. His right arm shakes, and the gun falls to the floor.

Once the gun is out of his hand
, I say a silent prayer and a little thank you to whoever may be watching.

But then it happens
—he falls forward, blood dripping from his mouth, and right on top of me. His weight is too much for me to take, and we fall to the floor.

I scream out for Chase, praying he
’s in good enough condition to come. I can’t even consider that the man on top of me is now dead and how he got to be that way. Youthful indiscretions are one thing, but being a murderer is completely different.

I
’m unable to hold back the consuming thought that I just killed a man. I cry out, but not from pain, though my wounded leg is throbbing and my head is killing me and everything in between feels like it’s been through a food processor. He’s a bad guy, I know that. But this man had to have had a family, or at least a mother. Maybe even a sister or a brother. He could’ve had kids, a wife. He could’ve had an entire life set up, and this could’ve just been a job for him. Kind of like me, only he was too scared or too stupid or just couldn’t find a way out. Whoever he is, whatever his name is, he’s gone. And it’s because I killed him.

In
a matter of seconds, Chase to run into the cabin, his clothes a dirty mess and blood dripping out of the corner of his mouth. Leaning down and pulling the guy off me, he rolls him over. My chest is coated in his blood. The man’s eyes are open wide, and fearful. I know that the last thing he saw before he died was my face—the face of the woman who killed him.

Looking into his eyes, I start screaming all over again. Sobs rack my body with such an intensity that I can’t process anything else. Breathing ragged and limbs shaking uncontrollably, the unbelievable realization of what I’ve done consumes me. Soon, the strain from my cries weighs on my lungs, making it near impossible to breathe. In between frightened screams, my lungs take in breath after insufficient breath.

Chase pulls me into his arms and holds me, telling me it will be okay, but it doesn’t feel okay. His promises feel empty and standard. I don’t know how he could have liked me before, but I’m quite certain that once we’re out of here, he won’t anymore.

The shame of everything I
’ve done up until now pales in comparison to this. I’ve never let myself consider the idea that Becca may not make it out alive, and so even though she may hate me forever for what happened, I still have the potential to right that wrong. But this—I have no way to make this better. Dead is dead.

Chase checks me over
, making sure I didn't get hurt. I want to tell him not to bother, that I’m not worth the effort, but I know he won’t listen. That’s just who he is. He’s helpful to a fault.

Minutes pass, and my panicked tears calm to quiet whimpers. Chase keeps asking me if I
’m okay, but I don’t answer him. How can I say anything? I killed a man.

“
Shel, he was going to kill you. Or if he wasn’t going to kill you, he was going to serve you up to Victor. Don’t forget he still has Becca and the potential to harm her. He was a bad guy, baby. Don’t mourn his loss. Just be grateful you’re making it out of here on two feet and not in a body bag.”

“I
 . . . killed . . . a man.” I cry into Chase’s chest.

My focus has been all over the place since meeting Chase. He distracted me
, and it put us in a very bad situation. I can’t let that happen again. I’m back to business now, and I won’t be letting whatever this is between me and Chase cloud my judgment anymore. He’s just a cop, and I’m just a stupid girl who got herself caught up in a disaster. And that’s it.

CHAPTER 19

Chase

I’m too smart to think he’ll let me live.

SHELBY IS A
mess. She’s all tears and hiccups and strangled sobs. I’ve never killed a guy before, so I can’t relate to what she’s going through. If she were a cop, the department would make her take some time off and undergo a psychiatric evaluation. When she was able to return to work, she’d be on desk duty and would continue talking through the shooting with the department’s nut doctor. But she’s not a cop—she’s a waitress. And she hasn’t been trained for this.

The guy outside is just knocked out, but I did use his shoe strings to tie him up as best I could. He’ll have a good amount of pain and confusion over that hit he took to his skull
, but at least he’ll be breathing. And aside from the few scratches and dirt I got on me, I’m fine. But Shelby—she may be fine physically, but I’m not sure if she’s going to be fine emotionally for a while, if ever.

“I killed a man,” is all she says. Again and again. It grates on my ears. I don’t want her seeing herself this way—as a killer. But nothing I say is getting through.

Eventually, she says, “That run I made? All I had to do was to drop off a sealed manila envelope at this lady’s house at a certain time. It seemed like such an easy thing to do. It was like being a mail carrier. And that handbag I bought with the run money—it’s a gorgeous brown leather with vintage detailing. It was on special at Dillard’s. I just . . . didn’t have the cash for it, and I didn’t want to let Victor buy it for me—and he was going to buy it for me. He was always doing stuff like that. But I wanted it, so I. . . earned the money.

“When I got to the store, there was only one of them left, and I grabbed one strap while some lady grabbed the other.
I
really
wanted that purse. So I didn’t let go, and she didn’t let go. I tugged and she tugged, but then she fell backwards and into a watch display.” She levels a flat look at me and continues as though she’s on autopilot. “She told the store security that I made her fall. And I didn’t, but I should have just let go of the purse. Now I can see how stupid that was. It was just a purse. It shouldn’t have mattered.”

She does a pretty good job at trying to come across as a hard
-ass, but I’m beginning to figure her out. She’s not a hard-ass at all—she’s just trying to follow through on her choices no matter how awful things may become. It’s an admirable quality, but I want her to know that in this particular case, she doesn’t have to follow through. And she has to stop blaming herself for everything that’s happened. The only person to blame for Becca’s kidnapping is Victor. Shelby was just trying to do what’s right by breaking it off with him.

I want to tell her all of this. I even try to lie to her and tell her it’ll all be okay. But I can’t. I can’t lie to her
, so I don’t say anything. Like Becca, I was accidentally dragged into this situation, and now I’m as much a target as Shelby. Victor’s attention may be on getting Shelby back—and that diamond, though I have no idea what that has to do with any of this—but that doesn’t mean he has or will forget about me entirely. I’m too smart to think he’ll let me live. So now, even if I wasn’t falling hard and fast for the girl in my arms, her problems are my problems. If she doesn’t survive, neither do I.

I take a deep breath and try to clear my head. Victor knows where we are
. We should be getting up right now and running the fuck out of here, but I can’t bring myself to move her just yet. Though the tortured sobs are calming down somewhat, she’s still a mess. I give her a few more moments while I figure out what the fuck we’re going to do now.

I look around for my phone, about to call Sarge
, and realize it’s across the room. I think I slept through the part of training that covered a situation like this. I have no idea what I’m doing here. I don’t feel comfortable leaving Shelby just yet. She’s still in that dark place, and the only thing that I can do is to hold her and tell her that it will be all right, even if the rational part of my brain knows that is all bullshit.

It
’s another few minutes before I consider moving again. But before I can suggest it, a shrill ringing sounds from the dead man’s pocket. I shift and lean and toward Shelby, closer to the dead man. She tenses and tries to pull away, but I’m relentless. I reach my hand into his jacket pocket, searching to calm the noise.

I glance at the caller ID and freeze. Everything I know about this world and everything that defines me ceases to exist. Right there on the display it says SARGE CALLING.

I could try to explain it away, because of course
my
sarge isn’t the only sergeant in the NOPD. But really, what’s the use of that? It’s pretty obvious Shelby was right. We’ve been set up.

I angle the phone away from Shelby
’s face. This is something she does not need to see right now, but her inquisitive nature doesn’t afford me the opportunity. She leans over and checks the display on her own. When she does, I cringe, knowing what she must be thinking—this is hopeless. After all, it’s what I would be thinking if I were her. Hell, it’s what I’m thinking now. We are so screwed.

“
Is that—” she begins, but I cut her off.

I place my index finger over her lips to silence her. We can
’t go there right now, to that place where we talk about how betrayed we’ve been. Even though I want to. I want to share my frustrations with her and my fears, but she needs me. It wouldn’t be fair to expect her to carry that for me. Relationships are about give and take, leaning on each other when the other needs it. But if there’s anything I know about relationships from watching my parents, it is that both people can’t fall apart at the same time. It just doesn’t work that way.

Years ago, before my parents divorced
, they went through a particularly rough point in their marriage. They were both at the end of their rope trying to make ends meet and pay the bills as best they could. I think they lost sight of why they were together to begin with. Eventually they grew apart, and now they only see each other for important moments in my or my brother’s life, but even then, getting them in the same room is like pulling teeth. There’s too much bad blood there, my mother says. My father just says, “Son, your mother is crazy.”

They
’ve been divorced for well over ten years now, and still I catch my mother looking fondly at old family photos every now and then. They probably could’ve made it work, had at least one of them been the rock in the relationship when everything else was falling apart.

I hit the talk button on the phone and bring the speaker to my ear without a single word. On the other end, Sarge is talking to somebody, though I don
’t know who. His voice is his gravelly as ever and half-annoyed.

“Hello? Ke
vin?” Sarge says into the phone a few times until I get so sick of his voice that I hang up. I decided not to let Sarge know that I know he’s been playing me all along.

“
Baby, we need to talk this out.” I speak gently and slowly bring us to a standing position. At the couch, I set Shelby down and begin to pace. The guy’s phone is still in my hand, but I don’t really know what to do with it.

“
Text him,” she says. “I mean, you should text him from that phone and tell him you’re cleaning up a mess.”

“
You want me to do what?”

“
Chase,” she says, her voice authoritative and firm. She’s triggered some sort of switch in herself that’s allowed her to go from the crying mess she was just a few moments ago to the woman who sits in front of me now. She’s strong and determined. Her lower lip sticks out in a pout, but she doesn’t seem sad—she seems thoughtful.

“
If you let Sarge know we’re on to them, he’s just going to come after us. Text Sarge and tell him something happened and you’re having the clean up the mess. That way, he and Victor will both think we’re dead or something. They’ll all come up here looking for the diamond. Oh, and make sure to put in there about the crappy cell service! Say you can’t talk but you made a mess, and once it’s cleaned up, you’ll call him back.”

I stare at the woman, a little in shock and a little in awe at her mind.

“So that should buy us some time to get out of here and figure out what we’re doing next.”

“What do you mean?” She shakes her head and says, “We’re going back to New Orleans.”

I raise a hand and stop pacing. “We can’t go back to New Orleans.”

“Yes we can,” she says. “Once they figure out what’s happened
, neither one of them will think to look in the city. Besides, we could try and hide out in small towns forever, but neither of us knows how far Victor’s reach really is. Any of the coastal towns he could have their cops on his payroll for the docks. Any of the inland towns he could have on his payroll for distribution. The next large city is hours away from New Orleans. Plus, they’ll assume we ran. I say we go home and regroup.”

“We’re not going home, and that’s final. Listen, you got yourself into this situation
, and now it’s up to me to get you out of it. You need to stop going off half-cocked and let me help you. Besides, it’s not safe for us at home.”

I don’t like this one bit. I don’t want to walk back into the danger zone
, and I really don’t want to go home. We can’t put anyone else in danger. As if we’re on the same page, Shelby’s eyes grow wide.

“My mom and dad! Once Victor figures out we’re not dead
, he’s going to flip his lid, and then he’s going to go gunning for the people we care about.”

“Sarge has access to my personnel records,” I say and turn around, kicking the corner of the couch. “Shit.”

I cross the room and snatch up my cell phone from the countertop near the sink. I look up and see Shelby already has her cellular phone to her ear. I turn toward the open side door and peer out. There in the field, the guy I knocked out is still lying in the grass, tied up but just barely. I close the door and lock it, having little faith in my on-the-fly bowline knot. If he wakes up and decides to come after us, I want something to slow him down in case the knot doesn’t hold.

Looking over at Shelby
, I say, “Have your parents pack a light bag for a few days’ travel, and don’t let them forget one for you, as well. Have them drive to the airport and park in the long-term parking. Tell them to wait in the terminal near the Air Canada concourse. Have them wait inside near the ticket counter. We’ll be there as fast as we can.”

She nods her head and then
starts talking into the receiver at rapid speeds. I let out a deep breath and pick up my phone to call my mother. She answers on the first ring.

“Chase Aaron Guilliot!” she screams into the phone.

“I have less than a minute. Whatever you’re doing, stop it. Pack yourself a travel bag for a few days. I’ll need a bag, too. Grab the pouch from the safe in your room and your purse, then get in your car and drive to the airport. Don’t stop for anything. Go. Now.” I wait a moment for her to respond, but she doesn’t. “This is an emergency,” I say and hang up the phone and repeat the process with my father. I can only pray they listen.

When I look up
, Shelby is off the phone and already standing, collecting her things. I grab the wall charger and toss it in a plastic bag and a few waters from the mini-fridge, as well as crackers from the cupboard and the Tylenol with Codeine. I retrieve the box of bullets from the countertop and the shotgun. I cautiously step around the dead body and through the splintered door. I check my truck for damage, and once I’m satisfied there is none, I toss the shotgun and bullets in the cab.

While I’m outside, I pull the dead guy’s phone from my pocket and send good old Sarge a text
.

MADE A MESS. CLEANING IT UP. WILL CALL WHEN GONE. BAD SERVICE.

Walking back in the cabin, I find Shelby bent over the dead guy with his wallet in her hands. She looks up at me with tear-filled eyes. “His name was Kevin Christopher,” she says.

I stop, not knowing what to say or how to comfort her.

I’d never seen a dead body before him. I walk to Shelby and kneel. With her eyes level with mine, I decide to give it to her straight.

“Yeah, his name
was
Kevin Christopher. I’m sure he had a mama, and there’s bound to be a few other people who will be sorry he’s gone. Maybe he had a wife, I don’t know. What I do know is that the pain whoever loves this guy is going to experience from losing him is not something I want to experience. This, whatever we’re doing here, could destroy my career. Taking up with a felon isn’t exactly considered playing by the rules. But when I’m with you, I don’t care about any of that.”

She looks astonished
, with her eyes wide and her jaw slacked and tears spilling down her cheeks. It’s something of a mix between appreciation for the things I’ve said and disbelief. Realizing she’s going to need a little more encouragement to get her out of this cabin—and we need to get out of this cabin—I continue.

“Now, I’m going to be honest with you in a way I’d rather not be because it leaves me wide open. When I said you have me hooked
, I meant it. I don’t know how you’ve done it, but you’ve got me believing that your problems are my problems. Hell, you even got me suckered into being here in this cabin, stitching you up and tending to your every need. At some point I obviously decided that you—that this—is worth having. Enough to risk losing my job over. I need to know that you believe I’m worth fighting for, too. Because that’s the only way this is going to work—if both of us give it our all. And right now, giving it our all is us getting our asses out of this cabin and getting into the damn truck. Because there isn’t going to be an ‘us’ if more of Victor’s guys show up here.”