I didn’t get to finish the thought before my phone vibrated in my pocket.
Chapter 56
Bryan dropped the silverware onto the plate with a loud sound. Sarah jumped and looked at him, gun still in her hand, one eye remaining on the window.
“It’s driving me insane,” he said.
“What is?”
He threw his arms out. “This. You.”
She turned her head briefly and looked at him before her eyes returned to look out the window at the street outside.
“What do you mean?”
“I can’t stand this. You, sitting there by the window, day and night, watching for whatever it is you fear might come. You still haven’t told me what happened to you.”
Sarah lowered her head and studied the gun in her hand. When she was a child, her dad had taught her to shoot. She had hated it back then, but today, she was glad she knew how to defend herself. No one was going to sneak up on her and live to tell about it. Never again.
“I can’t tell you. I’m sorry.”
“Why not? Don’t you think I deserve to know? You come here all bruised up, blood smeared on your skin, dirty like you’ve been living in a mudhole for months. You’re scared as heck and sit by the window constantly as if you’re expecting someone to come driving up to the house to attack you. Why won’t you tell me anything? Every time I ask even the simplest question, you simply ignore it or answer something that doesn’t tell me anything.”
She exhaled. He was right—she owed him an explanation. She couldn’t keep this up.
“What do you want to know?”
“Where were you? You were gone for weeks, and no one knew where to find you,” he said.
“I don’t know where I was,” she said. “That’s the problem.”
A car drove up in the street outside, and she lifted the gun, keeping it ready. The headlights shone in the darkness, and Sarah couldn’t tell what type of car it was.
“Okay, so tell me why you’re guarding the house. Is someone looking for you? Are you in trouble?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
The car came closer, and Sarah held her breath as it slowed. Could this be it? Had they found her? She cocked the gun and heard her brother sigh deeply behind her.
“What can you tell me, huh?”
He got up and walked to the window, pulled the curtain aside, then scoffed. “That is the Thomasons’ car. They’re my next-door neighbors. You ought to recognize them by now,” he said. “You’ve watched them come and go for days now.”
“It’s hard to see in the darkness,” Sarah said. “All the cars look the same, and I’m not taking any chances.”
Bryan grabbed her by the shoulders and knelt in front of her. “Just tell me, Sarah. What happened to you?”
She looked into his eyes and felt a pinch of guilt. Bryan had been so worried about her; she knew he had. And he probably still was.
“I…I was taken,” she said, already regretting having said it as the words left her lips. “I was kept somewhere…”
His eyes grew wide. “You were kidnapped? By who? Did you know this person?”
She exhaled again, then shook her head slowly.
“I can’t tell you. I am sorry.”
He rose to his feet, throwing out his arms in frustration. “Why not? We could go to the police and tell them everything. Then you wouldn’t have to live in fear like this.”
Sarah shook her head, tears springing to her eyes. She couldn’t stand all these questions anymore or the way her brother looked at her. She couldn’t stand any of this anymore.
“I just can’t, okay?” she almost yelled.
“Fine,” Bryan said and walked away. “If you don’t want to tell me, then there isn’t anything I can do to help you. Have it your way.”
Sarah looked after her brother as he left the living room, feeling awful for keeping this from him. If only he knew what she risked, then he would understand. Sarah sighed, then got up, walked to her bedroom, and closed the door behind her. She sat with her back against it for a few hours, catching her breath, listening to all the sounds, jumping every time a car drove up the street outside, wondering if this could be the one—if this were the red pick-up truck coming for her.
Chapter 57
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
I stared at Scott as Chief Annie brought him out to me. He slumped his head and got into my minivan. His own car had been taken to the impound again after he was arrested, and he wouldn’t be able to get it until the next day, they said.
“Make sure he is taken out of my town and doesn’t come back here,” Annie said.
I nodded and got in. I started the engine with an angry movement, and it roared to life.
“I’m sorry, Eva Rae,” he said. “For having to ask for your help again. You’re the only one I knew would come and get me.”
“Because I am just that stupid,” I said and stepped on the accelerator, driving the minivan out of the parking lot behind the police station. It was late and very dark outside now. Chief Annie was the one who called me and told me to come to get Scott once they were done with him.
“No, that’s not what I meant. Not at all,” he said. “Please, don’t say that.”
“Then what is it, Scott? Why am I suddenly so important in your life? Why is it I constantly have to throw up everything I have in my hands and come tend to your many emergencies?”
He exhaled. “I’m sorry. What do you want me to say?”
“What were you even doing at her house? She said you had been stalking her. What is going on with you, Scott? Stalking young girls? What happened to you?”
He gave me a look, then focused his gaze on the window. We drove for about ten minutes without anyone saying anything, then as we went over the bridges towards Viera, where Scott lived, he looked at me again.
“Do you ever wonder what our lives would be like if we had chosen differently?”
I swallowed, feeling my stomach turn to knots. I had been thinking about exactly that a lot lately.
“What do you mean?”
He shook his head. “Nothing. I just wonder sometimes. There’s a lot in my life I would have liked to do differently now, looking back.”
“I think most people feel that way,” I said. “Life is messy. But at the end of it, I do like to believe we look back at it and say that we made the most of what we had been dealt.”
He nodded. “I sure hope so. I hate to think I wasted it.”
I looked out the window while driving, wondering about him. I couldn’t stop thinking about Sarah and the way she had looked at him when we faced her in Winter Park. It was strange. She really didn’t want him. What had happened between them? Had Scott hurt her? Was that why he was stalking that girl too? Because he was some creep that hurt women?
If so, then why was I helping him again? Just because he had no one else? Or was I deeper in than I thought? After what happened in Winter Park, I had promised myself I never wanted to see him again, yet I came running as soon as Annie called.
Was he just a creep? Was Matt right, and I was completely blind?