Shit.
He ran after her. He couldn’t leave her like this. “Amber, please don’t be embarrassed. This development with Riley and me getting back together is very new.”
She just kept running. Now he was getting concerned about more than just her emotional well-being. If she wasn’t careful, she might slip over the ledge.
Just like her brother. Jesus.
“Whoa. Hey, be careful, please. Stop and let’s talk.”
She stopped so close to the edge, one of her feet actually slid off.
But at least she’d stopped running.
He gestured for her to come back toward him, even though she wasn’t looking at him. “Please be careful of that ledge. You’re too close.”
He stepped closer—could he reach her if she lost her balance and began to fall?
But she didn’t lose her balance, she just began to laugh.
“Um, are you okay?” Now she turned to face him. There was no sign of discomfort or embarrassment on her features.
Just full, unadulterated hatred.
“No, we wouldn’t want me to fall off the ledge, would we now? You were the one who was supposed to fall off the ledge. Not get a happily ever after with your girlfriend.”
“What are you talking about?”
But he knew. Before she said another word, he knew.
Before he looked down and saw the gun in her hand, he knew.
Amber was behind everything that had happened to him this week.
“Felix idolized you, did you know that? Like, full-on man-crush. All the stupid stuff he did was because of you.” She brought the gun up from her side to point directly at him.
Riley kept his hands out low and in front of him, not wanting to give her any reason to pull the trigger. “I didn’t know him very well. Not as well as I should have. But Felix knew the risks of what he was doing. Everybody who goes out there knows the risks.”
“Someone should have sent him home! You should’ve sent him home. Felix had no business being out on those skis on that kind of slope.”
If memory served, they had told him to go home, but Felix hadn’t been interested in anyone else’s opinion. He’d had something to prove, and nobody was going to talk him out of it.
God, in his younger days, Riley had been that person too many times to count. It was common among athletes of their type—ones who stared down danger every chance they got, convinced of their own immortality.
Felix had been one of those too.
But telling that to a grieving sister, especially one with a gun in her hand, probably wasn’t the best plan.
He nodded instead. “You’re right. Someone should’ve taken a hard line with Felix. I should’ve taken a hard line with him and told him he wasn’t ready.”
Riley ran a hand through his hair, then quickly held it out to show her he wasn’t doing anything fishy when she jerked the gun in his direction.
She didn’t understand the reality of how stunts worked. Didn’t understand that, although the finished project may have looked like it was just Riley and a couple of buddies haphazardly filming, in reality, there were sometimes dozens of people involved. Beyond that, there were sometimes fans who came out to try to get in on the action too.
It had been that way on the mountain that day. Riley had known Felix in passing, but not well at all. He’d never had a full conversation with the other man.
But Felix, like so many fans sometimes did, thought he really knew Riley, had built up a pretend connection in his head until he’d convinced himself it was real. That they had a relationship. A friendship.
It was called parasocial interaction, when people felt an attachment and formed an imaginary relationship with celebrities, convinced it was real. He could thank his sister, Quinn, and all her college degrees for providing him with that knowledge.
Not that it was going to make him any less dead if Amber decided to fire that gun.
“And after his accident you should’ve been there with him. It was your fault he was paralyzed, and then he just gave up. He would’ve listened to you. He would’ve tried if you had been there to encourage him. He wouldn’t listen to me. Didn’t care about anything I said. I wasn’t the great Phoenix.”
Now that he couldn’t argue with even if he’d been planning to argue. He should’ve gone to see Felix, whether he’d known the man well or not. Should’ve made the time. “You’re right. You’re right about it all. I should’ve been more aware and done more after the accident. I should’ve made Felix a priority.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Is that supposed to be enough? Just…you’re sorry? You’ll do better next time? That’s not going to make it right. I came here to make it right.”
“What will make it right?”
“It was supposed to have been you on that rappelling rig. I didn’t even know Baby was up there.”
“Because his stomach was upset.” He shook his head, barely able to believe it.
“I knew if I told you Bo said that left rig was fastest that you’d choose it. I had no idea he was already up there.”
He needed to keep her talking as long as possible. Give himself time to figure out…something. A way to talk her out of this? A way to get the gun? “It’s not too late, Amber. Just put the gun down. Nobody has gotten hurt, and we can still work things out—especially given the circumstances.”
“Circumstances such as you murdering my brother?” she sneered. “You’re pretty damn lucky, I’ll give you that. When I found out how allergic you were to penicillin, I thought my little gift to you yesterday would certainly do the trick.”
“That was you?”
“It wasn’t as good as you falling, but dead is dead. Except your Florence Nightingale saved you, did she? And now you say the two of you are getting back together?” The gun wavered. “You don’t get to have a happy ending! You don’t get to ride off into the sunset with the girl when my brother died because of you.”
There was definitely going to be no talking her out of this.
She firmed up her hold on the gun. “I want you to fall, Phoenix. I want you to feel what Felix did as he went over that cliff. I want you to know those few seconds of abject terror and knowledge that even if you somehow survive, nothing is ever going to be all right again.”
Riley crossed his arms over his chest. He wanted to look still and firmly planted, not about to make any moves. But he kept his weight on the balls of his feet. There wasn’t going to be a good time to make a move for that gun. All he could do was choose the least bad time.
She pointed at the ledge with her free hand. “Jump. I want you to dive headfirst over the edge.”
“No.” He said the word simply. Not adding the insults he’d like to tag on. “I won’t do it. I’m sorry about your brother, I really am. Believe me when I say if I could go back and do things differently, I would. But I’m not jumping off that fucking ledge.”
“Then I’m going to shoot you in the face.”
“You know if you fire that gun, everyone is going to hear it. People will start running in this direction.”
She shrugged, unconcerned. “There will be more questions, and I’m afraid poor Bo might be under quite a bit of scrutiny. But let’s face it, nobody is going to suspect me. I’m the amazing one, remember? So strong, so noble to do this in my brother’s memory.”