In a vain attempt to gather myself, I now rested against the hallway wall, my head lolling back and my eyes screwed shut. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. I concentrated on each breath, as if that would evade the bad thoughts creeping in my mind.
God, that should have been me. Not Hunter.
He didn’t deserve to get hurt on my account.
I love him and I could have lost him tonight.
The realization weighed heavily on my chest, like a suffocating, taunting pressure.
I choked back a sob but was unable to hold back my tears. They steamed down my face like a river. I kept wiping themaway. I didn’t want Hunter to see me like this. I wanted to remain strong for him.
Fucking bitch.
Those two words looped in my mind like a broken record.
Now that the adrenaline slowly wore off, I replayed the moment in my head.
It was dark, the attacker appeared in a flash, and all their features were masked. There was no way Hunter and I could have identified them. Furthermore, I didn’t know who it could be…but whoever it was, they had a vendetta against me. Saying I was the wrong person at the wrong time would be a fluke. Nothing in our world was a coincidence. It was also clear that I’d been watched for a long time, if the timely attack was anything to go by.
How else would they have known where I would be this very night?
Chills rushed over my skin.
The Remington men stated that it might be one of my papà’s enemies, someone he pissed off and they in return wanted revenge. Getting said revenge by hurting me—his daughter—wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities.
There was a smaller voice in my head that said perhaps it wasn’t someone who had beef with him. Perhaps it was someone from my past…like Franco.
I wasn’t fooled by that sham of an apology the night of the gala. Given Franco’s abusive past, it wasn’t far-fetched to assume that he could be the so-called attacker.
And if it was him, then God have mercy. Papà would tear him limb from limb.
I told my theory to Josh and Cade. They said they’d have their men locate Franco just to be certain. They also insisted that I stay at one of the Remington safe houses tonight until they figured out who was behind this ordeal.
But Hunter offered his home instead—the same one on the city’s outskirts where we had our first unofficial date—and I agreed. It was private, far away, and would keep me out of the limelight.
Despite the threat looming, it wasn’t my well-being I was concerned for.
It was Hunter’s.
I hated that he got hurt because of me—hated that he could have been fatally wounded if the attacker’s slash had landed elsewhere.
What if it was his jugular, his head, or that heart I loved so fucking much?
I was spiralling, unravelling at the seams like a worn-out piece of fabric. It wasn’t healthy to harbour these thoughts, but I couldn’t stop the train wreck thinking once it began.
Hunter was still being stitched up in the bathroom and I was waiting outside for him, feeling helpless, worried, and bone-deep exhausted.
Right as I made the decision to knock on the door and see the verdict, my phone pinged with a series of incoming texts.
I pulled it out of my clutch, unlocked it, and my heart thudded.
The texts came from a number I didn’t recognize.
And when I read them…
Everything inside of me wheeled to a temporary halt.
Did you like the quote I left on your wall? —Unknown Number
