“Sorry, my brother’s a jackass,” I told Gary, walking toward him. “Chance, this is Gary Whitlock.”
“Nice to meet you,” Chance said easily, as if he hadn’t just been completely offensive.
“You too,” Gary replied flatly, rising to his feet to shake Chance’s hand.
“Aw, shit.” Chance nodded. “Hiding in plain sight.”
“You’re a fucking idiot,” I snapped.
Gary just shook his head.
“Is she inside?” I moved to pass him, but jerked to a stop when his hand landed heavily on my arm.
“A little warning,” Gary said, his voice low. “She’s been giving you a long leash. You no longer have one.”
I wasn’t sure what he meant until I entered the house. Immediately, the sound of pacing steps was audible, thudding over the hardwood.
Dalton nodded at me from the couch and jerked his head toward Rosemary’s bedroom.
When I found her, my breath left me in a whoosh, and I couldn’t seem to drag any back in.
Rosemary was a mess. Her hair was wet and tangled so badly that it looked half as long as it actually was. She was wearing a pair of shorts and a shirt that were too big for her and didn’t match. There were little scratches all over her forearms and the lower halves of her legs.
Her face was haggard, her eyes hollow.
And her feet were leaving bloody footprints all over the floor.
She jerked to a stop, her eyes on me. “You’re back.”
“What the fuck happened?” I asked, my heart thundering in my throat.
I wasn’t prepared for the way she flew at me, but I would’ve caught her anyway.
I didn’t get the chance.
Her nails raked across my face so quickly that I didn’t even dodge them.
I was too shocked to defend myself as she shoved at my chest, her fists pounding against my sternum.
“Three hours!” she screamed, her voice breaking. “You said three hours.”
“I got held up,” I countered, finally catching her wrists. She tried to rip them away, and I struggled to hold her captive without hurting her.
“Held up?” Her eyes widened in disbelief, and her face jutted toward mine. “Fuck you!”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I asked in confusion.
In the next moment, I was flat on my back, my top half in the hallway, and my bottom half still in her bedroom. My head bounced off the floor.
Rosemary was straddling me, her eyes filled with a level of anger that I’d only seen a few times before and never from her.
“You left me here,” she raged, leaning down into my face. “You left, and you didn’t come back!”
“I’m here,” I shouted back, mostly because I didn’t think she would actually hear me if I spoke normally.
“You said three hours.”
“Things took longer than I thought they would,” I said, trying to soothe her. I ran my thumbs over the delicate tendons in her wrists. “I lost track of time.”
