I wouldn’t have thought Reese could be shocked any more than he already was, but that statement did it. It took him a full fifteen seconds to say, “You know what he did for me?”
Everett nodded. “He called me when he found out about the contract on your life. I asked him to do whatever he could to help you, since I knew you wouldn’t accept any help from me. When he called me after the job was done, he said he wanted to offer you a job, but he wanted my permission first.”
It was hard to watch the slew of emotions play over Reese’s expression. Confusion, hurt, despair. God, he just looked so fucking devastated. His eyes swung to me as if looking for confirmation that he’d been played from day one. That everything he’d believed for the past year had been based on yet another lie. When I gave him just the tiniest of nods, he closed his eyes. I saw him sway slightly.
“I need to go,” he whispered.
His anger turned to panic as he began to lose control. I knew if we let him go, we’d never see him again.
“Reese—” I began, but he shook his head violently.
“No,” he said. “Please, no more.” He looked at me almost pleadingly. “Don’t you get it, Gage? He ruined my life! Why don’t you give a shit aboutthat?” he asked.
“I do,” I said. “But there are things you don’t know?—”
“And you do?” he asked angrily. “So you know what it was like to grow up with everyone watching your every move, waiting for you to say or do something stupid? You know what it was like to live with the constant fear that you’d let down the most important person in your life… who you looked up to like they were some kind of god or something? Like they could do no wrong, but that was allyoucould do?”
His tormented eyes shifted to his father.
“Do you have any idea how much of myself I gave up to be what you wanted? What you needed? To be the great Everett Shaw’s son? Do you know how many people told me it was a shame I didn’t have what it took to follow in your footsteps? I was a fucking kid, Dad! They wrote me off from the moment I stepped into that hellhole and you didn’t do a damn thing to stop them!”
I waited for Everett to say something, anything, to defend himself, but he remained quiet, his eyes downcast.
“Say something!” Reese shouted.
“That’s enough!” Nash said as he strode around the couch and reached for Everett, but Everett lurched away from him. He looked at his son.
“All I ever wanted was for you to be happy. I know you don’t believe that?—”
“You’re right, I don’t,” Reese said quietly. “You know the fucked-up part?” he whispered. “Even after everything you did to me, I still had to protect you.” Reese suddenly grabbed his wallet and pulled out a folded-up piece of paper.
“Protect me?” Everett whispered. “I don’t know what you?—”
“My darling, I keep trying to tell myself I can go on without you, but it isn’t true. I’ve loved you every day since the moment we met more than thirty years ago, but I no longer believe the words that you say so often to me – that despite the others, I’m the only one you really want and that we’ll one day have the life you promised me when this farce is all over with. You’ve made a mockery of our love, but I know that even now, I’d forgive every lie you told me about the many nights you spent in the arms of others.”
As Reese continued to read, I sensed the door opening behind me. I went on full alert when I saw an older man step into my house, but he shook his head at me and put his finger to his lips. I was about to kick the fucker’s ass for daring to enter my house when he nodded in Nash’s direction. I looked at Nash and saw him shake his head at me.
What the hell? He knew the guy?
Reese was so preoccupied with reading that he didn’t notice the guy and Everett had his back to him.
“You’ve made my life not worth living anymore, and for that, I hope God has mercy on your soul. Elanor.”
Reese tossed the letter at Everett’s feet. “It wasn’t a fucking accident,” Reese bit out. “She didn’t fall asleep with the engine running after taking a few too many Xanax like you convinced everyone she did.”
“Where did you get this?” Everett asked as he bent to pick up the letter.
“It was in her goddamn hand when I found her! It’s your fault she’s dead,” Reese said. “You may as well have forced those pills down her throat and put her in that car.”
“That’s enough, son,” the man behind me said as he stepped around me.
Both Reese and Everett turned. Everett’s eyes went wide. “Grady,” he said in disbelief.
It wasn’t until he said the name that I finally realized who the man was – William Grady, Everett’s friend and former Secret Service agent.
Chapter 29
NASH
