“Andi, where are you?” This is how I answer the phone.
“Well, hello to you, too, my love,” she chuckles as she responds to my abrupt greeting.
“Sorry, baby. I just couldn’t find you and I was worried. Where are you?”
“I’m at home. Are you finished? Can you come home now?”
“I’m getting in my truck right now. Be there in twenty,” I say before we hang up. She sounds fine but I know something is up. Iknow I haven’t had these strange feelings about her for nothing.
She’s sitting at the kitchen table, staring at nothing and drumming her fingers, when I walk in the house. I lean against the cabinets and just watch her, taking in her facial expressions, her body language, and the fact that she doesn’t even know I’m here yet. That feeling deep in the pit of my chest increases, squeezing me and makes my breath catch with its sharpness.
“Baby, what’s wrong?” I ask softly, trying to not startle her. She doesn’t jump at the sound of my voice. In fact, she doesn’t move at all.
“I left the gym early because of what’s going on with Shane. It’s my fault he’s about to lose his shot at the title fight,” she responds with no emotion in her voice. I start to object but she continues.
“When I got home, I had a visitor waiting for me inside the house. It was Jackson. I knew he was behind what’s happening to Shane, but he admitted it.”
I know shewas still talking after she said Jackson was in her house, but my brain stopped comprehending the words when I pictured her being here alone with him.
“He basically said I have to publicly take responsibility for everything or he will destroy everyone around me. Shane, you, your parents…..He knows his involvement will eventually be found out by the media – because he plans to run for the presidency.”
“Back. Up.” It seems I’ve finally found my damn voice. “I don’t think I heard anything after you said Jackson was here.” I start pacing now to try to contain the adrenaline that’s coursing through my veins.
I just thought I was tired after my workout today. Seems I have plenty of energy left to kick Jackson Rhoades’ ass all over Atlanta. I run my hands through my hair and groan in frustration. Just knowing he was here, in her house, waiting for her to get home. He could’ve done anything to her and I wouldn’t have been able to help her at all.
“How the hell did he get in?” I bellowed. Not meaning to direct it at her, but my fear for her safety and my anger at Rhoades are getting the best of me.
She calmly responds, “I don’t know how he got in. But he walked right out the front door when he left.”
“Why are you so nonchalant about this?” I demand, still pacing and now pointing at her. I know I should calm the fuck down.
“He’s desperate. He needs me to take the blame and cover for him. He thought he had this all figured out when he sent me to that psychiatric hospital but he didn’t. There’s something I’ve missed. Something obvious that I didn’t consider. Something big,” Andi continues speaking as if she’s simply reading off stock market values.
She’s talking to me but she’s deep in thought, like she’s not really here with me. I think she’s been relivingeverything that happened that night and trying to come up with the missing puzzle piece. I also think that reliving it has taken quite a toll on her.
“I’ve gone over every detail of that night…and the whole time I lived with them before that night….and every detail of the time in that hospital…..and –,” she suddenly stopped talking and jumped up from the table.
Her hands flew up in the air over her head as she yelled, “Oh. My. God. I’m such an idiot!Of course!”
“I hate to be thick, but what are you talking about?”
“I know exactly why he’s so desperate now. He made a comment about how I let the media get those pictures of me. He never considered that I would be all over the news and tabloids after inheriting my father’s business. When those pictures hit the news, the story was sensationalized even more. They will keep digging until they find out who the anonymous foster family was that took me in.”
“Ok, but I still don’t get why he needs you so much. What did you figure out?”
She gave me her mega-watt smile and she honestly looked so happy. Her excitement level just increased a hundred fold and she’s even making me believe there just may yet be hope. She’s pacing, her eyebrows are furrowed, but she has a determined glean to her eye. She’s not scared or in shock now – she’s sure she has figured it out and she’s working out a plan now.
“I need to get everyone together, Luke. Shane, Mack, your parents, all our friends – everyone. This will impact them all and I need to make sure you all can handle the fallout – until Jackson is taken down for good. I want to explain everything to everyone at once and give everyone a chance tospeak before I do anything.”
I agree to call an emergency meeting. I feel like a damn idiot even saying that, like I’m some kind offucking geek government official. But I promise to do it for her anyway. Everyone is coming over to Andi’s house within the hour and she’s back at the table feverishly making out a list.
Soon everyone is gathered in the den where Andi has put out drinks and snacks. We’re all chatting and just generally mingling when Andi comes in the room. My parents are here, along with Brandon, Alicia, Greg, Christina, Tania, Katie, Shane, and Mack.
“Thank you all for coming on such short notice. Ihad an unwelcome visitor when I got home today. Jackson Rhoades was waiting in my house for me.”
After a collective gasp from the ladies and a few comments of rearranging his manhood from the guys, Andi told everyone the same story she had told me. She startedwith her parents’ death, then she described what happened the night she ended up in the psychiatric hospital, and everything else up to this point.
“The reason I’ve asked you all here is so that you understand what is at risk with my plan. Jackson is a very powerful man with contacts and resources that we can’t match. He has threatened every one of you in an attempt to control me.He’s banking on me taking full responsibility for everything – for attacking him, but also for convincing the girls that he molested them, that it was all fabricated by me. That’s his plan and if I go along with it, he will win. He will always have something to hold over our heads and no one will ever believe the truth if I change my story later.
