Page 22 of Black Waters

With this in mind, I assumed the Russians had backed off after Timothy’s death because her father became well known overnight. “Where’s Whit from?”

Spooked eyes looked at me. “What do you mean?” He spoke in a monotone that told me my other assumption was correct.

“I mean what country was she born in?”

He rushed to me, put one hand on the back of my head, the other over my mouth, and frantically looked around his library as if we were being watched, listened to, or both.

Believe it or not, that was the first time it all sunk in. Constance’s death, Whitney’s danger, Crash’s and my connections to it all. That’s how petrified my father looked. Up to that point, I was in some sort of protective survival mode.

We both trembled in fear, not for ourselves but for our loved ones, the ones who could still be saved… or not. He held me like that with incredible strength as he whispered in my ear. “If anyone were to find out her documents are falsified—”

Without thinking—pure reaction—I reached around his arms to grasp the sides of his head as hard as he was holding mine, only compounding the intense moment. Anger poured off me as I realized how my father, the lawyer, was involved. My eyes squinted, telling him to let me talk. His hands moved to mirror my hold on him.

“Did you put Whit in this danger?”

My father tightened his grip. “No, you ungrateful little bastard. I saved her life!”

Instantly, my hands dropped. “You what?”

Forehead to forehead, he growled in a whisper. “You think she came here legally? Use that brain I’m spending thousands to educate.”

“No… No… she was kidnapped?”

His anger would not subside the way mine was. He spit, “Worse,” and shoved me as hard as he could. I flew into the closed library double doors and slid to the floor. “That’s for punching me.”

I had that coming. “Yes, sir.”

He threw a piece of crumbled paper at me, and in a deep voice demanded, “Now get out of my sight.”

Never had I seen hatred on my father’s face before, especially toward me. At that moment, the sight of me seemed to disgust my father. Now I knew how Crash felt: exiled.

As I flattened the paper, I saw it was a photo, a photo of Constance in my arms the previous night. In her driveway, with her bare feet still off the ground, she looked so happy, smiling at me like I was her sun. My eyes welled, and the paper in my hand shook. I now understood my emotions. Guilt. From the floor where I’d landed, I looked up at my dad, knowing I was to blame for Constance being removed from this earth.

My father sounded evil. “Go ahead. Go to your precious Whitney, and have her blood, and that of others you love, on your ignorant hands.”

I had blamed—and wanted to continue to blame—Crash, but the truth was, by being around her, I had gotten Constance killed. I sat next to her gravesite daily, vowing to never make that same mistake. “I promise, Connie. I promise to keep her alive.”

Whit and Connie might have been rough on each other for a while, but in the end, they were friends, and I believed that sweet-hearted girl—who had to say good-bye because of me—would want right done by Whit. But staying away from Whitney was like living without limbs. My legs and arms, my heart and lungs were not my own, not anymore, but I would not be a Crash. I would not let my needs and desires put her or anyone else in danger. Since the same couldn’t be said for Crash, I gave ol’ Ninja a call. “Don’t let her out of your sight since you’ve practically signed her death certificate.”

“No more threats have come in, Reether.”

“And in the drug dealing profession, what does that mean?”

After moments of silence, with no energy, Crash said, “I don’t know.”

“I hope it was worth it.”

“I love her.”

“Fuck you.”

“I won’t leave her side.”

“Better not. She gets hurt, you die by my hands. Understood?”

“Understood.”

I didn’t have to come up with lies to keep people safe, to keep friends from Whitney. As soon as they learned of her relations with a drug dealer, she became scum in their eyes—even with half of them being users and Crash’s personal clients. And then when schoolmates realized Whit was affiliated to the one who, in one shape or form, killed her brother, the deed was done, and my very best friend was exiled, too.