Page 126 of Against The Tide

Hanging up, I consider trying his cell again but decide against it.

Rhett isn’t Carl. It’s all I keep telling myself as the doubt creeps in, even though I’m fully aware there’s no reason for it. Rhett has been nothing but gracious, kind, and loving…devoted even.

Rhett is nothing like Carl. He isn’t.

Still, I can’t shake off the niggle that follows me into my meeting. Unlike usual, I leave my phone on the table beside me as I take my potential new boss through the project breakdown I’ve put together. Every time I get a notification, I can’t help but peer down at it.

There’s nothing, and the longer there’s nothing, the more the niggle grows and grows. Like poison spreading through my veins. There’s nothing I can do to stop it either, because that’s the thing about the past—you can walk, run, or drive away from it, as far as you possibly can, but you’ll never outrun it. Its ghosts will always find you.

CHAPTER 34

RHETT

The clinic is quiet, and with no more appointments for today, there’s only one person I want to see right now. Two actually. My girls. Avery must have her hands full because the calls I’ve returned have gone unanswered and the texts also. It’s not like her, but today is an epic day for her. I can’t help but feel proud of her for muddling through the mess and not only staying on her feet but continuing to move forward.

She’s stronger than she thinks and more so than anyone might ever know.

Pulling my jacket on, I grab the file Rowan gave me this morning. Things aren’t exactly looking great with all the shit Callie managed to dig up on the people on the drive. It’s safe to say that she’s called in all her favors at one time. Without her and Rowan’s help, along with Spencer looking into the nephrologist’s history in California, we would never have been able to make sense of any of it.

“Dr. Reynolds?” Tessa calls me back as I dial Avery again on my way out. When I look back at her, she’s got that expression on her face that tells me she’s done something wrong. “I’m so sorry…”

“What’s happened?”

“I was meant to let you know to call Avery when you arrived. She called this morning and…” Sucking in a breath with a grimace, she slumps, leaning forward with her elbows on her desk. “I didn’t realize she didn’t know you weren’t here. I’m so sorry.”

Something about her trepidation has my chest tightening more than it already is with the deluge of information from this morning. “No worries, I already called Avery back…”

But now, I’m wondering if there’s more to the fact she hasn’t answered or replied to my texts. I’m out of the door, heading for the truck, when I spot the Suburban, but it’s a different number plate to the one the agents were driving the times they were here or outside the house in DC. With the blacked-out windows rolled up, I can’t see them, but I have that odd sensation of being watched all too closely which only makes me get in the truck as fast as I can.

I’m pulling my phone out again when Rowan’s name and his middle finger flash up at me. I should’ve known better than to leave my phone on his desk when I used the restroom earlier.

“Fuck you too,” I answer the call, waiting for the booming laugh that never comes. “Rowan?”

“Where are you?” he asks, sounding more serious than ever.

“Leaving the clinic. I’m heading to the beach to meet Avery. She hasn’t answered my calls or texts today.”

“Callie’s not picking up her phone either. I’ve just left the office. Jesse is at the ranch, and Alison is trying find out more, but we just got ear that Carl has expired.”

“Is that why I’m being followed?” I turn down the short stretch to the beachfront and park at the rockier end of the shore, right outside the surf shop Iris and I got her suit and board from. It’s closed, leaving this part of the beach pretty much abandoned. There’s no one around, which makes it easy to find the group of kids making their way up the shore to the school bus waiting for them. Avery is following behind them with Callie trailing her.

The Jag is a couple of cars ahead, and a little farther down the strip, there’s another Suburban. The tightening feeling in my chest constricts all the way through me. I’m out of the truck before Rowan tells me, “Shit, stay in the truck.”

“What’s going on?”

“In the truck!” he yells back at me at the same time as the bus leaves.

Rowan starts talking at a thousand miles an hour, all in code that takes me far too long to decipher as Avery spots me and starts toward me. A somber look twists her features before she smiles, and there’s a short second where the heaviness lightens and the tightness eases.

The smallest blip in the shrouding doom.

Avery’s nothing but a couple of long strides away when Callie yells her name, and as I glance toward her, the world comes crashing down. I see the gun aimed at her, and for a small fraction of a second everything slows down. My feet can’t move fast enough. My arms don’t reach. My hands can’t clutch hard enough.

Fuck.

I wrap and spin before the silence is split through with a bang that ricochets with the burst of heat in my chest, pushing the breath from me. And then it’s silent again.

Frozen. Quiet. Bleary.