Chapter Seventeen: Holly

It takes us hours to reach the nearest city. Four to five hours in the car that really should’ve been less than one, if the roads were clear. He drives slow but steady, and though I started out this whole thing intending to kill him, I have to say, I am thankful he stopped me.

I… I don’t know what I’d do if I was alone.

No, wait. I do know. I wouldn’t do anything, because I’d be dead. Howard’s assassins would have killed me by now, and I’d be nothing more than a body. A cold corpse.

It’s silly. Even though we got vocal confirmation from the last assassin, a part of me still doesn’t want to believe Howard is capable of something like this. Everything the last thirteen years would’ve been a lie, and I was too dumb to even think he could be at the root of my parents’ murder.

Considering it’s Christmas Eve, you’d think most of the shops in town would be closed. It’s one of those old-timey towns, however, and you can tell Christmas is big here. The streetlights have wreaths and lights wrapped around them all the way up. Every single business on their main street has decorations and Christmas trees filling their front windows. People walk on the sidewalk, bundled up. Some hold onto a warm drink with their mittens, while others keep their hands stuffed in their pockets.

It’s almost like a Hallmark town. Makes me sick.

“Here, a bed and breakfast. Let’s see if they have any room.” Kane pulls us into a small parking lot nestled between two buildings. “Wait here.”

I roll my eyes. “Right. Because I totally planned on making a run for it.”

The sound that rumbles from his chest makes me catch my breath. He leans closer to me and whispers, “No need to be a brat, little killer.” The way he says it, it’s like he murmurs it directly into my ear and breathes down my neck at the same time, and my body reacts accordingly.

God. I need to get a grip. This guy’s not my friend, and he’s definitely not my boyfriend or my lover or anything like that. I still hate him for what he did. My body just needs to get the memo.

Kane gets out of the car after that, and I spend my time alone quietly fuming and hating myself. Assuming this plan works and we both get out of this alive, it won’t change the past. Giving me everything to start a new life somewhere doesn’t change the fact that I don’t want to start a new life.

The only thing I want is the life I can never have thanks to Kane and Howard.

Minutes pass before Kane returns with good news. We got the last room at the inn late on Christmas Eve. He helps me out of the car and is my support as he brings me through the side door of the inn. His large body blocks out the old lady at the front desk, and I do my best not to limp like a motherfucker as we head up the stairs to our room.

It’s like a house. An old house with a lot of rooms, and every inch of it is decked out in Christmas decor. It’s enough to make me want to barf.

Our room is the farthest room on the third floor, with a window overlooking the street. The walls are a dark maroon color, the bed made of bright red sheets with trappings of silver. It has its own small Christmas tree in the corner, just next to the dresser with the TV.

As I study the room, I mutter, “It’s homey, I guess.” I pull away from Kane to sit on the bed and immediately work to pull my boots off. My feet do feel better without the weight of boots surrounding them. My jacket comes off next, which I just drop to the floor.

Kane leaves me to get everything from the car, and I decide it’s time for a nice, long shower with some hot water, so I shuffle my way into the bathroom and close the door behind me. My clothes come off first, then I have to sit on the toilet and work at the bandages wrapped around my feet.

The soles of my feet are still tender. I could use some pain killers, but I doubt anywhere in this Hallmark town will be open tomorrow. Might have to wait until the day after Christmas to get some true relief.

The bandages fall to the ground, and my lips pull into a frown as I stare at the bottom of my left foot. The wound looks like a bruised cut; the skin re-fused itself together where the glass shard pierced the tough skin, but it was deep enough to bruise everything underneath. It doesn’t look awful, but it doesn’t look great, either.

I turn the water on, and since I need to wait a bit until the water gets hot, I end up staring at my reflection in the mirror on the opposite side of the room. I’m a mess. One big mess. I look tired, weary, exhausted to my bones, but I guess there’s a good reason for that.

Stepping in the shower, feeling the warm water pelt my head… I’ve never felt anything more relaxing. The comfort a warm shower brings with it is unmatched, and I sigh and close my eyes, reveling in its embrace.

Of course, I don’t have any shampoo or soap, but that’s okay. Right now, it’s enough to simply stand there in the warm water and feel it wash over me. With my eyes closed, I can easily pretend I’m anywhere but here.

I can’t say how long I stand there in the shower, soaking it all in, but it must be a while. I nearly doze off once or twice. The thought of getting out is the worst, but I can’t stay here all night. Besides, it’ll feel good to actually sleep in a real bed.

I turn off the water and get out. I know I should bandage up my feet again, but as I dry myself off, all my energy is suddenly drained, like I’m tapped out. I don’t want to bandage them. Hell, I don’t even feel like putting my clothes on again. The only thing I want to do is go to sleep.

You know what? Fuck it. Fuck it all.

I hang the towel back up and push out of the bathroom, utterly naked, finding Kane standing near the window, looking out at the town. By the time he glances over at me, I’m already in bed, the sheets pulled up to my neck.

“You don’t want to eat anything?” he asks me, slow in pushing away from the window.

“No,” I murmur against the pillow. “I just want to sleep.”

“As you wish.”

It’s Kane’s turn in the bathroom now, and the moment he walks in, he must spot my clothes on the floor. I hear him pause, but he doesn’t say a word, doesn’t comment on my nakedness. The only thing he does is shut the door behind him and turn on the water. By the time he comes out, I’m fast asleep.

Howard sits at the head of the board meeting, where I should be sitting. Cooper Enterprises is my company now, after all—but the man shows no signs of getting up and relinquishing the chair. Everyone’s attention is on him, not me. I stand at the far end of the table, trying to speak, but no words are coming out.

He’s talking about financial incentives, meanwhile I’m trying to say anything and failing.

My hand curls into a fist, and I slam it on the table to get his attention, and just like that, every single pair of eyes in the room flick to me, even Howard’s.

His nostrils flare, his mouth drawing into a thin line, the action on his face creating more wrinkles. “Oh, Miss Cooper. You’re not supposed to be here. We both know it.” He tilts his gray-haired head, his brown eyes boring into me as he adds, “You’re just a dead woman walking. We both know it. You never really cared about this company anyway, so why not just sit down and let the adults do their jobs?”

I feel so angry I could flip the long table between us and lunge at him, but for some reason, I’m unable to do that. The only thing I can do is sit down and let Howard put me in my place.

That’s when he smiles at me, and I know, deep down, I have to kill him.

Thoughts of murder are what linger after I wake in the morning. I groan as I roll over and find Kane sitting up, a remote in his hand. The TV is on; the volume is super low so I barely hear it. The TV isn’t what catches my attention, however.

It’s Kane—or, rather, the fact that he’s shirtless, all of his muscles on display as his upper back leans against the headboard. He only wears one bandage, the one over his gunshot wound. He must’ve decided to leave off the other.

His blue eyes shift to me. “Did you sleep all right?”

“I think so,” I mumble with a yawn.

“I’ll say you did, if the snoring was any indication.” He only smirks when I reach over and give him a gentle shove. It’s about all I can muster right now. “I’ll admit, it was nice to sleep in a real bed and not on that uncomfortable sofa pull-out.”

I hold the blankets against my chest as I slowly sit up. “You can say that again. What are you doing?”

“Watching the news to see if they say anything about the explosion. Might be a few days, since it’s Christmas and all.” A muscle in his jaw tenses, and he looks at me. His gaze is mostly glued to my face, though it does drop to my exposed back for a few seconds.

Right. It’s Christmas. And to think I imagined myself torturing Kane until now. How stupid I was.

“Christmas,” I repeat quietly. “This isn’t where I thought I’d be on Christmas.”

“I know. You probably thought you’d be digging into me, or maybe even killing me by now.” He chuckles a dark sound. “I don’t blame you for wanting that. If I was in your position, I’d want that, too.” When he looks at me after that, I detect a note of sympathy… or maybe I’m just allowing myself to get too close to this man.

To like him a bit too much.

To want things from him I have no right wanting.

When I don’t say anything, when I just continue to stare at him, he notices and asks, “What?” His dark brows come together, and he studies me like I’m a puzzle he’s trying to figure out.

There are a lot of things I could say. He already knows he’s to blame for who I am today, for how broken I am, but… somehow, someway, there’s more to it. There’s so much I could tell him, so much I could say—I’ve never felt more alive than I did when we were together, that I stupidly feel safe with him watching over me. All of which makes zero sense, and that’s why I’m struggling so much.

In the end, all I say is, “My clothes.”

Kane practically leaps to his feet. “I’ll get them for you.” He pads around the bed and disappears into the bathroom for a few seconds. When he returns to me, he hands them over as he says, “Here.”

I take them, but I don’t say a word in thanks, nor do I go to actually put them on. I’m frozen in place.

“What is it? Do you need something else? Food? You haven’t eaten since yesterday afternoon.” Kane moves to where he set our bags, and his tall frame kneels down as he digs into one of them and pulls out a granola bar and a bottle of water, which he then brings to me.

“Thank you,” I whisper, though, like with my clothes, I don’t do anything right away. I simply set the granola bar and the water bottle on the bed, on top of my clothes.

Kane starts to walk away, but he must sense something’s off, something’s wrong—and it doesn’t involve my clothes or the fact that I haven’t eaten in a while. He is slow to move around the bed, even slower in sitting down beside me, his sole focus on me instead of the TV and the late morning news that’ll soon give way to a Christmas parade. “What’s wrong, little killer?” Maybe I’m just blind when it comes to this man, but it sounds as though he actually cares about the answer.

“Christmas used to be my favorite holiday. The movies, the decorations—the presents.” I turn my head toward the window, and though I can’t see out of it from where I am, I can imagine the Hallmark-like town outside. “I would’ve loved to come to a place like this on Christmas, but now…”

How can I say it without sounding like I’m whining? Like I’m being ungrateful for Kane’s help? I honestly don’t know how to explain the complicated, frustrating feelings inside me.

“Now everything has changed and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. Howard was like family to me. I still don’t want to believe it’s him. Add onto all that, if I would’ve done what I went to that cabin to do, you’d be dead and I would be, too. I would’ve been so happy to have finally given my parents’ memory justice, only to die at the hands of another stupid assassin.”

I shake my head once. “And if this works, if we manage to take down Howard and avenge my parents, you say you have enough money stashed that I can start a new life somewhere, but… what if I don’t know what to do? Or where to go? I’ve never—” I swallow hard. “—I’ve never stopped to think about a future or what I’d want in it. My only goal for the last thirteen years was finding and killing you.”

A sound escapes me right then, and it’s a mixture between a bark of incredulousness and a chuckle full of bitterness. “And here I am, stuck in an old-timey bed and breakfast with you, trying to snap myself out of it—but I can’t.”

“Hey,” Kane’s voice comes out soft and gentle, so unlike his usual tone. He scoots across the middle of the bed to reach me. His hand goes toward mine, but he stops himself as his hand hovers inches away from mine, like he’s thought better of it. Instead, that hand falls to where my knee sits, the only thing separating his hand from my bare flesh the sheets. “Don’t let yourself spiral—”

The only thought I can think is: I’m so fucked up. I’m so fucked up it’s not even funny. I want to tell Kane more, but when I look into his blue gaze, everything else fades away, like magic or something.

I spent thirteen years dreaming of those blue eyes and the face they were set in. They were cold, emotionless eyes—or maybe that’s just how they looked to ten-year-old me. Now Kane’s stare fills me with warmth and thoughts other than murder.

“I’m so lost. I don’t know what I’m going to do.” I feel myself leaning towards him, wanting something I have no right to want. Needing the man who put a bullet in my parents. There’s a special place in hell for me, isn’t there?

God, what’s wrong with me?

Don’t answer that. I already know: lots .