Chapter Fifteen

~ Patrick ~

Saying I wasn't freaked out would be the biggest lie in history. I was plenty freaked out. I was also shocked that my brother had done something so heinous.

But mostly, I was pissed.

As soon as the guards pulled him to his feet I stepped over and grabbed him by his shirt. "I can't believe you tried to kill Zaq, Peter," I snapped at him. "Are you insane?"

He had to be.

"He's mine!" Peter yelled. "You can't have him."

Probably wasn't a good idea right now to mention I'd already had Zaq, several times.

"He's not a toy, Peter. He's a human being. He doesn't belong to you if he doesn't want to be yours. Can't you get that through your thick head?"

"He was mine first," Peter sneered. "He'll always be mine."

My head snapped around when Zaq snorted. Considering the volatile nature of the situation, I didn't expect that out of him.

"We've kissed a couple of times, Peter. That's it. I was never yours. You wanted to wait for marriage, remember?" Zaq stepped up to my side and looped his arm through mine, smiling up at me. "Unlike Patrick, who is my legal husband. He's had me many, many times, and he doesn't just kiss me."

I tucked my lips in and pressed them together when I heard one of the bodyguards snicker. I wasn't going to mention it, but if Zaq did I would fully support him. Maybe Peter would get a clue this time.

I let go of my brother's shirt and stepped back from him, taking Zaq with me. I sighed sadly as I looked at my brother once again. "You fucked up big time, Peter. Mom and Dad aren't going to be able to gloss this over for you. This time, you are going to have to take responsibility for your actions."

I wasn't sure how much time he'd do for stalking and attempted murder, but I knew Miles and Joe could help me make sure the charges stuck. I was done with letting my brother get away with everything.

"Your golden life is over, Peter. You're going to jail this time."

Peter sneered at me, a look I had seen many times. "You can't put me in jail. I'm your brother."

"Uh, yeah, I can, and I am. You tried to kill my husband, the man I love. I don't consider you my brother anymore."

It hurt to say those words, but they were the truth. I'd take Zaq over Peter any day of the week. Peter had never really been a brother to me anyway. He'd always just been a bully.

The police arrived before I could say anything more, but that didn't matter. I was pretty much done talking to Peter anyway. It wasn't like he was going to hear my words no matter how loudly I yelled them or how many times I said them.

He still thought he was invincible.

Peter was hauled away while an officer took our statement. My eyebrows shot up when Zaq produced a voice recording on my cell phone of everything that had been said. That had been pretty smart of him.

Before the officer could take the cell phone, I had him send me a copy of the recording. I wanted to make sure that it wouldn't get lost.

The sun was just starting to set by the time we began making our way back toward our condo. I glanced behind me at Jackson, who was walking just a few steps behind me.

"Did those other bodyguards work for the same company as you do?"

"Yes, sir," Jackson replied. "I called them in when you said you wanted to go to the park. I figured if Mr. Scotton wanted to confront you, that would be the most likely place he would do it since there weren't a lot of people around. If he hadn't confronted you, you never would have seen them."

Interesting.

"Thank you." Jackson calling in a couple of more bodyguards probably saved our lives tonight. I'd definitely be calling Alejandro and giving this guy a good review.

"It's no problem, Mr. Scotton." Jackson gave me a curt nod. "This is what I am trained to do."

"Hopefully, we'll only need you for a little longer," I told him. "I just want to make sure that Peter goes away for a very long time before I let my guard down."

"Probably best, sir."

The rest of the way home was fairly silent. Zaq's brow was creased as if he was thinking hard about something, but he didn't say a word. I figured he'd talk to me when he was ready.

I was worried that today's activities might have hit him harder than I first thought. It was unsettling to think today could have been his last day on earth if those guards hadn't stepped in. Zaq was probably thinking the same thing.

I needed some serious cuddle time to get over this.

Once we reached our condo I sent Zaq to take a shower and then headed for the office. I had a couple of phone calls to make. My first one was to get some expert legal advice.

"Hey, Joe, it's Patty. I'm sorry to bother you right now, but we've had a bit of a situation here and I need your input."

"Lay it on me."

I carefully explained everything that had occurred tonight, especially the fact that Peter had pulled a knife and tried to stab Zaq. I even sent him a copy of the recording Zaq had made.

"My first piece of advice is to file for a restraining order first thing in the morning. If Peter gets out on bail, I doubt it would stop him from trying something again, but it's always good to have a paper trail."

"Can you help me with that?"

"I'll send this recording to Miles and get him to file for one first thing," Joe replied. "He's more experienced with this type of thing than I am."

That was a great relief. "Thank you."

"How's Zaq holding up?"

I grimaced as I thought about how pale Zaq had been right after Peter had been taken down. "Not well."

"What about you?" Joe asked.

I blew out a heavy breath of air and tilted my head back to stare up at the ceiling. "He tried to kill Zaq, man. There's no coming back from that."

"I get it," Joe said. "Back when we were having issues with Jayce's parent's someone tried to shoot him. Got his bodyguard instead. Kato was wearing a bullet proof vest so he wasn't badly injured, but the mere thought of someone trying to kill Jayce still took about ten years off my life."

He did get it. I knew that.

"Peter has done a lot of rotten things in his life, but I never imagined he'd try to kill Zaq."

"I'll be honest with you here, Patty," Joe said. "I'm not sure Peter has all his oars in the water. Some of the things he's done are pretty far out there."

I stilled, frozen in my chair. "You think Peter is insane?"

"Don't take this the wrong way, but maybe."

My heart skipped a beat. "Is there any way to prove that?"

"We could request a psychological evaluation. It's up to the police and the prosecutor whether they choose to do it or not."

"Can you ask Miles to do that when he goes down to the courthouse to get the restraining order?" I asked. "I want to do everything we can to keep Peter behind bars as long as possible."

I dropped my head down, running my hand through my hair. "You didn't see him tonight, Joe. He was obsessed with getting Zaq to go back with him. He kept saying Zaq belonged to him even when Zaq denied it. He refused to believe Zaq didn't love him. He was almost fanatical about it."

"I'll forward that recording to Miles and have him take a listen. He might be able to pinpoint something in it that will convince the prosecutor to do the psychological evaluation."

"I'll take any help that I can get."

"I'll give Miles a call then."

"Thanks, Joe."

"I'm glad things weren't worse, Patty."

I sighed heavily. "Yeah, me, too."

I still couldn't get the image of Peter lunging at Zaq with a knife in his hand out of my head. It was by far the most terrifying thing I had ever witnessed. If I hadn't gotten Zaq out of the way in time he could have easily died.

I hung up with Joe and called Alejandro. "Hey, it's Patty. You got a minute?"

"Sure."

"I just wanted to thank you for sending Jackson to us. He and a couple of your other bodyguards saved our lives tonight."

"So I heard," Alejandro replied. "Jackson called and gave me the report."

I figured he would.

"I don't know much about the security business, but you seemed to have it handled well. Jackson knows what he's doing. If he hadn't figured out that Peter would try and confront us in the park and requested a couple of my bodyguards, I might not be talking to you now. Peter really went off the rails."

"As long as you two are okay, that's all that matters."

"I think we both need some cuddle time, but physically we're okay." I'd be even better if Peter did some significant time behind bars, but I wasn't holding my breath that that would happen.

Justice could be fickle.

"I'll give you a call if there are any more problems, but I'm probably going to need Jackson for a few more days. Just so you're aware. I don't want to let my guard down until I am sure Peter is going to stay behind bars."

"Probably best," Alejandro replied. "You can have Jackson for as long as you need him."

"Thanks, Alejandro."

I felt a little better after hanging up with the man, but not by much. I don't think I'd feel completely better until I knew there were no more threats to Zaq's life.

I knew there were probably a couple of other people that I should have called, but I wanted to get to Zaq more than I wanted to talk to people. I could call them tomorrow when my brain wasn't fried and the terror was gone from my heart.

My cell phone rang before I could get up from my desk. I huffed as I glanced at the screen and then swiped my finger across it and held it to my ear.

"Hey, Jake, what's up?"

"Norris just got done going over Zaq's phone so I thought I'd call and tell you what he found."

Damn.

"I'm listening."

"There was an app installed on it called "Lover's Locke", which is essentially an app people use to catch their cheating spouses. Not only does it give the location of the cheater, but it allows whoever controls the app to see anything they do like phone calls, messages, and pictures. It even shows what they search for on the internet."

That explained a lot.

"The big thing about this program is that it is a hidden app. Once it goes on a certain phone, it's invisible to the user. You can only find it by going into the interworking of the phone."

"Fuck." I thrust my hand through my hair, tugging at the ends. "Can you get Dr. Teller to write out a report about this and then get it to Miles? Joe is going to see if he will go down in the morning to get a restraining order against Peter in the morning."

"You're getting a restraining order?"

"Today was a total shit-show, Jake." It took me a few minutes to explain to Jake everything that had happened when we went to the park. By the time I was done, Jake was swearing right along with me.

"I'll get all of this to Miles as before he heads to court in the morning. You might want to think about getting Zaq a new phone. He's not going to be able to use his for awhile. Besides, with a new phone, you'd know the app wasn't on there."

"You're probably right," I said. I just hated the fact that that was one more thing Peter had taken from Zaq.

"For now, we need to leave this app on Zaq's phone. The police might want it as evidence in their investigation."

I hadn't thought of that.

"Thanks, Jake."

"We'll get him, Patty. He won't have a chance to go after Zaq again."

I prayed Jake was right.

"Joe is forwarding everything to Miles," I said. "Can you do the same? Maybe fill him in on what happened? I need to go check on Zaq."

"Yes, of course," Jake replied. "Taking care of Zaq is more important. Just don't forget to take care of yourself as well. You need to keep it together so you can be there for him. This is probably going to hit him pretty hard in a few hours."

Oh, I had no doubt.

"Give me a call tomorrow when you get up," Jake ordered. "We'll see where things stand and what we need to do to keep Peter from seeing daylight outside of prison again."

"I appreciate it, Jake."

I realized after I hung up with Jake that I felt a little better once again. With each phone call I made to my frat brothers, I felt better. Maybe it was their unwavering support and willingness to do whatever it took to help me? Maybe it was the knowledge that I wasn't alone in this fight?

Whatever it was, I was grateful for it.