57. Baxter

CHAPTER 57

BAXTER

Kai's phone call was more than unsettling. After finally getting my ass up off the floor, I've spent over an hour trying to find out where Tammy lives. It wasn't like I could call and ask her parents, who will no doubt eternally hate me after the way I embarrassed them on Main Street. And it was too late to call Grace and get an address. I probably should have just waited until the morning, but I felt compelled to hunt, so I kept searching until I found a Hudson and Tamara Clark living in Chesterfield, Missouri. It feels right. Chesterfield is only two hours southeast of Gladstone. I write down the address and am tempted to get in my car and start driving. But it's past midnight, and I can't show up in the early hours of the morning, knocking on their door, and I don't want to sit in my truck like some creeper, waiting for sunrise.

I need sleep.

I need to show up calm and in control.

Just a friendly check-in. That's how I'll sell it.

Tammy and I are buddies from high school. It doesn't need to be more than that. I can get a read on the situation and figure out what the hell I'm supposed to say to her then. Maybe I can find out if she's read my email or not.

Hopefully my gut will know what to say when I knock on her door.

I frown at my phone screen, brushing my thumb over the house I'm pretty sure is hers. Doubts start to fire through me again. Will showing up make everything a million times harder for her?

Maybe I shouldn't just turn up unannounced.

Maybe I should call first.

But what if he's in the room when she wants to answer the phone?

What if he's there when you knock on the door?

"Shit. None of that should matter. It's a friendly check-in." I try to convince myself out loud, but I know I'm lying.

It's not a friendly check-in. I'm going there to try and convince Tammy to leave her husband. Does that make me the scum of the earth or her knight in shining armor? I don't fucking know!

"I don't know." I shake my head, hating the complexity of this situation.

With a sigh, I stare out across my motel room and figure I shouldn't be making any decisions when I'm this damn tired.

So, after a long, hot shower, I fall into bed and drift off into a fitful doze…

"Baxter?" Kai calls my name as if he's looking for me. I search my surroundings, but it's dark, and I'm struggling to find him.

Heading for the light, I stumble down a hallway and walk into a living room I don't recognize.

"Kai? Where you, buddy?" I call out his name, searching behind the couch and the curtains.

It's like a game of hide-and-seek… but not a fun one.

Someone is groaning behind me, and I spin, seeking out the sound. It's not a painful groan, more like sex, and I walk into the kitchen and find Hudson with his pants around his ankles. His ass cheeks are clenching as he buries himself deep in a woman. I can't see her face. It's pressed against the counter while Hudson goes for it. She's moaning like she's enjoying it, and my stomach bottoms out.

I don't want to see this.

Tammy and Hudson doing it in the kitchen while Kai is playing hide-and-seek makes me sick. What the fuck!

I'm ready to bolt from the room and make sure he doesn't come into the kitchen and find them, but just as I turn, I spot Tammy.

She's standing by the fridge, frozen in place while she watches her husband do another woman.

Fuck, that's another woman.

Tammy's eyes are bright with tears, and you can tell she wants to run from the room, but when she starts to edge for the doorway, Hudson looks over his shoulder and snaps, "No! You stay! You watch!"

Tammy covers her mouth and starts to jerk with sobs. Then she looks right at me, and her eyes are screaming at me. " Help me! Get me out of this!"

Anger bursts through me in a rush so fast, it's nearly blinding.

I lunge for Hudson with a vicious growl, but when I go to grab him, my fingers fly straight through his shoulders.

He grunts, pounding on the woman a little harder, while I spin to look at Tammy in confusion.

"Please," she begs, and I hold out my hand, ready to pull her away from this mess, but her fingers fly straight through my palm.

No. I need to get her out of this.

We need to go.

We need to?—

Hudson grunts, his moan changing pitch, and I swear he's about to come.

"Baxter!" Kai appears in the doorway, his face morphing with shock as he spots his father behind me…

"No!" I sit up with a jerk, breaths punching out of my chest as the horrifying images fade into the background of my mind.

"Fuck," I whisper, resting my head in my hands and muttering a string of unintelligible curses.

The bedsheets have twisted around my body, and I struggle to throw them off before getting up to splash some water on my face and recover from that nightmare.

Resting my hands on the edge of the bathroom sink, I stare at my reflection and swear that dream is going to haunt me forever.

"Unless you do something about it." I scrub a hand down my face, then give myself a firm look. "Go get her, man. Go right fucking now."