Be My Hero(12)

"Yeah . . . " I said slowly before shaking my head. "No, I think maybe we should shy away from anything involving . . . murder."

"Murder?" Reese snorted. "It wouldn't be murder. It'd be . . . it'd be  doing society a favor to rid that kind of evil from the world. It'd be a  public service."

Crap, she was beginning to scare me. "But you weren't sure it was her,  remember? The shadows. The dark. She was all the way across the street.  It was probably someone else, sweetie."

Reese took a long, deep breath, physically calming herself. But she wouldn't stop staring at the front doors of Forbidden.

"How about you guess another baby name," I tried, suddenly glad I had  refused to tell her what I'd decided to name my little girl; now I had  something to use as a distraction. "You're on the letter I, remember?  Maybe you could try to come up with something different than Isabella  this time."

"Idiot," she hissed.

"What! Why would anyone name their kid Idiot?"

"No. I'm the idiot. I was so sure moving us halfway across the country  away from her would get her out of his hair and free him from her  forever, but-oh God. There." She pointed. "There she is." She covered  her mouth and whimpered. "It's her, E. It's really her."

I'd never actually met Mrs. Garrison before. Never even seen her. I'd  only heard Reese's horror stories. The woman was Mason's living  nightmare. Sorry, I meant, the living nightmare of Mason.

It was dark, and I barely saw her face. But she did have a certain air  about her that reminded me of my father. Rapists were all the  same-predators.

"Are you sure? I can barely see her," I insisted, trying to keep Reese  calm so her reactions wouldn't throw me into a panic attack, because  that atmosphere about her freaked me the hell out.

"Yes," she said with steely determination as she reached for the keys still dangling from the ignition.

"Whoa. No." I reached out and caught her hand. "This is not . . . you  shouldn't . . . " Damn, I was no good at this. We really needed Mason  here. I'd never seen my cousin this unhinged before, but if anyone could  draw her back from the ledge, it'd be him.

"Mason," I gasped, an idea hitting me.

Reese glanced sharply at me. Wow, even his name broke through her haze.

"What about him?"

"He's inside. If she went in there, she probably saw him, right? So  don't you want to make sure he's okay?" I snatched her phone off the  center console and thrust it at her. "Call him."
         

     



 
He'd make this better. He'd tell her she was mistaken, his blackmailing  rapist was nowhere near Illinois, and everything was fine.

Blowing out a shaky breath, Reese nodded and dialed his number.

"Put it on speaker phone," I demanded, beginning to chew on my own nails  as I turned to stare at the opening of the club, where the wicked witch  lookalike had thankfully disappeared down the block.

Reese complied and I listened to the phone ring and ring, and ring. When it went to voice mail, she cursed and hung up.

I bit down a little harder on my thumbnail, wondering why he hadn't  picked up. Mason always answered the phone when Reese called. It was all  part of how disgustingly adorable they were together.

"Call again," I ordered.

She did. Then she did again. Baby Girl must've noticed the growing  unease in me because she stirred in restless agitation. I smoothed my  fingers over her, my palms naturally ironing down the image of Tinker  Bell I had on the nightshirt I wore.

When the ringing stopped and the line clicked on, Reese and I sat up  straighter and shared a relieved look. Until a muted voice as if it were  a distance away from the receiver shouted, "Shit! Are you really going  to tell her some old chick just came in, claiming Lowe knocked her up?"

"Say what?" Reese cried.

Immediately, the line went dead.

"Oh, no, they did not." Reese redialed.

I wasn't at all surprised when no one answered. Gulping in absolute  worry for her, and even a little for Mason, I tried to calm her. "Maybe .  . . maybe they meant . . . "

Reese glanced sharply at me. I winced. She muttered a couple more  obscenities before grabbing her phone and shoving open the driver's side  door.

"Ree Ree?" I squawked, not sure how I was going to physically restrain  her if she actually did try to kill someone. I lurched out of the Jeep  behind her, waddling pathetically in an effort to catch up. "What're you  doing, sweetie?" I tried to sound soothing.

Totally didn't help.

"I'm going to find my goddamn boyfriend and figure out what the hell is going on."

Oh, double crap. I hurried after her. Her phone began ringing as soon as  we hit the sidewalk. She answered without hitting the speaker to let me  hear this time.

As she shoved open the front doors of the bar, she growled, "Let me  guess. Mrs. Garrison just showed up to announce you'd put a baby in  her."

I followed her inside, only to pause briefly in the entrance. Since the  place had already closed, it was cleared out save for five guys-all  employees because they wore the same kind of black T-shirt Mason always  wore to work-and one woman. They had gathered around the bar in the  back.

On the other side of the long counter, Mason dropped his phone from his  ear and let out a long sigh. "Yeah. Pretty much," he confessed, looking  more troubled than I'd ever seen him.

Worry gnawed at my stomach. I'd just decided Mason wasn't the  anti-Christ and now this? According to Reese, if he had knocked up Mrs.  Garrison, it wasn't because he'd wanted to be with her. But still, how  could Reese stay with him after learning he'd fathered a child with  someone else?

Even more shocking, I didn't want them to break up.

It was such a perplexing thought for me since I'd spent the first six  months of their relationship trying to get them to do exactly that.

But they loved each other, they were good for each other, and they gave  me hope that happily ever after existed. Or at least they had up until  now.

"I had a feeling we hadn't gotten rid of her so easily," Reese said as she hurried toward her man.

I bumbled after her because, yeah, I felt totally out of place being  seven months pregnant and pretty much wearing my PJs-a nightshirt and  gray yoga pants-while inside a bar with a bunch of complete strangers. I  mean, sure, every guy in the place was hot, but they were still  strangers.

"I say, if a stake through the heart doesn't work, we try cutting her head off."

I rolled my eyes and gave a soft smile. Only Reese would say that.

Mason laughed as if relieved by the way his girlfriend was taking all  this. But he just as quickly sobered and shook his head. "I am so . . .  so sorry."

When I saw the hint of tears in his eyes, I had to blink and glance away  because I'd never seen Mason anywhere near tears before. It was hard to  watch him like this. Lately, I could not let anyone cry alone. I even  wailed over those dog adoption commercials, and I totally wasn't a dog  person.

Freaking pregnancy hormones.

Too-forgiving Reese merely shrugged. "Hey, if there isn't some  insurmountable obstacle in our path, we wouldn't be us, would we?" But  there was still a tremor in her voice, letting me know she was just as  freaked out as Mason was.

He didn't seem to want to be forgiven quite so easily, though. He  brought her hands to his mouth and shook his head. "You shouldn't have  to deal with this. You shouldn't-"         

     



 

"I think she was lying," I blurted out, unable to watch them go through  this torture. I felt so strongly against the whole idea, I absolutely  refused to believe this could happen to Reese.

Winded from chasing her across the street, I plopped down on a stool at  the bar beside Reese. When I spotted a bowl of beer nuts, the pregnant  munchies struck with a vengeance.

I reached for them, not even caring how much the salt in them was going  to make my ankles swell. Already tasting the tart nutty flavor, my mouth  began to water. But mere inches away from scooping up the biggest  handful I could manage, I was shut down. Warm fingers wrapped around my  wrist, stopping me while another hand yanked the bowl away.

Ack! My nuts! That yummy, yummy salt and-

I looked up, ready to lambaste whoever was keeping the famished pregnant chick from her food.

But the dark brown eyes of the guy staring back at me caught me totally off guard. Wow.

He was-

I didn't even know how to describe him. A surface description would be  tattooed and pierced. There was a metal hoop caught in his eyebrow, and  two right next to each other through the corner of his bottom lip. His  tats spread down both arms, making him look like he was wearing long  sleeves instead of a short-sleeved shirt and one colorful design flared  up the right side of his neck.

He appeared to be a bad boy straight from the wrong side of town. But  there was something not bad boy about him. He simply didn't look like  the type who didn't give a damn about life. His deep brown eyes held too  much compassion and vivacity.