Calculated Vendetta. Jodie Bailey

Чтение книги онлайн.

       TWO

      “You didn’t need to come over. Really.” Casey tried to block the doorway to keep her best friend from entering the apartment. There was a reason she hadn’t called Kristin James and told her what had happened at the restaurant. Casey had known it would go down exactly like this, with her stubborn friend practically bursting through the door.

      Casey didn’t want a babysitter. She wanted a quiet place to curl into a ball and fall apart in peace. The shudders that had fluttered through her like wild birds for the past couple of hours were trying their best to work their way out to every limb. When she let go, the force would likely be epic, and the last thing an explosion of such a magnitude needed was a witness.

      Of course, Kristin was having none of that. She slipped past Casey into the small hardwood entryway, dropping her backpack into the doorway of the guest room as she passed. “Seems to me I remember the same argument coming out of my own mouth a few months ago.” She crossed her arms. “Did you leave me alone when someone came at me and broke into my house? No. I’m pretty sure I remember you bunking in my guest room and, oh, calling the police even though I asked you not to.”

      Casey crossed her own arms and mimicked her friend’s posture. “Your brother pasted a target on your back. This is different. Tonight was a random mugging.”

      “With a gun.” Kristin stepped into her personal space and leaned even closer. “Don’t pretend everything’s all sunshine and roses.”

      “Like you did?” Jerking away, Casey stalked for the den. Kristin had no room to talk. When the smuggler her brother had double-crossed came calling, Kristin hadn’t wanted help either, even after she was attacked in her own home. “If I want to be alone right now, let’s say I learned from the best.”

      “Ooh. Ouch.” Kristin twisted the dead bolt then followed Casey, her relentless streak going full bore. “See? This is how I know you’re not fine. You’re not me. You don’t go around biting heads off.”

      She was right, for the most part. “Maybe I’m not like you in some ways. But in others...” Casey dropped onto the couch and stared at the ceiling.

      “You need to be alone to cry.” Settling onto the opposite end of the creamy beige sofa, Kristin smiled with a gentleness out of character for her. Rarely did her blue eyes soften with sympathy. “I get it.”

      “Yet you’re still not leaving.”

      “Nope.”

      “How did you find out anyway?”

      Kristin’s eyebrow arched. “Two guesses.”

      “Travis called Lucas.” Casey sighed. She should have known without asking. Kristin’s fiancé, Lucas Murphy, was platoon sergeant in the same company as Travis. They’d been close friends for years. It shouldn’t surprise her Travis had contacted his best friend, who’d turned right around and contacted hers. After all, they’d met through the other couple, and although Casey had managed to avoid Travis for months, her days of avoiding him had likely run out.

      “I never understood why the two of you didn’t work out.”

      “You’d have to ask him.” While Casey appreciated Kristin trying to change the subject, she’d a thousand times rather talk about the mugging than her nonexistent relationship with Travis Heath. He’d been fun, had made her laugh, had been a perfect gentleman. Then one day, he was simply gone. The thought of his departure still burned bitter. “So how’s the wedding planning coming along?”

      Kristin’s lips tightened into a thin line. Clearly, she didn’t want to change the subject.

      Getting engaged had softened her hard edges so much that she now thought the rest of the world should pair up, too. Even though it had been months since Travis quit their СКАЧАТЬ