Deadly Chemistry (Entangled Ignite) (18 page)

“What? What are you talking about?”

Mike walked over to his brother and pulled the kid’s T-shirt up, exposing the scarring that marred what should have been a smooth, pale stomach. “I left you alone. I’m responsible for this.”

He turned away, unable to bear the blame he knew he’d see on Dylan’s face. He spun and looked straight into the shocked eyes of Lauren, who stood in the hall, listening to everything. He saw her lips, her perfect lips, form the word, “What…?”

He held her gaze. Let her hear it from the horse’s ass. “I left him alone. I was supposed to be watching him. I was in the backyard, trying to get into Allie Dunham’s pants. Dylan was hungry.”

Dylan made a sound of disbelief. “I was eight years old, Mike, not four! I knew I wasn’t supposed to be cooking. I made the decision. I wasn’t starving, and there was peanut butter and jelly. I remember, because that’s what you laid out for me on the counter. I’m the one who decided I needed a hamburger and started the damned grease fire.”

Lauren held his gaze, but she flinched at Dylan’s words.

Mike blinked first. He picked up his jacket and walked out, brushing past Lauren.

“Mike?” She caught his arm before made it into the stairwell.

“This isn’t a good time,” he said.

She held on to his arm, and finally, he looked at her.

She stood there, looking at him so…hopefully?

God. She was so fucking beautiful, wearing stiff, cheap jeans, sneakers, and that old Tucker University sweatshirt, her hair in a ponytail, no makeup, just…her.

She said, “I just wanted to say—I’m sorry about this morning, or—that was this morning, wasn’t it?” She shook her head, smiling ruefully. “Wow, huh?”

He was pretty sure that if he tried to pull her into his arms, she’d let him, but if he did that—he’d never let her go.

And she needed someone who didn’t ruin everything he touched. Not only had he not gotten her algae back in time, but he hadn’t stopped the bastard who had hurt her.

“So, Evan’s okay?” she asked. “That’s what—Chief Crawford told me a little while ago.”

“Yeah, he’s gonna be pretty miserable for a while, but as long as the antibiotics work, and he takes it easy…”

“Good. That’s good.”

She was still looking at him, he guessed expecting something, but he couldn’t—

She put her arms around his waist and leaned into him. “I’m glad you’re okay, too.” The weight of her body pressed against him, holding him together for just a few more minutes, delaying the inevitable shattering of his heart.

Shit
. He wanted to return the gesture, but after that scene with Dylan, after everything she’d heard, how did she think…

He unwound her arms and pushed her gently away. “I can’t do this,” he said and stepped around her, shoving the door open and running down the stairs and out into the cold night air.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Mike let himself into the maintenance office, relieved that no one was there. He’d been to the campus gym, beaten the hell out of the heavy bag, and scared the shit out of a couple of frat boys who were pretending to train for some all-Greek MMA thing. Mike wondered if their parents knew that their tuition money was funding head injuries and broken collarbones but decided he didn’t really care.

All he was trying to do was make himself tired enough to sleep. He didn’t know what else to do. There was always bourbon, but he played that tape in his mind and it ended with him waking up in a puddle of vomit on the bathroom floor.

He just kept hearing Dylan’s words, over and over in his head. “There was peanut butter and jelly.” Was it that simple? Had the tragic accident that scarred his little brother, earned Mike a beating, and ultimately estranged him from Evan, all been just a freak
thing
?

Maybe. Maybe if Dylan had listened to Mike and made a damned sandwich instead of lighting a fire under a grease-filled skillet, maybe if Evan hadn’t been at the library, hiding from Dylan’s psycho, drug addict father, maybe if Mike hadn’t been so focused on getting into Allie Dunham’s panties… But there were three legs to that table. And Mike was one of them. If he’d been there, Dylan wouldn’t have been hurt.

The door to the office creaked open and Jason came in.

“What are you doing here?” Mike asked. “It’s a little past your bedtime, isn’t it?”

“Crawford called me. Said security got a call from the Rec Center about some crazy asshole trying to kill either himself or a punching bag.” The older man sat down on the bench next to Mike. “You wanna tell me what the hell your problem is?”

“Not really.” Mike tore off his sweaty T-shirt and wiped his underarms with it before taking a new one from his locker and pulling it over his head.

“I hear Evan’s going to be okay.”

“Yeah. He was in surgery for a while, they had to dig around a bit to get the bullet out. He’ll be in there for a day or so, getting pumped full of antibiotics, but he’ll make it.”

“That’s good. He’s an odd bird, but he’s a decent guy.”

Mike sighed. “Yeah. He is. I—I haven’t given him a fair shake.”

Jason rubbed his head, looking at the floor. “Yeah, I know. But you didn’t get much in the way of support yourself. I should have stepped up after Lloyd died and been a father figure or something like that, but I suck at this emotional shit. Hell, I can’t even admit that I’m afraid I’m not good enough to work for my wife’s family, so I hide out here with my tool belt. They keep asking, though.”

“What do they want you to do for them?” Mike asked.

Jason chuckled. “Miss Emmaline wants me to evaluate the requirements for those crazy grants that she offers faculty members. She says I’m in a unique position to be objective about the projects and to have a ‘plumber’s eye view’—her words, not mine—of the people who are applying. She says I probably know more about the personal integrity of everyone on campus.”

“You probably do,” Mike told him. “You should give it a shot.”

Jason harrumphed.

It was silent then, except for the buzzing of a fluorescent light fixture that needed to be replaced.

Mike thought about everything that had happened over the last few days, weeks, years. He thought about the anger that he carried around with him, the blame, the constant fear. It was all about fear, wasn’t it?

And what was he afraid of? That he would fail to protect his family? And what did that mean? That they would leave him? Keeping everyone at arm’s length, what did that accomplish? Not a goddamned thing.

Jason swore. “See? I’m lousy father material. I came in here to make you feel better about whatever was bothering you, and instead, I just pile my own shit on your sandwich.”

Mike laughed. This time it felt more real. “But you’re so good at being an inappropriate uncle.”

Then something occurred to him. “Jason, you definitely need to take Miss Emmaline up on her job offer. I know the perfect person to receive one of her grants.”

…

Lauren sighed and tried to make herself comfortable, sitting on a too-hard mattress, leaning against too-soft pillows, in a too-empty room at the Tuck U Inn. Because she didn’t want to think about anything else, she tried to mentally plan the next day. At least maybe she’d hear from Dr. Jerrold that she’d be allowed back on campus, since she couldn’t go home until a professional cleaning service had been through to remove the traces of Dylan’s cologne—his former cologne, he’d promised her—that Alex had spread around the house to throw suspicion off of himself. Okay, so much for not thinking about Alex, or Devil’s Dust, or…Mike.

Lauren flipped—twice—through all of the channels so kindly provided by the Tuck U Inn for her viewing pleasure, but each time she got to the end of the list, she realized she hadn’t registered any of the choices. She thought about going for a third spin around the TV dial, just to give her hands something to do besides pick at her cuticles, but she felt the need to check her phone for non-existent messages first. Nope. None. But then again, what had she expected?

No matter how many times she tried to focus on something else, her mind kept turning back to that run-in with Mike at the hospital. He had looked at her with something akin to disappointment, almost disgust. God, she was such a fool. She’d really thought that they had something going. Something beyond a couple of earth-shattering orgasms each. But clearly she’d overstepped her bounds by showing up at the hospital tonight.

After Mike pulled his disappearing act, Lauren had slunk in to see Evan and talk to Dylan, who tried valiantly to act like nothing was wrong, that he hadn’t just been having it out with his oldest brother.

Evan had woken up for a few minutes and asked Lauren to feed his frogs while he was out of commission. She suppressed her usual grin as she said she’d feed the little FUCRs. Then he wanted her to move the monitor with his vital statistics so that he could see it and
then,
he wanted her to tell him how much, and what color, the urine draining into the bag at the foot of the bed was. Finally, he pushed the button on his morphine pump and drifted back to la-la land.

Dylan told her about Angela, about how, even though they knew that both of their families disapproved, she’d called him a few months ago. Dylan had told her that he couldn’t see her because of the crap that Dino had gotten him into, and she’d shocked him with a suggestion that they try to nail Dino for his drug dealing. Angela couldn’t bear to see any more of her friends carted off in caskets or handcuffs.

So they’d been hanging around, following Dino whenever possible, until a few days ago, when Angela had come to Dylan and told him she thought, based on something she’d overheard, that her brother had something to do with the Devil’s Dust situation. And that was why they’d been hanging around in front of Lauren’s house. Hoping to catch Dino breaking in. Unfortunately, they’d caught Alex Barker, instead. Or rather, he’d caught them, trying to catch him. That was how they’d wound up in a closet in his basement.

She and Dylan had then shared a little more small talk, ignoring any and all elephants that had taken up residence in the hospital room, and then Lauren had officially had enough of the Gibson-Adams-White family for one day. She’d headed for the Tuck U Inn, where she made friends with the clerk at the front desk—she recognized him from a class she’d taught last spring but couldn’t remember his name. Looked like a science major wasn’t doing him much good.

Huh. Wasn’t doing her much good, either.

The phone rang, yanking her out of her self-pity spin cycle and into the “Is it gonna be Mike?” agitator.

Nope.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Talk to me,” Karen Kane demanded. “I got your message—and understood most of it, even through the sniffling. I don’t think that getting that drug off the street and finding out Alex was responsible is why you were crying, though.”

Of course not, but how did she say this? Better to just yank off the Band-Aid. “Mom, I’m sorry. I messed up, and I don’t think I can be a scientist anymore.”

“Huh? I thought this was going to be about the guy. What was his name?”

“Mike. And yeah, there’s probably a little of that, too.”
A little
being more than half, but as far as her mom was concerned…

“Wait,” her mom said. “Please don’t tell me you’ve been pursuing a career in science because you think you owe it to me?”

Lauren thought about it for a minute. “No. I love science. This is what I want to do. But I didn’t think I could have a family and a successful job at the same time.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’ve finally realized that I can have as much as I’m willing to let myself have.” And it was true. Unfortunately, she’d realized this a little too late to have it with the one man she wanted.

After hanging up with her mom, she decided to walk to one of the fast food restaurants across the street. She thought about splurging on a Big Mac, large fries, and a large chocolate shake, but that seemed too much like wallowing. When she got to the counter, she ordered a salad. With extra ranch dressing. And large fries. And a large chocolate shake.

Back at the Tuck U Inn, the clerk from the front desk was standing outside, pretending not to smoke a cigarette. Or maybe a joint. At least she knew it wasn’t her algae—she’d checked the bag she’d taken from Alex’s lab, and it was almost all there. Whatever he’d taken out to sell to his test subjects had already gone up in flames.

The clerk—what
was
his name?—smiled at her. “There you are. I thought you were still in your room. Your boyfriend just went up to see you.”

“Boyfriend?” The kid had to be mistaken.

“Yeah, some good-looking dude. Seemed kinda crazy about you. I didn’t tell him what room you were in, but I did pull up your info on the computer to ring your room, and he kinda leaned over the counter and saw your room number. Took off running toward your room. The dude definitely is crushing on you.”

Mike was here? Hope flooded her chest and she almost dropped her milkshake. “Thanks!” She practically ran up the outdoor stairs to the second-floor balcony, going over what she would say in her mind as she took the steps. “I can’t live without you” seemed a little desperate, considering how he’d pushed her away earlier. Would “Why are you here?” be too cold? Before she’d decided, she was there. She came around the corner, and stopped. There was no one standing outside her room.

Disappointment replaced the hope that had bloomed in her chest just a few seconds before. Had Mike changed his mind and left?

She slowly walked the rest of the way to her room, shivering as an evening breeze wafted over her. After sliding her key card through the slot and shoving the door open, she made it across the threshold before she realized the room wasn’t empty.

Alex Barker sat in the middle of her bed, a handgun pointed straight at her heart. A big—very big—black gun. “Come on in, sweetheart. Thanks for bringing me dinner.”

Lauren froze.

“Close the door.”

She pushed the door behind her and heard it click shut on her life. “What do you want?”

“Well, let’s start with dinner. I haven’t eaten in…” He looked at the ceiling. “A couple of days.” It didn’t appear that he’d showered in at least as long. He was still wearing the same rumpled clothes he’d had on that morning.

Fear and anger let pity look in, but then shoved it away. “Alex, what are you doing? Why did you do this to yourself?”

He sighed. “I’m not going to go back through the list of the ways you could have avoided this. Let’s just move on to what’s going to happen next.”

“Okay…”

“After I eat your dinner, we’re going to leave here. We’re going to go to the lab and get the algae that you have growing and take it somewhere far from here.”

He gestured to her to hand him the bag of food. She did, and he looked inside, not releasing the pistol, and cursed. “A salad? Christ. That’s not going to cut it.”

There was a knock at the door. Lauren’s heart stuttered.

Alex was on his feet in an instant, behind the door, gun aimed at Lauren. “Get rid of them.”

She peered through the peephole. Oh, God.
Mike
. She’d hoped he would come, but now that he was here, fear for him roiled through her. She had to keep him safe—even if it meant breaking her own heart.