Edge (Parker Reed #2) (5 page)

Past

NEED you to help me die.”

“Excuse me?” I stared wide-eyed at Parker sitting across from me on the bed. “You want me to help you with what?”

He sighed and scrubbed his hands down his face a couple of times before meeting my gaze. “I need to disappear and the only way I can do that is if we allow the public to think that I’m dead. Devin needs to think that I’m no longer in the way.”

“But won’t that just make him come after me sooner?” I asked, my heart racing against my rib cage.

“No. You and I both know that Devin will never believe that I’m actually dead but we need to put the idea in his mind. It’ll drive him fucking crazy. And when he starts seeing it all over the news, he’ll have to believe it eventually.”

I jumped from the bed, pacing back and forth. “I can’t do this. I can’t help you die, Parker. That’s too close to home. It’s…no.” I shook my head. “I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. You’re strong. You can do this. For me. Please.”

I stopped pacing and glanced his way. “How can we do this? I’m a hacker. I know nothing about faking people’s deaths.”

“The CIA can make people disappear. Colin has already agreed to help me.”

“But you need me to help as well,” I finished for him.

He nodded slowly. “I could have done it without telling you but after everything you have been through, I didn’t want to do that to you.”

“You don’t think my fragile mind can take it?”

He frowned. “I never said that.”

I looked away. “You didn’t have to.” The hairs on my body tingled when I felt him come up behind me.

Parker placed his large hands on my shoulders, squeezing, pouring the strength from his very being into me. He was so strong. I couldn’t do this. I refused. But I didn’t have a choice, did I? If he did it on his own and then I would never know if he was alive or not. Or I could help him and know for sure that he was very much alive and breathing.

“Help me. Please,” he whispered in my ear.

“How are we going to do this?” I asked, softly placing my hands on top of his.

“We’ll set up a scene at my apartment. Colin will take care of the rest. The only thing I need from you is to act like it’s real. The media needs to see you break.”

I nodded, letting out a deep breath. Turning in his arms, I grazed my fingers over his hard abs. “When you come back to me, and I know you will, you’ll have to help me. I am fragile.”

“No.” He pinched my chin, forcing me to look up at him. “You are fucking strong. The strongest person I have ever met. We will get through this together. Do you hear me?”

“Parker.”

“I said, do you hear me?” he repeated, his voice firm.

“Yes. Sir. I hear you.”

“Good girl.” He placed a soft peck on my lips. “You won’t know when this will happen. There won’t be a body. But there will be a funeral.”

My eyes widened. “I have to bury you?”

“We need to make this as real as real can be.”

“Parker, this is fucking crazy. Let’s just go bang Devin’s door down and destroy him!” I cried. “I’ll do the hacking job he wants me to do. I’ll do anything. As long as you stay with me.”

“No!” he yelled. “I refuse to have you working for that bastard again. You give in once and he’ll be right back at your door, demanding you do another job for him.”

“But I can’t bury you!” I screamed, shoving out of his grip.

“It won’t be me.” He wrapped his arms around my shoulders as I fell to the floor. “It won’t be me, angel.”

Sobs wracked through my body. “I can’t. I’m not strong enough for this. I was just getting better. You were helping me get better. I need your dominance. I can’t do this without you.”

“Shhh…” he whispered against my hair. “You have me. You have my heart. My notes.”

“They don’t do shit,” I snapped, roughly wiping the tears from under my eyes.

“Angel, I need you here with me. I can’t do this if you don’t agree.”

Him begging only made me cry harder. If only we could have a normal life. A normal relationship. But no, I had to help my boyfriend die. The love of my life. The man who promised to take away my nightmares and replace them with dreams of him.

“I’ll help you,” I whispered.

His big body relaxed. “Thank you.”

I knew then that this would be the last time I would see him for God knows how long. Although his death was fake, I felt like I actually lost a piece of myself. My heart.

OW WAS your meeting with Agent Cross?” Jones asked as I slipped into the passenger seat.

I rolled my eyes. “He’s worse than a nagging five year old.” I turned to Jones. “But he knows stuff. So does Devin.” I scrubbed my hands down my face. “I don’t know how they know but they do. He was asking me how I helped Parker die. It’s all so…so…confusing.”

“Don’t worry, Miss Price.”

I scoffed. “How can I not? I’m going to go to fucking jail for this shit.”

“Keely.”

My eyes widened as a deep, muffled voice washed over my skin. The smooth vibrato that I hadn’t heard in so long made the hairs on my body tingle. “Parker?”

The window separating the front seat from the back lowered halfway. “Act natural, angel. Do
not
turn around.”

My body was vibrating with the need to see him but I listened. “I’ve missed you,” I said softly. It was an understatement. I felt like I hadn’t slept in weeks.

“I...” He cleared his throat. “I’ve missed you too. More than you’ll ever know.”

Tears welled in my eyes. “I ran out of hearts twenty-eight days ago.” The little plastic hearts that had been filled with notes were scattered around his cottage, reminding me of him.

“I know.”

“Where are we going?” I sat up when I noticed that Jones was turning onto the freeway.

“Do you trust me?” Parker asked.

“With all of me,” I said softly.

“Keely, please forgive me for the shit I’ve kept from you. Jones, tell her where we are headed.”

I frowned and waited for some sort of explanation from either of them.

Jones nodded once. “Colin Vain and I have known each other our whole lives.”

“Really?” I asked, curling my feet under me.

He nodded. “Our mothers are best friends.”

“Okay. So...”

“Patience, pet,” Parker whispered in my ear. He was close behind me and I could feel the heat of his breath caress my skin.

It took everything in me not to turn around. Not to jump into the back seat with him and wrap myself around his hard body but I had a few choice words to say to him first. “Patience,” I scoffed. “Do you realize how much patience I’ve had in the past couple of months, Parker?”

“Keely,” he said, his voice filled with warning.

“No! Cross is fucking with my head. One minute he’s asking where you are, how I helped you die and the next he’s calling you on the phone from my cell phone. Patience.” I shook my head. “Please.”

“Cross will pay for breaching your privacy.”

“I don’t want that.” I scrubbed a hand down my face. “God, I just want this over. I hate having to look over my shoulder. I hate that I can’t even look at
you
.”

“I know,” he said, softly.

“Colin and I have a cottage in the middle of nowhere, about seven hours from here. No one knows about it except for Parker.” Jones looked down at me. “You’ll be safe.”

“Are you staying with me, Parker?” I asked, bracing myself for him to tell me that he’s leaving once again.

“Yes.”

My head whipped around. “You are? What about Reed Industries? What about Troy?”

“I’m still going to lay low. You can run the company from your laptop.”

“I don’t have a laptop. Agent Cross seized it when they picked me up this morning.”

“That doesn’t mean shit. Wait until you see the piece of machinery I got for you,” Parker said, clearly proud of his present.

“What about Troy?” I asked again.

“You’ll tell him that you needed some time away.”

“Jones, please stop at the next service station,” I said, my voice firm.

Jones glanced into the rear view mirror. “Keely, I don’t think—”

“Please.”

“Jones, it’s okay,” Parker said, reassuring him.

I breathed a sigh of relief when Jones nodded.

“I saw you talking to Agent Cross.” Parker’s voice lowered, dripping with contempt at the mere mention of the other man.

“You did?” I sat up straighter. “Where were you?”

“Around. What did he want, Keely?”

I sighed, picking at the hem of my dress. “He picked me up this morning, as you know. He seems to think that he knows all of the answers.”

“Does he?”

“I don’t know. He asked me who Devin is but then he acts like he knows him. I don’t know. I’m so confused.”

“Devin sent you a package,” Parker stated, his voice cold.

“Yeah. It was a box of roses with…blood on them.”

“
Shit
.”

“Parker, he told me that the blood belonged to you. When was the last time you saw him?”

“Not since before we faked my death. But he must at least have a feeling that I’m still alive . The fucker isn’t stupid.”

I nodded in agreement. This whole situation was enough to drive anyone mad. A part of me wanted to just hand myself over to Devin to give him what he wanted but I knew that that would backfire. If only I could do the hacking that he wanted me to do from far away. Like in another country. But Devin would have none of that. He wanted to see me squirm. Right now, I just needed to spend as much time with Parker as possible. While I could. We would get through this together. We had to.

AS SOON as we stopped a half an hour later, I made sure to casually exit the limo and headed to the back. I took a breath and pulled open the door before sliding onto the seat. I swallowed hard when my gaze landed on Parker sitting on the other side of the limo.