Page 41 of Written with You (The Regret Duet 2)
Things might have changed, but I was still me.
Only, as I walked out of the store that day with renewed hope infusing me, I realized that I’d never truly be me while the world still thought I was Hadley Banks.
I’d just loaded the final gallon of bleach in to my trunk when a man’s hand collided with my throat and shoved me into the back of my car. The mop jabbed me in the side as I crashed down, but I couldn’t even scream around his hold on me.
“You fucking cunt,” he rumbled. “What did you tell him?” Panic consumed me, but from his blond goatee to his buzz cut, he didn’t trigger the first memory for me.
“Let me…go,” I grunted, clawing at his wrist.
He gave me a hard shove, my head banging against the tire well on the inside, but he finally released me.
I gasped for oxygen. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He laughed without humor. “After everything I did for you. This is the way you fuck me over? Well, guess what, Hadley? I can fuck you ten times harder.”
Hadley.
Of course.
He loomed over me as I balanced half in and half out of my small trunk area.
“Where is it?” he growled. “Where the fuck is it?”
My pulse thundered in my ears as I shook my head. “I don’t know. I’m not Hadley. I’m—”
“Swear to God, woman. Don’t try this bullshit with me. Your fucking sister is dead. I checked. You can only pretend to be Willow so many times before your act gets stale. I let you drag me into this, but I’m not letting you hang my ass out to dry.” He picked my purse up and dug through my wallet to remove my ID. “Yeah right, you’re not fucking Hadley.”
I let out a scream, lifting my hands in defense as he reared back and threw my purse at me. It hit me square in the face, the buckle on the front clocking me on the cheek.
“Hey!” a man yelled. “Get away from her.”
My attacker looked up and quickly started to shuffle away as he shoved my ID into his pocket. “I’ll swing by your place on Sunday, and I swear to God, if you don’t have that fucking flash drive, it’s your head that’s going to roll, not mine.” His feet beat the pavement as he took off at a dead sprint.
Almost immediately, another man appeared. But this one I recognized. As soon as I saw Ian, whatever strength I was holding on to crumbled.
“Oh, God,” I croaked.
He helped me to my feet and pulled me straight into a tight embrace. “Shhh, it’s okay. Just relax. He’s gone.” His hand glided up and down my back. “Do you know who that was?”
I shook my head and swallowed hard, doing my best to keep the tremble out of my voice. “He…he thought I was Hadley. I think she stole something from him. I don’t know.”
“All right. Okay,” he mumbled, and I was vaguely aware of him pulling his phone out. “Just breathe. I’ve got you. It’s all good.”CAVEN“She’s fine. She’s fine. She’s fine,” I chanted to myself as I white-knuckled my steering wheel.
I’d just gotten home from the office when Ian had called to tell me that a man had mistaken Willow for Hadley and assaulted her outside the grocery store. He’d assured me that she was fine, but she was Willow. Fine was not fucking good enough. Leaving Rosalee with Alejandra, I’d darted out of the house, and the worst-case scenario played in my mind as I’d all but peeled out of my driveaway.
Because Ian knew me so well, I received a text a few minutes into my drive, warning me that an ambulance had arrived, but it was only a precautionary measure. In all caps, he repeated that Willow was fine.
It was crazy how a mind worked sometimes. I was ready for the ambulance, had mentally prepped for it the entire fifteen minutes it took me to arrive. However, the second it came into my view, a savage anxiety slashed through me. With nausea rolling in my stomach, I frantically searched the area for any sign of her red hair. It wasn’t until I caught sight of her sitting in the back of her Prius with the hatch open, shading her from the sun, that my pulse slowed a fraction.
She was okay.
But as I took in the fact that she had an icepack pressed against her face, I was not.
My car was barely in park before I was out the door, storming her way. The thunder of my steps caught her attention and her head slowly turned my way. The surprise that hit her face might as well have been a sledgehammer to my gut. Things were bad with us at the moment, but what the hell? Had she really not thought I’d come when I found out some idiot had attacked her in the parking lot?
