Page 37 of Deserving Maisy
“Leave the thinking to me, Maisy. You’ve always been too stupid to figure shit out. I’ve got this, and in a little over three months, all our problems will be behind us.”
Three months. It wasn’t enough time. Maisy began to panic as Jason started the car and got back on the road toward the bank. Mentally, she took a deep breath. She had money, thanks to her brother needing to trick Jack. She could use that to…to what? Fly somewhere? Her brother could find her if she used her own name. And what about Jack? What would she tell him?
Maybe she could post on social media about Jack and how he’d lost his memory, asking if anyone knew who he was. A lot of those things went viral. Maybe it would find its way to his people.
But Jason or his friends could also see it before Jack’s friends did, and that wouldn’t go well for either of them.
She and Jack could literally get into the car and drive away, but where would they go that Jason couldn’t find them? How would they live once their small amount of funds ran out? Yeah, they could both find jobs, but how long could they stay under the radar under their own names? She wasn’t a criminal like her brother. Or at least…she hadn’t been. She didn’t know about things like false IDs and new identities.
Her shoulders sagged. Getting away from Jason seemed more impossible with every passing second.Maybe Jack would have some ideas…if she told him everything. She truly had intended to do just that last night. She lost her nerve right around the time Jack started kissing her, caressing her…stripping her out of her clothes.
God, she was weak.
And even more terrified than before, if that was possible. She hadn’t been sure that Jason had anything to do with her parents’ carjacking, but now she was almost certain. And Martha was a given, after his crack about Maisy ending up just like her.
Her brother was a psychopath. Didn’t care about anyone other than himself. He had enough connections that he easily could’ve hired someone to fake a carjacking and shoot their parents in the process. As easily as he’d found someone to kidnap Jack.
She sat up and stared sightlessly out the window. She had to tell the police. It was her only option…though it seemed unlikely Jason would let her out of his sight too often now.
He might succeed in stealing her money, and maybe even killing her…but if she wrote out everything she knew andleftit for the police, they’d have to investigate, right? It would at least be justice if Jason ended up behind bars, unable to spend the money he’d worked so hard to get his hands on.
It wasn’t the best solution, Maisy would prefer to live, but she was pretty sure that wasn’t in the cards for her.
Her first goal would be to save Jack. He didn’t ask to be involved in any of this. Second, she wanted Jason to pay for killing poor Martha, and likely their parents.
The more she thought about it, the more she warmed to the idea. She’d write down everything she could remember,every sin she believed her brother had committed, giving details and specifics that could hopefully be used against him. Names of his friends, doctors who’d written prescriptions without question, people who she thought might’ve helped him take out the life insurance policy on Jack…and now that she thought about it, he probably had one on her too.
“Remember, keep your mouth shut as much as possible, let me do the talking,” Jason told her as he parked in front of the bank.
Maisy nodded. For a split second, she envisioned standing up in the bank office, in front of the manager and the executor of her parents’ estate, and blurting that it was all a lie. That Jack had been forced to marry her and her brother was a total psycho.
But then she pictured Jack sitting in the basement, chained to the wall, starving and staring at her with hatred…
It made her flinch just thinking about it.
She couldn’t do it. For now, she’d do whatever Jason forced her to do, simply to buy some time. There was a one hundred percent certainty Jack would hate her in the end anyway. As long as he was back with those who knew and loved him, and he wasn’t living a lie…it would be worth it.
Maisy had made lots of mistakes in her life, but it was past time she owned up to them. It was too little, too late, but it was all she had.
With no other choice, she got out of the SUV and followed Jason into the bank.
CHAPTER NINE
Jack was worried about his wife.
In the last week, ever since she’d gone to the bank with her brother and he’d stayed home to try to get rid of his headache, she’d been different. Far more subdued.
And that was saying something, because his Maisy wasn’t exactly Ms. Outgoing in the first place. But she was even more introverted now. And frankly, it was scaring the shit out of him.
She’d come to their room when she’d returned, where he’d been lying on the bed with his eyes closed, trying to relax, and she’d snuggled up against him without a word. Then she’d told him that she wasn’t ready to move out yet.
She’d sounded so sad, so defeated, that Jack had agreed without hesitation.
Over the last week, she’d been completely different from the woman he’d been getting to know. She had an almost permanent line in her brow from worry, and she barely left their room. When she did, it was to sit outside in the sun, quietly staring into space and not engaging withanyone. Either that, or writing in the diary she’d started the day after her bank visit.
He’d pleaded with her to talk to him. Tell him what happened. All she’d said was that she’d had a panic attack at the bank, and an ER doctor had recommended she go back on her meds. She refused to discuss it further, and Jason claimed to have her hospital paperwork locked away in his office. Telling him in a condescending tone not to worry about it, that he’d always taken care of his sister, and Jack didn’t need to trouble himself.
Jack was furious. Even more so about the red mark on her cheek, which hadn’t escaped his notice. He immediately wanted to confront Jason the second he saw it that afternoon. But when he’d attempted to get out of bed to do just that, Maisy lost it. Cried and begged him not to say anything to her brother.
