I’d thought it was impossible.
Tears blurred my eyes, and I nearly bent in two, gasping for a breath as my mind reeled and my heart threatened to crack.
How could he do this?
My heels echoed in a panicked rhythm on the marble floor, and I hurried toward the end of the hall, coming up short when I saw the people swarming the entire place.
Packed wall to wall.
Bodies thick.
My eyes darted everywhere, landing on a small stairway to my left. I took it, stumbling up the steps as the chaos continued to grow from below.
When I made it to the landing, I fumbled down the hall to the left, ducking into the first empty room that I could find.
Desperate for seclusion.
For a way to clear the torment beating a path through my spirit and mind.
I slammed the door shut behind me, and I leaned against it as I struggled to remain standing, hugging my arms over my chest and trying to keep myself from splintering apart.
It was dim inside the sitting room, a couple lamps glowing their warmth that gave me no comfort. Walls decorated with large hand-painted family portraits, a big sectional leather sofa in the middle facing a large television on the far end, a few wing-backed chairs situated around the space.
Ragged pants heaved from my lungs, and I stumbled forward so I could sink down onto the couch.
Unable to remain upright when I felt the foundation getting ripped out from under me.
Everything I’d told Royce . . . everything I’d confided? Had every second of it been a ploy?
I dropped my head, trying to piece it together when the door creaked and the hairs at the nape of my neck lifted.
A sizzle of dread.
A prickle of alarm.
The door clicked shut again. Though this time, the lock rang out.
My legs wobbled when I forced myself to stand, when I forced myself to find the courage to turn around and face the evil I could feel filling the room like a sinister cloud.
“Get out,” I rasped around the emotion that was already trying to bring me to my knees.
Cory Douglas laughed from where he stood at the door.
His blond hair appeared as crazed as the look in his eye. He shot me a condescending tsk, clucking his tongue as he drifted farther into the room. “Always so unwelcoming, Emily Ramsey. And here I’d heard it said that southern girls are the friendliest.”
A shiver tumbled down my spine. Spread across my flesh. Pricking like barbed wire that snagged.
Little wounds that bled like the scar that he’d left on my body.
“Everyone’s comin’ for you.”
It was probably the wrong thing to say, but I couldn’t help but find some kind of justice in it.
I might have hated that Royce had used me to enact it.
It didn’t matter.
I understood why.
A shudder ripped through me as I remembered the vengeance that had flashed in Royce’s eyes when he’d told me someone had hurt his sister. The same agonized look he’d worn tonight when we’d come face-to-face with Cory and his wife.
Without a doubt, I wasn’t the only person Cory Douglas had hurt.
From just inside the room, Cory cracked a menacing smile. “Seems so, doesn’t it? Which is why I had to find you before it was too late.”
A lump of fear lodged itself at the base of my throat. I tried to swallow around it. “It’s already too late.”
Cory moved in closer. The atmosphere went cold with the wickedness. “Nah . . . not quite.”
He craned his head to the side, his own vengeance shining in his eyes. “You know . . . it’s almost a little sad, isn’t it? The way Royce is always trying to take what is mine?”
Disgust shivered across my flesh, and I took a fumbling step back farther into the room when he took one closer. “It was his fault to begin with, you know. First it was our band. Our band that was just getting ready to make it, on the cusp of greatness, and that bastard tried to take it from me.”
Confusion twisted my brow. Mind spinning.
Cory must have seen it because he let go of a condescending laugh. “You didn’t know that? Royce Reilly used to go by Royce Reed. Lead singer of A Riot of Roses. He always viewed me as a threat. Knew I was better than him. More talented. He tried to kick me out the minute before we got famous. Had to let him know who was really in control. Could anyone blame me?”
He was edging forward the entire time he was spewing the appalling words, and I was inching the opposite direction, out around the couch, trying to keep him as far away and as much furniture between us as possible. All the while trying not to crumble with the blatant admission he was making.