Here With Me (Adair Family 1)

His hand wavered. “No … No … I …”

A deafening crack sounded milliseconds before Fergus’s head snapped back. Blood and brain matter exploded out of the back of it.

My breath expelled from my body in a shocked cry as his body folded like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Shocked to my core, I tore my gaze from him to Lucy who now stood, arm outstretched, holding the small handgun she’d just used to kill Fergus.

Holy shit.

Lucy looked at me, eyes fierce. “I started carrying after the freezer. Moron didn’t even think to pat me down.”

“Oh thank God.” I wanted to slump with relief, but there was no time. “We have to get Lachlan out of these cuffs. I think McCulloch must be the one working with Fergus. We’re on his land.”

“Okay.” Lucy nodded. “He has the keys.” Her eyes widened on me, as if she’d just realized what she’d done. “I can’t …”

“It’s okay.” I gave her a reassuring, tremulous smile. “I’ll get the keys. You stay there.” I moved over to Fergus’s body and avoided looking at his head as I bent to pat his pockets.

Something hot and hard pressed against the back of my skull, and I heard Lachlan’s muffled yell of outrage behind me.

No.

“Stand up slowly. Don’t make any sudden moves,” Lucy ordered.

Oh no.

Tears clogged my throat.

I did as asked, the pressure of the still-warm gun painful against my head as I stood. I felt the heat of her at my back and then she grasped hold of my neck, nails biting painfully into my throat as she moved the warm muzzle to my right temple. She turned me to face Lachlan, and my horror was mirrored in his eyes.

“You were my friend,” I whispered lamely. Because that’s all I could think to say.

My mind screamed a huge fat fucking NO.

Not Lucy.

“Yes,” she said softly in my ear. “And I hate that it’s come to this.”

Lachlan yanked at his arms, but they’d been entwined around the chair’s back before they’d been handcuffed. His muffled shouts of Lucy’s name over and over were breaking my heart.

“Shush, Lachlan, and stop moving.” She pushed the gun into my temple so hard, my head pushed to the left.

He stilled immediately. I couldn’t stand the bleakness in his eyes.

If she killed me in front of him, he’d never get over it.

But I had the sudden, horrifying realization that she truly planned to kill him too. There was no way out of it for her unless we both died.

Stall her. “Why has it come to this?”

“I didn’t think it would,” Lucy said, bitter sadness in her voice. “I promise I didn’t think it would. At first, I just wanted him back.”

Lachlan’s eyes widened as I stiffened against her.

“You’re the only one who deserved me, and I’m the only one who deserved you,” she told him, affection clear in her tone. “I’ve been used and abused since I was a kid, and I naively thought escaping to Hollywood, becoming someone, would give me back my power. But there are always people with more power, more control, no matter where you go. They used me too. And I let them. It was only when we got together I realized I could deal with all of it, if I had you.”

It was hard to know if what she said was true. Hard to believe anything out of her mouth because she’d played her part as our friend so convincingly.

I shuddered and realized I was going into shock. I couldn’t let that happen. If I could just distract Lucy long enough, I could get out of her hold without losing half my head. A trained killer would have popped us both and gotten on with their plan. However, Lucy had proven herself the consummate actor, a lover of drama, and she’d want us to know why this was happening before she concluded her plans.

I had to keep her talking for as long as possible. “You told him you just wanted an affair.”

“I lied. Like you lied. Like most of us lie. I thought he’d come around. See what I could see. I’m America’s sweetheart. Royalty in my own right. And Lachlan is not just an actor. He’s a gentleman with a pedigree few men in my life can match. The industry was falling all over themselves to be a part of his club, and that was the type of man I deserved to be with. But he couldn’t see it like I could. So I tried to move on. But I chose wrong.”

Her nails scored across my throat lightly, and I sucked in a breath. “Slept with a married actor, and his wife caught us. Ever heard of Rozette Donelly?”

Yeah, hadn’t everyone?

Rozette Donelly was the head of one of the major studios.

“Yeah. That Rozette Donelly. I fucked her young husband, and she found out and blackballed me.” Lucy laughed with an edge of hysteria.