Chapter 219
“I’ll handle it,” Kegan said, pushing off the doorframe. “I’ll tell him you’re not here.”
“No.” Cailin pushed the covers back. “I need to see him.”
“Cali, you can barely stand.”
“Get me a wheelchair,” she said. Her voice was weak, but her eyes were steel. “I need to end this. If I hide, he’ll keep hunting. I need to look him in the eye and tell him to go to hell.”
Ten minutes later, the rain had stopped, leaving the air thick and cold.
Hilliard stood at the intercom by the main gate, soaked through. His suit was ruined. He looked like a man who hadn’t slept in a week, his knuckles white against the side of the intercom panel.
The massive gates groaned and began to swing inward.
Hilliard stepped forward, something that felt dangerously like hope flaring in his chest.
But it wasn’t Cailin running to meet him.
It was Kegan, pushing a wheelchair.
Cailin sat in it, wrapped in a blanket. She looked small. Broken. Her face was pale, bruises blooming along her jawline where Victoria’s hand had landed.
Hilliard felt as though he’d been punched in the gut.
“Cailin,” he breathed. He took a step toward her.
“Stop,” Kegan said. Low. A growl. “One more step and I release the dogs.”
Hilliard ignored him. He looked only at Cailin.
“I know,” Hilliard said, his voice cracking at the edges. “I saw the tape, Cailin. The Ferris wheel. I know you saved her. I know she lied.”
Cailin looked at him. Her eyes were empty.
“You know?” she repeated. “Now? You know now?”
“I was wrong,” Hilliard said, stepping closer despite Kegan’s warning glare. “I was blind. But I’ve fixed it. I broke things off with Charla. I declared war on her family. I’m here to take you home.”
Cailin laughed — a dry, hollow sound.
“Home?” she said. “To the penthouse where you kept her clothes in the closet? To the life where your mother slaps me and you just stand there?”
“I didn’t stand there,” Hilliard said. “I defended you.”
“You arrested me,” Cailin said. “You made me sign a document that treated me like a criminal. You watched me get crushed by that stand and you hesitated.”
“I took you to the hospital!”
“You took me to a prison,” she said. “And then you left me there to be hunted by them.”
“I came back!” Hilliard shouted. “I came back for you!”
“You’re always too late, Hilliard,” Cailin said softly. “Five years ago, you were too late. Tonight, you were too late.”
“Cailin, please.” His voice dropped to a desperate whisper. “Stop hiding her. Let me see our daughter. Let me apologize to her.”
Cailin’s face hardened into stone.
“There is no child for you to see,” she said. “You’re delusional. Leave us alone.”
“I’m not delusional!” he said. “The call I received — ‘Bad Man.’ Your sons, Cailin. They called me. I know I have sons. Don’t do this.”
“Go home, Hilliard,” Cailin said. She looked at Kegan.