I knew that would get her to reveal anything she had if she did in fact have something.
And here it came.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said, sounding way too pleased with herself. “Really. Because I was just about to tell you I know your girlfriend’s little secret.”
I shook my head, unable to believe Reese could have that bad of a secret.
“What the hell are you talking about?” I said, encouraging Patricia to just spill it already.
“Nothing, really,” she murmured, still stalling. “I mean, I’m sure she’s told you all about Teresa Margaret Nolan. Hasn’t she?”
I tilted my head, never having heard the name before. “Who?”
“Oh, Mason.” Patricia tsked, sounding wickedly delighted to reveal, “Didn’t she ever tell you her real name? That concerns me. It doesn’t sound as if there’s enough trust and honesty in your sweet little monogamous relationship if the girl hasn’t even told you she legally changed her name to Reese Alison Randall just a few short months ago. I mean, not that I blame her. If my ex-boyfriend tried to kill me and promised he’d finish the job the next time he saw me, well, I’d probably run halfway across the country and change my name too.”
Oh, shit.
Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.
I’d known Reese’d had a bad past because of some guy; she’d admitted as much, but it all started to make sense. The scar on the back of her neck, the way she’d jump at shadows sometimes, the reason she came all the way here from Illinois in the first place. Waterford wasn’t exactly a reputable Ivy League university. It wasn’t on the coast. There was nothing spectacular about it at all.
“No,” I whispered, anyway, not wanting to learn what kind of horrors my girl had survived. I shook my head, my limbs going cold with dread.
“You think I’m making this up?” Patricia taunted. “He cut her. With a knife. It was actually life threatening; she was in the hospital for over a week. I’m sure you’ve seen the scar. It’s somewhere on her neck, I believe.”
“Oh, God,” I uttered, hating how much she knew, even as I asked, “What happened?”
Patricia simpered, sympathetically. “Your girl has quite the taste in boys, let me tell you. It was nasty. Nasty business indeed. I guess they were high school sweethearts, and all was well with that until he started to get a little too controlling for her taste. The first time she tried to break up with him, her sophomore year, he dislocated her jaw. The second time, during her senior year, he broke her arm…after pushing her down a flight of stairs.”
Shit. Reese had said she hadn’t played basketball her senior year because of a broken arm. I clutched the gate to support myself, picturing Reese unconscious and mangled at the bottom of a stairwell.
“That’s when she finally decided enough was enough,” Patricia went on. “But he still refused to take no for an answer. He stalked her and harassed her for months after she dumped him until he broke into her parents’ house to kill her. And he nearly succeeded.”
“Jesus,” I rasped.
Not Reese, I wanted to say. Not my sweet, cheerful, amazing Reese. What kind of monster would do that to her?
“Miss Teresa missed her high school graduation because she was in the hospital. And her naughty boyfriend got out on bail almost immediately. So she skipped town with a new name. And since the case against him was dropped, Mr. Jeremy Walden has been completely pardoned. Ergo, he started looking for her. Her parents’ home was broken into last week. I’ll give you three guesses who I think did it.”
“Did he find anything?” I asked, unable to help myself.
Patricia shrugged. “It’s hard to say, though I will tell you, that boy will do anything, anything, to get his Reese’s Pieces back. Just think, Mason. If he almost killed her when he was in love with her and wanted to rekindle their relationship, what will he do this time, now that he wants revenge? Wouldn’t it be awful—simply horrible—if someone accidently leaked her whereabouts?”
Next to me, the gate waved as if it had gone unsteady with fear as well.
“You wouldn’t,” I said, putting a load of warning in my tone.
“Of course I wouldn’t, sweetheart,” Patricia agreed fakely. “I would never do anything to upset you. Not when you’re going to give me what I want.” Her tone changed from cajoling to severe. “Right?”
“No!” a voice cried from the other side of the gate right before Reese shoved it open and came tumbling into Patricia’s backyard.
Shit. Oh, shit. Why was she here?
“Reese?” I caught her elbow and pulled her close, wrapping my arms around her, grateful she’d survived the monster who’d hurt her, glad she was alive and okay, and yet devastated she was here, hearing all this. “Christ. What’re you doing here?”
Latching onto me, she cried into my chest. “You said it yourself, my curiosity has no filter. I had to know if you were really going to go to her.”
“Dammit.” I squeezed my eyes shut and stroked her silken hair. “How much did you hear?”