Stolen Course (Wrecked and Ruined #2)

Emma comes running up and starts talking quietly into my face, but I swear I can’t focus on her. My mind is reeling, but I can’t quite connect the dots.

“Make him leave!” Sarah screams at Emma.

For just a split second, all the women go silent. Or maybe my ears just seek out the words I’ve longed to hear among the voices.

Casey whispers, “I was driving. It’s all my fault.”

“What the fuck is she talking about?” I ask Emma, not dragging my eyes from Sarah, who is still protecting Casey. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I finally roar into the room.

“We need to talk, babe,” Emma says, pushing me toward the door, but I hold my ground.

“Someone start talking, and for fuck’s sake, make some God damn sense.”

“I remember the accident,” Sarah rushes out frantically. “You were right. I was drunk. It was all my fault. Casey was just trying to protect me.”

“Sarah!” the girls shout at the same time.

“I did it. Now please leave,” Sarah says nervously.

“You’re lying.”

“Come on, Caleb. Let’s get out of here.” Emma once again tries to drag me away.

But I only take a step closer. I want to get a look a Casey and see if I can get a read on the situation. Why the hell would she say that she killed her? Casey wasn’t even there the night of the wreck.

I push down my anger, knowing that it will get me nowhere. I ignore Emma’s pleading and Sarah’s demands and begin talking to the only woman in the room who can give me the answers right now.

“What’s going on, Case?” I ask quietly.

“No, don’t talk to her. Get out!” Sarah acts like a mama bear herding her cub, but finally Casey turns and looks me right in the eye.

The pain on her face knocks me back a step. I haven’t seen something this bad since the night I carried Sarah out of Jesse’s apartment. It’s the look people get when they know there is no going back.

“Just talk. Tell me what’s really going on,” I say gently, but the inferno is burning inside me.

“I was driving that night. I was high and I killed Manda.” I can barely make out her words over her chokes.

“No, you didn’t,” I breathe, rejecting her confession.

My eyes slide to Emma, who is crying and nervously sliding her hair into a ponytail. I figured she would be all in my face, but I think even she knows that I need the space.

“Don’t take it out on her, please. Let me pay for this. Hate me,” Sarah begs as her lip begins to quiver.

“You were not fucking there!” I scream, suddenly losing it completely.

I begin to pace around the room, trying to wrap my mind around this. I have a million questions, but I’m so enraged that I can’t even force out the words. I finally land a punch through the drywall, which seems to level me. This isn’t happening.

“Start at the beginning,” I snap.

“She was—” Sarah starts, but it’s obvious she’s trying to protect Casey. I won’t get the truth from her.

“Not you. Her.” I menacingly point my finger at Casey. The anger in my voice has Emma jumping into action.

“Nope. Not here. You are not doing this right now. If you want to talk, great. But if you want to intimidate her like that, you can do it another day when she is emotionally able to defend herself.”

“Back it up, Emma,” I say coldly.

“Shut it up, Caleb,” she responds, challenging me and blocking my view.

Casey pulls in a deep breath and bares it all. “Sarah thought she could drive but pulled over at a gas station when she realized she couldn’t. I had a friend drop me off, but I was all fucked up.”

“What the fuck?” I say as adrenaline rushes through my system. How the fuck did I miss this all these years? “Where did you go? Stephens would have seen you.”

“I wasn’t there when Stephens showed up.”

“Well where the fuck did you go? You couldn’t just disappear!” I roar, stepping close, but Emma stops me with a hand to the chest.

“Please calm down,” she says, but there is damn near nothing that can ease the rush of my emotions right now. Not even Emma.

“Where?” I demand again in a lower voice.

No one speaks up. They all just stand frozen, and I suddenly realize, judging by their faces, that this is about to get a hell of a lot worse.

“Eli was first on the scene,” Emma answers when it’s obvious Casey isn’t going to.

My ears begin to ring as that night starts to unfold in my mind. All of the missing pieces finally click together to form one perfectly devastating puzzle.

Eli Tanner, one of my best friends, has held the answers to what really happened that night all along. He sat by and watched me running myself ragged while investigating it for years. He watched Sarah fall apart from the grief and the hatred eat me alive. He stood quietly while Brett watched his wife repeatedly try to kill herself over something she’d had nothing to do with. Casey may have been driving, but Eli could have saved us all years ago.

“I’m going to kill him,” I growl through clenched teeth.

And in this moment, I mean those words with my entire being.