A Harmless Little Game (Harmless #1)

 

 

With a curt nod, she submits, then spins on one heel and leaves.

 

Drew’s ice-cold eyes make my heart restart, the hands loosening at my neck, my body expanding with the pounding of blood running in double time.

 

Before he can say a word, I mimic Anya, not giving him the pleasure of ordering me out of the room.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 7

 

 

 

 

 

“You’re demanding way too much from Lindsay.” I’m almost around the corner and into the living room when I hear Drew’s angry voice. I skitter to a halt, nearly pitching forward but grabbing the wall in time. He sounds like he’s ready to punch Daddy.

 

“I’m in charge here. I’m her father. I’ll decide what she can and cannot handle.”

 

I hold my breath. There were times in the Insight Center...er, mental institution...when I had a chance to overhear private conversations. The staff were so careful, but eventually people slipped up. Never Stacia. Never, ever, did Stacia make a mistake, but the lower-level counselors and nurses sometimes sat in small groups and quietly talked about the patients.

 

Talked about me.

 

Listening in on Daddy and Drew fighting about me is even more riveting than those snippets from the past.

 

“I thought I was in charge of Lindsay’s security,” Drew snaps. He makes no other sound. No sigh, no grunt, no nothing. He’s so self-contained. I can imagine his face, eyes hooded and fierce. I can see my dad in my mind’s eye, too. Blank face, burning eyes, and the body language of a dangerously powerful man who can squash you like a bug.

 

I know I’m right. If I peek around the corner, I’ll confirm I’m right.

 

My heart slaps against my ribs like someone playing a bongo drum. The erratic rhythm fills my ears. Blood rushes to the surface of my skin like angry bees, and swoon.

 

“I thought so, too,” Daddy snaps back. “And part of your job involved determining whether she was ready.”

 

Ready for what?

 

“She’s been more than ready. Four fucking years, Harry.” Drew’s voice drops to the kind of hiss reserved to brutal contempt. It’s the voice you use with someone when you have nothing left to lose.

 

It’s starting to occur to me that maybe Drew isn’t just here for the paycheck, after all. If I had any illusions that he and Daddy have been best buddies while I’ve been gone, they just disappeared.

 

“Don’t use that tone of voice with me,” Daddy answers. He doesn’t correct Drew on using his first name, though.

 

“You know you’ve been having her drugged up to keep her quiet.”

 

“I’ve done no such thing.” Daddy’s voice detours from his calm, cold focus. He sounds slightly panicky, which makes my stomach turn numb, electric shocks radiating out from my navel.

 

What? What? Daddy never, ever sounds like this. Senator Harwell Bosworth doesn’t do panic.

 

“What Monica and I have done, as Lindsay’s parents, is to consult with the medical and psychiatric experts to make sure she receives the best transitional care possible so she can re-assimilate into daily life,” he adds. By the time he’s done, he’s back in control.

 

My heart beat isn’t, though.

 

“And that included being drugged with enough sedatives to kill a baby elephant for nearly three years?” Drew’s voice is so calm it’s like they’re talking about the weather, or the Kentucky Derby, or a sale at Brooks Brothers.

 

It chills me to the marrow.

 

Because I know, and Daddy knows, that every word coming out of my ex-boyfriend’s mouth is deep truth.

 

“Is that what they told you at the island?” Daddy’s laugh is harsh, coarse, like sandpaper meant to rub up against your skin and make you bleed slowly. “I knew it was a mistake to give you access to Lindsay’s medical records.”

 

Huh?

 

“Not a mistake. Probably the best decision you’ve ever made in your career, Senator.”

 

I can feel Daddy’s physical reaction, even if I can’t see him, as Drew shifts from first name to honorific. My breath tightens. My legs feel like jello encased in numbing gel. My eyes flicker, unable to settle on one object. I look at the thermostat, the door lock, a crystal vase on a side table. Each item is like a snapshot.

 

My ears take in the tsunami of truth about the man behind the curtain who has been controlling me for all these years from afar.

 

“You know exactly why Lindsay was at the island. You know what those monsters did. And the media storm after was a nightmare for her. The accusations, the recriminations, the god-damned attacks on her character. The never-ending paparazzi, the speculation, the spun stories about her state that night.”

 

I have no idea what Daddy’s talking about. All I remember from four years ago is waking up, tied and bound, stuck to the carpet by what I later learned was my own, dried blood, with Jane over me, weeping and frantic, calling the police.

 

And then I woke up again, on the island.

 

I’ve spent four years there reconstructing everything about that night.