My Bad
Page 34
Kelley had, of course, said everything worked out perfectly fine.
My mother, who’d discussed it with her entire ER staff at different times over the six weeks, disagreed.
There were some places we could improve and some places that we needed to back off a little.
Kelley had agreed that we needed to back off a little and had gone about fucking things up instead of making things better—which we all knew he was determined to do at this point.
He resented the hell out of my mother and me and took it out on me because I was less untouchable than my mom was.
“Shit,” I muttered under my breath.
I opened my Messenger app and started to type, ignoring Kelley as he took the seat directly across from me and sat down.
My feet itched to stand up and run out of there, but I couldn’t let him know that he was winning. I couldn’t let him know that he scared the crap out of me, and each time he was in my vicinity I wanted to vomit.
Like right now.
I could literally throw up all over him, spew it all over his thousand-dollar suit, and feel great about doing it.
In desperation, I opened the message feed I talked to Hoax on and started spamming him with the fifty memes I’d saved for him to see over the last week. I was sending him number thirty-two—literally—when Kelley spoke again.
“I haven’t seen your sister lately,” Kelley teased.
I shrugged. “She graduated and got a new job.”
I knew he’d ask where. I couldn’t wait to tell him.
His face would turn into a mask of disgust, and then he’d think that job was inferior.
Even though it wasn’t.
Anything that wasn’t his job was inferior, truthfully. Even what I did was considered somehow less.
Though I always wanted to point out that at least I went to school, graduated, and found my job on my own and wasn’t handed it by my daddy.
I’d heard that he’d worked at a bank previously and that he’d been fired for sexual misconduct. Which I could see. Kelley was a creepy fucker.
Slowly I stood up and walked to the trash, tossing my reusable Tupperware straight in.
I wouldn’t be washing it today. The sink was directly behind him, and I would not put myself in that close of contact with him—practically giving him an opening to do something.
Tupperware in the trash, I dropped my phone in the front pocket of my scrubs, ready to send another meme, and turned to grab the handle of the door—only Kelley stood in front of me, blocking my path.
I felt my heart launch straight into my throat.
***
Hoax
“Jesus fucking Christ. Why is your phone on loud?” Treat grumbled.
I yawned loudly, not bothering to hide it from him or the rest of my team.
“I broke the button off yesterday,” I told him. “When I dropped it, it hit the corner of a rock and completely ripped it off. Then cracked the screen, remember?”
That had sucked. I could no longer watch the screen without having a large spiderweb-like crack bisecting it.
Pru had offered to send me another one, but it was my hope that we wouldn’t be here much longer. Two weeks tops, which was about how long it’d take if she sent it now.
I was getting packages from her that she’d mailed ten to fourteen days ago. Not that I was complaining.
The first package she’d sent—getting here within a week of my arrival—had come via one-day mail. I was honestly afraid to ask her how much it’d cost her.
But, I’d asked her not to do that anymore, because I knew that sending packages wasn’t cheap, especially over here.
“Motherfucker.” Treat slammed his hand down. “Answer her, tell her to give you another hour, and then y’all can text all the fuck you want. Take ten.”
With that, he walked out of the building. He already had a smoke to his lips by the time he breached the tent flap.
I wiped sweat from my face and looked at my phone, grinning when I saw all the memes.
“Jesus,” Carl said as he leaned back in his chair. “You’re really into this chick.”
I shrugged. “So what?”
“Just never seen you smile like that before,” he muttered.
The men around me grunted as they got up and left, following Treat to either take a smoke or use the bathroom while they got the chance.
We’d been in this particular meeting for four hours, and this was the first time he’d given us a break.
Honestly, I’d stopped paying as much attention after hour two.
We were going over surveillance of our target, and so far we hadn’t found a damn thing on the men.
Unlike the last team, we were unable to get any insider information from any planted sources since they were so on guard due to the last team’s fuck up. Meaning we were having to do this the long, hard way.
The way that was taking about six weeks longer than it should have.
The messages from Pru were coming in steady until suddenly they just stopped.
Finally, I scrolled up to the top and started to read them, periodically showing one to Carl, who laughed right along with me.
I was about ten memes in when I got the call.
I frowned, never having seen or heard that particular sound before, and saw that it said ‘Pru Mackenzie is calling.’
Having a feeling it was a complete accident, but not caring in the least since we had eight more minutes and I wanted to talk to her, I hit ‘accept call’ and waited to see what it would do.
It connected, and my phone screen turned a muffled black. Pru was in mid-sentence.
“Please step away,” Pru said, her panicked voice setting my heart to galloping within seconds of the phone call being accepted.
“What’s wrong?” the muffled voice of a man asked. “Are you feeling unsafe? I thought all those protocols we were forced to implement were meant to keep you safe? Are you feeling unsafe despite all the security measures you asked for?”
It took less than five seconds of hearing the man’s voice for me to place it. Kelley.
And my spine stiffened.
“Please,” Pru begged. “Back. Away. This is highly inappropriate, and I don’t want you this close to me. I’d like to leave.”
“No,” Kelley rudely denied her.
I reached for Treat’s satellite phone that was sitting across the table from me—the one that was only supposed to be used in emergencies—and started dialing.
They had to be at work.
There was no other way Kelley would’ve gotten her cornered.
The phone felt like it took a year to connect, and in that time, I listened as Pru pleaded with Kelley to back off. Her voice only getting more and more scared as time passed.
Someone picked up what felt like ten years later, and I recognized Conleigh’s voice almost immediately.
“…ER, can I help you?” Conleigh answered breezily.
“Conleigh. Hoax. Kelley has Pru cornered somewhere. Go help her,” I demanded.
“Fuck,” Conleigh whispered. “I’m going.”
Then the phone was placed down on the counter or something because then I could hear people talking—some doctor about a patient—and not a dial tone.
Carl held out his hand for the satellite phone, and I handed it to him, concentrating hard on the black screen that was driving me fucking insane.
“Kelley!” Pru said, truly panicked now. “Don’t touch me! Back off!”
I felt bile rise into my esophagus and found myself standing without consciously thinking about it. What I thought I was going to do, I didn’t know. Hell, the anger I was feeling right then could’ve fueled me all the way home.
“Oh, sorry about that, Kelley,” I heard Conleigh say. “What are you doing? Pru? Are you okay?”
“Pru here was just crying because of her boyfriend. Weren’t you, Pru?” Kelley asked teasingly.
My fist clenched, and had Kelley been standing in front of me right then, I would’ve force fed him my fist.
Goddamn creep.
I wanted to fucking filet him alive.
“Oh, okay,” I heard Conleigh say like she didn’t believe a word that was being said.
“Y’all have a good day now,” Kelley murmured.
Then, I assumed he was gone because Pru burst into tears—which she would never do in front of that piece of shit—and Conleigh started talking to her soothingly.
My mother, who’d discussed it with her entire ER staff at different times over the six weeks, disagreed.
There were some places we could improve and some places that we needed to back off a little.
Kelley had agreed that we needed to back off a little and had gone about fucking things up instead of making things better—which we all knew he was determined to do at this point.
He resented the hell out of my mother and me and took it out on me because I was less untouchable than my mom was.
“Shit,” I muttered under my breath.
I opened my Messenger app and started to type, ignoring Kelley as he took the seat directly across from me and sat down.
My feet itched to stand up and run out of there, but I couldn’t let him know that he was winning. I couldn’t let him know that he scared the crap out of me, and each time he was in my vicinity I wanted to vomit.
Like right now.
I could literally throw up all over him, spew it all over his thousand-dollar suit, and feel great about doing it.
In desperation, I opened the message feed I talked to Hoax on and started spamming him with the fifty memes I’d saved for him to see over the last week. I was sending him number thirty-two—literally—when Kelley spoke again.
“I haven’t seen your sister lately,” Kelley teased.
I shrugged. “She graduated and got a new job.”
I knew he’d ask where. I couldn’t wait to tell him.
His face would turn into a mask of disgust, and then he’d think that job was inferior.
Even though it wasn’t.
Anything that wasn’t his job was inferior, truthfully. Even what I did was considered somehow less.
Though I always wanted to point out that at least I went to school, graduated, and found my job on my own and wasn’t handed it by my daddy.
I’d heard that he’d worked at a bank previously and that he’d been fired for sexual misconduct. Which I could see. Kelley was a creepy fucker.
Slowly I stood up and walked to the trash, tossing my reusable Tupperware straight in.
I wouldn’t be washing it today. The sink was directly behind him, and I would not put myself in that close of contact with him—practically giving him an opening to do something.
Tupperware in the trash, I dropped my phone in the front pocket of my scrubs, ready to send another meme, and turned to grab the handle of the door—only Kelley stood in front of me, blocking my path.
I felt my heart launch straight into my throat.
***
Hoax
“Jesus fucking Christ. Why is your phone on loud?” Treat grumbled.
I yawned loudly, not bothering to hide it from him or the rest of my team.
“I broke the button off yesterday,” I told him. “When I dropped it, it hit the corner of a rock and completely ripped it off. Then cracked the screen, remember?”
That had sucked. I could no longer watch the screen without having a large spiderweb-like crack bisecting it.
Pru had offered to send me another one, but it was my hope that we wouldn’t be here much longer. Two weeks tops, which was about how long it’d take if she sent it now.
I was getting packages from her that she’d mailed ten to fourteen days ago. Not that I was complaining.
The first package she’d sent—getting here within a week of my arrival—had come via one-day mail. I was honestly afraid to ask her how much it’d cost her.
But, I’d asked her not to do that anymore, because I knew that sending packages wasn’t cheap, especially over here.
“Motherfucker.” Treat slammed his hand down. “Answer her, tell her to give you another hour, and then y’all can text all the fuck you want. Take ten.”
With that, he walked out of the building. He already had a smoke to his lips by the time he breached the tent flap.
I wiped sweat from my face and looked at my phone, grinning when I saw all the memes.
“Jesus,” Carl said as he leaned back in his chair. “You’re really into this chick.”
I shrugged. “So what?”
“Just never seen you smile like that before,” he muttered.
The men around me grunted as they got up and left, following Treat to either take a smoke or use the bathroom while they got the chance.
We’d been in this particular meeting for four hours, and this was the first time he’d given us a break.
Honestly, I’d stopped paying as much attention after hour two.
We were going over surveillance of our target, and so far we hadn’t found a damn thing on the men.
Unlike the last team, we were unable to get any insider information from any planted sources since they were so on guard due to the last team’s fuck up. Meaning we were having to do this the long, hard way.
The way that was taking about six weeks longer than it should have.
The messages from Pru were coming in steady until suddenly they just stopped.
Finally, I scrolled up to the top and started to read them, periodically showing one to Carl, who laughed right along with me.
I was about ten memes in when I got the call.
I frowned, never having seen or heard that particular sound before, and saw that it said ‘Pru Mackenzie is calling.’
Having a feeling it was a complete accident, but not caring in the least since we had eight more minutes and I wanted to talk to her, I hit ‘accept call’ and waited to see what it would do.
It connected, and my phone screen turned a muffled black. Pru was in mid-sentence.
“Please step away,” Pru said, her panicked voice setting my heart to galloping within seconds of the phone call being accepted.
“What’s wrong?” the muffled voice of a man asked. “Are you feeling unsafe? I thought all those protocols we were forced to implement were meant to keep you safe? Are you feeling unsafe despite all the security measures you asked for?”
It took less than five seconds of hearing the man’s voice for me to place it. Kelley.
And my spine stiffened.
“Please,” Pru begged. “Back. Away. This is highly inappropriate, and I don’t want you this close to me. I’d like to leave.”
“No,” Kelley rudely denied her.
I reached for Treat’s satellite phone that was sitting across the table from me—the one that was only supposed to be used in emergencies—and started dialing.
They had to be at work.
There was no other way Kelley would’ve gotten her cornered.
The phone felt like it took a year to connect, and in that time, I listened as Pru pleaded with Kelley to back off. Her voice only getting more and more scared as time passed.
Someone picked up what felt like ten years later, and I recognized Conleigh’s voice almost immediately.
“…ER, can I help you?” Conleigh answered breezily.
“Conleigh. Hoax. Kelley has Pru cornered somewhere. Go help her,” I demanded.
“Fuck,” Conleigh whispered. “I’m going.”
Then the phone was placed down on the counter or something because then I could hear people talking—some doctor about a patient—and not a dial tone.
Carl held out his hand for the satellite phone, and I handed it to him, concentrating hard on the black screen that was driving me fucking insane.
“Kelley!” Pru said, truly panicked now. “Don’t touch me! Back off!”
I felt bile rise into my esophagus and found myself standing without consciously thinking about it. What I thought I was going to do, I didn’t know. Hell, the anger I was feeling right then could’ve fueled me all the way home.
“Oh, sorry about that, Kelley,” I heard Conleigh say. “What are you doing? Pru? Are you okay?”
“Pru here was just crying because of her boyfriend. Weren’t you, Pru?” Kelley asked teasingly.
My fist clenched, and had Kelley been standing in front of me right then, I would’ve force fed him my fist.
Goddamn creep.
I wanted to fucking filet him alive.
“Oh, okay,” I heard Conleigh say like she didn’t believe a word that was being said.
“Y’all have a good day now,” Kelley murmured.
Then, I assumed he was gone because Pru burst into tears—which she would never do in front of that piece of shit—and Conleigh started talking to her soothingly.
