A Reagan Keeter Box Set: Three page-turning thrillers that will leave you wondering who you can trus by Reagan Keeter (fiction novels to read txt) 📗

“Wait. Diane!”

She cranked the ignition and was gone before Martin could stop her.

Martin went back inside for his keys. Now, more than ever, he needed to talk to Diane. He needed to make sure she was getting counseling. He needed to know if he could do anything to help her get over the abortion. After all, this was partly his fault, wasn’t it?

Back in the living room, the TV had been turned off. Cynthia was sitting on the couch beside Janice, trying to calm her down. “I’m sure Martin can explain all of this,” she said. “We just need to talk to him.”

Then she hugged the trembling, upset woman and looked past her. Martin was almost to the stairs when their eyes met, and he said, “We’ll talk later.”

He grabbed the keys off the desk in his bedroom. Gina stepped quickly out of his way when he came barreling back down the hallway. She was already on the phone with a friend, gleefully speculating about what he had done.

Martin left feeling hated and unwanted and felt no more welcome when he arrived at Diane’s.

“Go away!” she shouted from the other side of the door. He knocked louder, which was exactly what she expected him to do.

Diane was thrilled by Martin’s response. While he pleaded to come inside, she went into the bathroom to get the eyedropper she had bought a few days before. She filled it with tap water and carefully pumped several drops into each eye. They rolled down her cheeks like tears. Then she opened the door.

“I’m sorry for overreacting,” he said. “I should have been there for you when you told me about the baby.” The words were empty because he knew he had tried to be there for her. He couldn’t make her talk to him. But he also knew it was what she wanted to hear.

“Why weren’t you?”

He apologized some more, and eventually Diane moved from the doorway to let him inside.

Her apartment was one of seventy-five lofts in the Brentwood Building, all small and poorly designed. Carpet had been laid down because it was cheaper than wood, and there were still nails in the plaster from where the previous tenant had hung photographs.

She scooped a pile of clothes out of a chair and threw them on the floor. Martin sat down. Diane sat cross-legged on the bed, still close enough to make the conversation intimate.

She wiped away the fake tears and sniffled. Then she waited for him to speak.

With a deep breath, he leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. “It’s going to be okay.”

She exploded. “That’s it?” she said, genuinely shocked that he didn’t have anything more sincere to say. “That’s what you came here to tell me? Because it’s not going to be okay. It’s not ever going to be okay. I thought it would be easy, but it wasn’t. Giving up that baby was the hardest thing I ever had to do, and all you can tell me is that it’s going to be okay?”

“No, Diane, I’m . . . Well, I’m worried. Are you getting counseling?”

“What for?”

Wasn’t it obvious? She had just given up a child. She had just given up a part of herself. (A part of him, whispered a voice in the back of his head.)

He knew that nobody could go through something like that without psychological repercussions. And the only way to handle them was to get professional help, which he summed up by saying: “To deal with this.”

“You think some overpaid shrink is going to be able to help me?”

“I don’t know. But you need to talk to somebody.”

Diane’s face suddenly tensed. She cried into her hands. “God, I just feel so alone.”

“You’re not alone.”

Then in a whiny voice, she said something Martin couldn’t understand, and he reluctantly walked over to the bed and sat down next to her. He put an arm around her shoulder, feeling sad and guilty. Maybe he hadn’t tried hard enough before to talk to her. Maybe if he had knocked a little louder or come by more often things would have been different. But he hadn’t; so maybe, in some strange way he couldn’t quite figure out, he had abandoned her.

Jesus, pregnant and alone, and I abandoned her.

It wouldn’t happen again.

“I promise you’re not alone.”

“But you have your mom and Cynthia. I couldn’t tell anybody. I don’t have anybody. My parents would have been furious if they found out—”

“Hey,” Martin interrupted, “you have me.”

“But you broke up with me.”

Martin could feel his chest tighten with guilt. He squeezed Diane’s shoulder. “I didn’t know it would hurt you so much. Look, I’m here now. Doesn’t that count for something? I care about you, and I don’t want to see you like this.”

“Really?”

“Of course. I’m always here for you.”

She smiled a weak smile and kissed his cheek. He could feel what remained of her tap-water tears against his face when she hugged him. “You’re really here for me?” she whispered.

“Yes.”

She pulled back just far enough to stare into his eyes, like an animal sizing up her prey. Holding his face tightly in her hands, she asked, “You promise?”

“Always.”

Then she kissed his lips.

He was never sure whether it was sympathy or lust that made him kiss her back, but he did.

They kept kissing until their clothes were off and they were asleep in each other’s arms. Martin knew it was a mistake even while it was happening, but it wasn’t until the next morning that he knew he was trapped. He was back in a relationship with Diane. If he left her again, everyone would be angry with him.

BEYOND

TWILIGHT

NOW

THEY CAMPED IN a cold, dry spot that reminded Martin of a small tomb.

“Sounds about right,” Ethan said. “Ain’t no way we’re all getting out of here alive.”

“Can’t you be more optimistic than that?” Cynthia said