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In an attempt to offer her some reassurance, I continued to stroke my hand along her back, doing it gently in an effort not to cause her any pain, since I still didn’t know the full extent of her injuries.
“What happened next?”
Daisy didn’t immediately respond. If anything, she seemed to grow even more uncomfortable, and I was relatively certain the difficulty she was having didn’t have anything to do with the physical pain she might have been experiencing. This was something else.
It felt like it took Daisy an eternity to finally speak. “I want to tell you the truth, Forrest, but it’s going to change everything. You’re going to?—"
“Nothing about the way I feel about you is going to change, Daisy,” I insisted, cutting her off. “You don’t have to be afraid to tell me anything.”
Sadness washed over her expression. “Believe it or not, I had planned to come here today before this happened. I thought there was enough between us that it was worth taking that chance to come out here and go after you. I don’t want what I tell you to ruin my chances of having something special with you.”
Of all the things I’d expected Daisy to say to me when I first saw her here at Harper Security Ops looking the way she did, I could confidently declare having her tell me she wanted something special with me wasn’t one of them.
To know that’s where she stood and how she felt, I wanted to jump for joy. I wanted to tell her the truth about how I felt about her, but I didn’t think this was the time to say those specific words to her. So, I opted for something that I hoped would do the trick.
“I’ve thought about you every single day for the last six weeks, sunshine. There is nothing you can tell me that’s going to ruin what we already have and what I want to give you moving forward.”
Her bottom lip began to quiver again.
I’d spent nearly two whole weeks with Daisy, and with the exception of a few moments that caused her to get a little quiet, she’d been nothing but joy personified. To see her so emotional now, to see her tear-stained cheeks and the loose hold she had on her emotions, was enough to undo me.
I hated it.
I hated to see her like this.
Needing to get to the bottom of this, I urged, “Tell me what happened next, Daisy. I’m not going anywhere.”
She nodded her understanding, took in a deep breath, and shared, “I did it. I figured Jeremy didn’t like me enough to actually be interested in me, so why not do something to make somebody who was feeling bad feel better? I walked over and kissed the guy, and in the middle of it, his girlfriend returned.”
My body tensed. “What? I thought his girlfriend broke up with him. You mean, his ex-girlfriend was there at the same time?”
Shaking her head, Daisy clarified, “No. Obviously, I didn’t understand anything at that moment, because the girl attacked me, and I wound up in a physical altercation with her. The next thing I knew, there was a whole bar brawl happening, and all I wanted to do was get myself out of there. At some point, I managed to get myself away from the girl and wound up seeking out Jeremy. He was on his way out the door, but not before he flashed a sinister look my way. I tried to chase after him. Unfortunately, by the time I got outside, he was gone. So, I just left, and not even twenty-four hours later, the police were at my front door.”
I tipped my head to the side. “For what? Causing the bar fight?”
“No. The man I kissed had died.”
“From what?”
“Anaphylaxis.”
“An allergic reaction? I don’t understand. What does this have to do with you?” I questioned her, my curiosity making it impossible to remain neutral.
Daisy dropped her gaze to her lap and took in several calming breaths. When she returned her attention to my face, she explained, “The entire time we were playing the game of Truth or Dare, Jeremy and I were snacking on peanuts. The man I kissed was allergic, and Jeremy knew it.”
My eyes narrowed. “He wanted you to kill his friend?”
“No. Jeremy wanted someone who was foolish enough to do it to kill the man who was currently dating his ex-girlfriend. Apparently, in the chaos of the fight, nobody noticed that Kevin needed medical attention until it was too late.”
As the tears began to roll down her cheeks, it all started to come together for me.
Daisy hadn’t intentionally killed a man. She’d been set up by an evil person. “Can I assume that the police took your statement and realized you were innocent?”
She nodded. “Yeah. And I told them everything I knew about Jeremy. Apparently, his ex-girlfriend learned the truth about what happened, and he was arrested based on my statement and the connection they had. It really messed with my head for a while afterward, and my trip to Keystone Mountain Ski Resort was my first attempt to try to get back some semblance of normal in life while I figured out where I wanted to live.”
Talk about being caught by surprise.
If I had known she was looking for a new place to live, there was a whole lot I would have done differently.
