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“She’s alive but unconscious,” Chess said as her awareness of the situation sunk in once more and her fear reawakened. “We need to call an ambulance otherwise-”
“No, no, no, no, no.” Evie shook her head vigorously. “No ambulance.”
“Then what? Just leave her like this?” Chess’s voice took on a pleading note as she advised, “We need to get her to a doctor. Otherwise, she might die.”
Evie scowled. “She was going to die anyway.”
Chess’s heart bumped in her chest in alarm. “What?”
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” Evie began to pace around. Tension and panic shadowed every step she took. “She’s ruining my plan.”
“Plan?” Chess, who still couldn’t shake the statement about Kendall ‘going to die anyway’, asked, “What plan?”
“Shut up,” Evie yelled and pointed her gun straight at Chess’s forehead. “I need to think.”
Chess shut up. But on the inside, she was having a whole conversation with herself. Had Tazeem heard her cry for help? Was he coming? When was he coming? Hopefully, it would be before Evie did something crazy. And what did Evie mean by saying Kendall was going to die anyway? Was she planning to kill Kendall? If Kendall was to be killed, did that mean that Chess was next in line? Why? She didn’t want to die. She hadn’t done anything worth dying over. Oh, wait. Was this about Derrick? Was Evie the one who’d-
Without meaning to speak aloud, Chess gasped. “It was you.”
“Huh?” Evie snapped back from her musings to meet Chess’s gaze.
“It was you.” Chess stared at the woman in stunned disbelief. “You cut off Derrick’s hand.”
Immediate panic filled Evie’s expression. “No, I didn’t.”
Chess cut her eyes at her. “Evie!”
After a long silence, Evie admitted, “Okay, I did.” She rushed to add, “But it wasn’t deliberate.”
Chess’s jaw dropped. “How does someone cut off another person’s hand by accident?”
Evie didn’t answer the question. Instead, she huffed, “You don’t understand.”
“Where is Derrick?” Chess persisted. “Is he even alive?”
Evie didn’t say anything, but her silence was an answer in itself.
Even though a part of Chess already expected it, she couldn’t stop the intense grief that swept over her. Tears jumped to her eyes even as she choked out, “You killed him?”
“I didn’t mean to.” Evie’s words came out in a panicked rush. “I took him to Daddy’s boat for some fun, but then he springs on me that he’s quit his job and now wants us to run away together and get married. That’s stupid, why would I get married to him? I have a fiancé already, and he’s a Harrington. You know the Harringtons, right?”
Chess didn’t know the Harringtons but she nodded.
“Why would I leave my Harrington for Derrick? He’s poor, he’s got a kid, and he’s like… not white.” Evie made a face. “I only slept with him because he promised to help me make you lose. But if he’s not working with you, then what use is he to me?”
“Is that why you killed him?” Chess felt a lump in her throat as she asked, “Because he wasn’t any use to you.”
“No, I killed him because he tried to kill me first.” Evie’s hands moved so animatedly with her words that Chess worried she might pull the trigger of the gun inadvertently. “When I told him we were done, he went bonkers. He punched me, then tried to strangle me. See this.”
Evie pointed to the marks on her neck with the gun. “Derrick did this. So I just pushed him. And what do you know, he fell, hit his head on the side of the boat, and didn’t wake up. The idiot just went and died, so I had to toss him into the lake.” Disgust in her expression and tone, Evie added, “I didn’t even know that it was that easy to die. Did you know?”
There were so many ways Chess could’ve answered that question, and so many other questions she could’ve asked (What about the hand? Why had Evie cut off Derrick’s hand? How had she cut it off?). But none of those questions mattered because only three words kept ringing in her head.Derrick is dead.
She glanced at Kendall, but the poor lady was still unconscious.
Derrick was already gone. Chess couldn’t let Kendall die too. That would be too tragic.
“We need to call nine-one-one so they can wake Kendall.” Chess scooted closer to the unconscious woman and checked her breathing again. Kendall was still breathing, but her still being unconscious was incredibly worrying. While setting Kendall’s head on her lap, Chess repeated, “Call nine-one-one.”
