Bad Girl by Goode, Ella (chrysanthemum read aloud .txt) 📕

slipped in through. I pull the wood aside, letting myself out. My jacket snags on something, pulling me back. My wet shoes cause my feet to slip from under me, and I hit the ground, knocking the wind out of me.

The back of my head hits something hard, and my vision blurs. I groan, trying to get up, but my body won’t move.

“I think we might need an ambulance. The dumbass hurt herself when she was trying to get away,” I hear the man say. Everything starts to fade in and out.

Finally my eyes jerk open. I try to sit up, but I’m handcuffed to the side of a hospital bed. A dizzy spell hits me, causing the throb in my head to get worse. I fall back down on the bed, trying not to throw up.

“She’s awake,” someone says. A moment later two cops are standing over me.

“You have some explaining to do,” one of them says. Tears start to leak from my eyes.

“Out. All of you. She has a concussion. You can do this shit tomorrow. She’s clearly not going anywhere,” a woman in scrubs barks at the men. “I will not repeat myself.”

“Fine. A police officer will be stationed outside the door.”

“I know how this works. I'm not new here,” she snips back at the cop as she comes over to the side of the bed. “How are you feeling?” she asks.

“Terrible.”

“I’d think so. We had to put ten stitches into the back of your head.” I cringe. “Do you need anything, honey?” She almost looks sorry for me.

“Can I call my uncle?” I ask. She looks over her shoulder before pulling her phone out and handing it to me.

“Two minutes,” she says before she starts checking over the machines around me. I search my mind, trying to remember Chris' number. I close my eyes and picture his number coming up on the screen earlier. I enter it into the phone. It rings twice before he answers.

“Hello.”

“Chris.” Some relief hits me. I’m not sure what he can do, but there has to be something.

“Leila. How fucking stupid are you?” he hisses into the phone. I take it he already knows what happened. “Don’t call me while you’re in police custody. You don’t know me, and I don’t know you.” Before I can say anything else, he ends the call.

I stare down at the phone. He used me. This was all about money and nothing about family at all. More tears fall as the realization dawns on me. I have no one. I miss my mom.

Sobs start to pour from me. I can’t get them to stop. I pull on my arm, starting to panic. I need my mom, but I can’t have her. I’ve lost everything now.

“Leila. I need you to calm down,” the nurse says. I reach up, pulling a bandage off my head. Blood is covering one side of it. Still the sobs don’t stop coming. I can’t breathe.

I go for the IV in my arm, but a man in scrubs grabs my wrist, stopping me. He pulls my hand back, keeping his hold tight on me.

“She’s turning purple,” the man holding my wrist says.

“Got her.” I jerk my head to the woman and watch as she pushes something into the IV. Instantly I start to relax, my body letting go. My eyes feel heavy as I start to slip away to the darkness.

Where I’m always all alone.

Chapter Sixteen Warren

“War here,” I bark into the phone.

“Warren, I’m sorry—”

“You haven’t found her yet?” I interrupt.

Connor sighs. “No. We’re still working on that, but I have to tell you that the Park Hill deal—”

“Connor, I do not give two shits about the Park Hill deal—”

“We lost it.”

That grabs my attention. “Wait, what?”

“We lost it,” he repeats.

“How did we lose it? The deal was done. Hands were shaken. Promises given.”

“Contracts were not signed.”

“A man’s word is his—”

“Bond, I know. But Joe Rees got a last-minute bid, and it was about two percent higher than yours, so he went with it.”

“Two percent?”

“Yeah, I know. It’s a tiny margin. It’s almost like they knew how much you bid and then cranked it up just enough to make Rees bail on you.”

“That fucking sucks. Who was the last-minute bidder?”

“Some trading LLC. We’re tracking down who is behind it, but the paper trail is dense. Someone’s purposely hiding their identity. The registered agent is some company that offers that service out of Delaware and the corporate headquarters is in Barbados.”

“So a shell. A fake company.”

“Probably.”

“Why would they want the Park Hill property? It doesn’t even have access to the waterfront without going through my building next door. I own all those mineral rights,” I rage.

“I know. It’s a dumb move, and they’re going to have to pay an access fee, which will eat into their margins. That’s why it feels like it’s targeted toward you.”

“Perfect,” I remark sarcastically. “Some asshole spending all his money on getting a hollow revenge is exactly what I need at this moment. I can survive the loss of Park Hill, but I’ll be damned if the other guy walks away unscathed. Keep digging and find out the face behind all those incorporations. There’ll be a real person somewhere. Don’t call me unless it’s about the buyer or Leila.” I disconnect and keep driving. It’s insane of me to think I’m going to find her on the street, but I can’t sit back and do nothing. Not a minute later, it’s Connor again.

“Buyer or Leila?”

“Neither.” He sounds breathless.

“I don’t want to hear it.” I lean forward to hang up when he says, “It’s the D1 Tower.”

Alarm spikes in my blood. The D1 Tower was where I last saw Leila. She fled the building and hopped in a taxi before I could get to the door. Some asshole had moved my car, and it took me ten minutes to find it. In that span of time, Leila disappeared. “What about it?”

“Some woman broke in, pulled the fire