I don’t answer him. He frowns as he watches me drag a navy-blue suitcase across the cream-colored carpet.
“Ella! Damn it, will you just talk to me?”
The frown turns into wide-eyed gawking when I start throwing stuff into the suitcase. Some T-shirts, Reed’s favorite green hoodie, jeans, a couple of wife-beaters. What else would he need… Um, boxers, socks, a belt—
“Why are you packing Reed’s clothes?” Easton is practically shouting at me now, and his sharp tone snaps me out of my panic.
The worn gray T-shirt in my hands falls to the carpet. My heartbeat accelerates as the gravity of the situation hits me again.
“Reed was arrested for killing Brooke,” I blurt out. “Your dad’s at the police station with him.”
Easton’s jaw drops. “What the hell?” he exclaims. And then, “The cops came when we were at dinner?”
“No, after we got back from D.C.”
Everyone minus Reed had gone to D.C. for dinner earlier. That’s how the Royals roll. They’re so loaded that Callum has multiple private planes at his disposal. It probably helps that he owns a company that designs airplanes, but it’s still ridiculously surreal. The fact that we took a plane from North Carolina to D.C. tonight—to go for dinner—is crazy-rich. Reed stayed behind because his side hurt.
He’d been stabbed at the docks the other night and claimed that his pain meds made him too woozy to go with us.
But he hadn’t been too woozy to go see Brooke…
God. What had he done tonight?
“It happened about ten minutes ago,” I add weakly. “Didn’t you hear your dad screaming at the detective?”
“I didn’t hear a goddamn thing. I…ah…” Shame flickers in his blue eyes. “I kinda pounded a mickey of vodka when I was at Wade’s tonight. Came home and crashed right afterward.”
I don’t even have the energy to lecture him about his drinking. Easton’s addiction issues are serious, but Reed’s murder issues are a million times more urgent at the moment.
I curl my fingers into a fist. If Reed were here right now, I’d punch him—both for lying to me and for getting hauled away by the police.
Easton finally breaks the stunned silence. “Do you think he did it?”
“No.” But as confident as I sound, inwardly I’m shaken up.
When I got back from dinner, I saw that Reed’s stitches were pulled and he had blood on his stomach. I keep those incriminating tidbits from Easton, though. I trust him, but he’s hardly ever sober. I need to protect Reed first and foremost, and who knows what might come out of Easton’s mouth when he’s drunk or high.
Swallowing hard, I refocus on that task—protecting Reed. I hurriedly toss a few more items of clothing into the suitcase and zip it up.
“You haven’t told me why you’re packing,” Easton says in frustration.
“In case we need to run.”
“Us?”
“Me and Reed.” I bolt to my feet and race over to Reed’s dresser to raid his sock drawer. “I want to be prepared just in case, okay?”
That’s the one thing I excel at—being prepared to run. I don’t know if it’ll come down to that. Maybe Reed and Callum will stroll through the front doors and announce, “All fixed! Charges were dropped!” Maybe Reed will be denied bail or bond or whatever the hell it’s called, and won’t come home at all.
But in the event that neither of those things happens, I want to be ready to skip town in a heartbeat. My backpack is always stocked with everything I need, but Reed’s not a planner like I am. He’s impulsive. Doesn’t always think before he acts—
Before he kills?
I shove the horrible thought aside. No. Reed couldn’t have done what they’re accusing him of.
“What are you guys yelling about?” a sleepy voice comes from Reed’s doorway. “We can hear you all the way down the hall.”
The sixteen-year-old Royal twins step into the room. Each one is wearing a blanket around his waist. Does no one in this family believe in pajamas?
“Reed offed Brooke,” Easton tells his brothers.
“Easton!” I say in outrage.
“What? I’m not supposed to tell my brothers that our other brother just got arrested for murder?”
Sawyer and Sebastian both hiss out a breath.
“Are you serious?” Sawyer demands.
“The cops just took him away,” I whisper.
Easton looks a bit queasy. “And I’m just saying, they wouldn’t have done that if they didn’t have some kind of evidence against him. Maybe it’s about the…” He draws a circle in front of his stomach.
The twins blink in bewilderment.
“What? The baby?” Seb asks. “Why would Reed care about Brooke’s demon spawn?”
Crap. I forgot that the twins weren’t in the loop. They know that Brooke was pregnant—we were all there for that horrible announcement—but they’re in the dark about Brooke’s other claim.
“Brooke was threatening to say that Reed was the father of the kid,” I admit.
Two sets of identical blue eyes widen.