A_Wanted Man - Alana Matthews by Intrigue Romance Read Free Book Online

met after we broke up was measured against you. Against what we had before Treacher was killed.” He paused. “You may think you have every right to feel the way you feel, but I’m not the reason he’s dead. If you want to attribute blame, then why not look at the real culprit? Treacher himself.”
    He expected her say something, but she remained silent. Wouldn’t look at him now. And he knew that what he’d just told her hadn’t penetrated. The barrier she’d erected was too high and wide and thick, and trying to get through it was impossible.
    So why even bother?
    Turning, he flagged the waitress and headed across the bar to get his food.

Chapter Seven
    She was staring at her half-eaten burger when the call came.
    After returning to the table, Rusty had given up on her and had taken his food across the bar to sit with the girl with the fake boobs.
    Callie hadn’t put up much of a protest. She’d wanted to be alone. To think about Harlan and what he’d said.
    Because she wasn’t you.
    There was so much heartbreak in those words that she’d found it nearly impossible to maintain her composure.
    How do you react when someone tells you something like that? Someone you once loved so deeply you thought life simply couldn’t go on without him?
    Do you let go of all the animosity you’ve nurtured? Do you set aside the pain—the pain he still refused to take responsibility for?
    Apparently not, if your name is Callie Glass. And not because you don’t want to but because you can’t .
    Callie had tried many times over the years, had even thought about getting in touch with Harlan, had often wondered where life had taken him.
    But she’d always held back.
    Always.
    The sting of Treacher’s death had ruptured something inside her. A vital organ had been damaged and refused to heal. And every time she picked up the phone, or thought about entering the name Harlan Cole into a search engine, she had stopped herself.
    She would remember all those crazy late nights when the three of them would get drunk together and talk about the future. Their plans to join the Marshals Service, to request assignments in the same jurisdiction, to raise families in the same neighborhood and have backyard barbecues and birthday parties and cheer their kids on at soccer games.
    In short, they were inseparable.
    The Three Amigos .
    And beneath it all was the assumption that Callie and Harlan would get married. Treacher would often smile that crooked smile of his and say, “The two of you were born to be together. God pointed you on a path toward each other from the moment you were conceived.”
    What they were all witnessing, he told them, was destiny in motion.
    A plan perfectly executed.
    On hearing this Harlan would pull Callie into his lap and put his arms around her as she leaned back against him, languishing in the heat of his embrace.
    “Soul mates,” he’d say softly, the warmth of his breath against her ear. And later when Treacher had gone home, they would lie together on Harlan’s bed, making love with an urgent passion that Callie had never since felt.
    They both knew that Treacher was right. The bond between them—between all of them—was shatterproof.
    Or so they had thought.
    They couldn’t know that God apparently had different plans. That Treacher would be dead within months, taking that crooked smile and their relationship along with him. That the man who was so convinced that they were meant to be together would become the reason they broke apart.
    And when Callie remembered this, she would hang up the phone or close down the search engine and try not to cry.
    She didn’t want to hate Harlan. She just couldn’t help herself. Maybe because that hate was the one true thing in her life these days. The one true thing that made her feel alive. Or maybe it was the thing that helped assuage her own guilt for not being there that night. For choosing to forego the party because finals were approaching and she felt so