BAD Beginnings by Shelley Wall Read Free Book Online

been an out-of-body experience to voice them. He hadn’t focused on any of the faces there—yet he’d connected with all of them. Through the words. Her words. Words of passion for a cause that was so close to home it hurt. He was speaking at a fundraiser for a program for troubled youth called Reconnect.
    Damn, why hadn’t there been something like this when I needed it?
    Only he hadn’t really needed it, because he wasn’t a troubled youth. He had been a normal, every-day teenager with a girlfriend. And some other troubled teen took it all away.
    The cold wetness of a tear on his cheek jolted him back to reality, then her breath whispered against his neck. “Are you okay?”
    Baden sniffed and smiled at the silent and tearful crowd. He had completely zoned out, entranced in her words, her cause. “I wish there had been programs like this when I was younger. Don’t you?”
    Two more beats of silence passed before the screech of chairs pushed against the floor, and the whistling, and surge followed.
    Baden’s heart chugged like a freight train, roaring along with the thunder of the claps of hundreds of hands. He had given a speech to a room of filthy rich sophisticates—and received a standing ovation. He couldn’t remember a fucking word he’d said. It’s a damn good thing he had it on paper.
    He leaned back to Gemma and spoke for her ears only. “God, that was painful. I’m shaking like a leaf. Is it time to leave yet?”
    “Before you hand over the check? That was a hell-of-a speech, but they’d lock the doors if you tried to jet before you doled out the money.” She drew a paper out of her purse and put it in his hands, then nodded over his shoulder. “Here they come.”
    The number on the check was surreal. He turned and his knees gave out. He grabbed for a chair. For the table. For anything that would keep him from falling flat on his face in front of the very man who had sent him to jail years ago. The man who was hell bent on getting into the prosecutor’s chair and didn’t care who he trod over to do so. Nor how many innocent kids he sentenced to waste their youth in a flawed justice system.
    “I’ve got you now, you son of a bitch.” Hell, even the voice was the same. “You don’t have me fooled for one damn minute.” The man charged forward, sweat splattered across his forehead. The pit in Baden’s stomach rolled and dug in with a healthy sting that made him twinge. The vile taste of food resurfacing resonated against his tongue—God, don’t let me vomit here in front of this room of thousands. Not in front of Gemma. The world went dark.

    He realized he had to be dreaming because his face was nestled exactly where he’d hoped. Right against Gemma’s perfect body. When she swiped a wet cloth over his head, he remembered what happened. He’d passed out. Hit the floor loud and hard. Great.
    He swallowed back the vile in his throat and spoke only to her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do it. I was just…” In the wrong place at the right time like always.
    A sea of curious faces hovered over them. They were pushed aside by a man in a white shirt with a blazing red cross stitched on the pocket and a stethoscope hanging. “Move aside everyone, let the man have air.”
    Gemma released the comforting grip and, rather than lie down, Baden lifted to sit. He pulled a leg up and dropped a hand over it, not recognizing his own skin in the fancy clothes. She smiled, but the look in her eyes held concern—and perhaps a touch of fear. “You okay, boss? You dropped like a dove in hunting season.”
    When the stethoscope pressed against his cold chest, he realized his shirt buttons had loosened. He glanced around. His mother—correction, Logan’s mother stood in the background. Her eyes were riveted to the open neck of the starched white cotton/silk blend. He shoved the metal from his chest and drew the buttons closed. “I’m fine. I’m fine. Just got a little queasy with all the