52. Zander
52
ZANDER
“Roxanne? What do you mean?” Beast runs his hand through his hair.
A sickening feeling develops in the pit of my stomach.
“She’s in love with you, Ash. In some sick way, she thinks you are hers.”
For the first time this morning, Sophia’s eyes don’t hold guilt but burn with rage. She recites the incidences that changed their lives forever in an almost mechanical tone, as if she has rehearsed this conversation with Beast several times in her head.
“Roxanne hired someone to abduct me, to hurt me. But when you were beyond consolation, she had to bring me back. She threatened me all those months in our house, Ash.” When Sophia clutches Beast’s tensed hands, his angry, pained gaze settles over her face.
“When I was pregnant, she kept her distance. I thought that whatever gross infatuation she had for you was finally over…until the day she told me about her sick plans. How she’d raise our baby with you. She wanted me to leave with Kristy or she would kill us. I was so scared that day, I went in to premature labor. I couldn’t take it anymore, Ash. I had to go away, to keep myself sane and Kristy safe.”
Beast stares at Sophia with eyes filled with disbelief. As if of all the reasons he thought might have led to Sophia’s departure, this wasn’t even on his radar.
“Ash, say something.”
“I’m gonna kill that woman.” Beast’s voice booms in the room as he gets up from the chair.
He marches out the door, and I’m torn between following him and being with Rose. I take a hesitant step toward the door and then look back at Rose.
“Go.” Rose glances at me, tears shining in her eyes. “Beast—Ash,” she fumbles, as if unsure what to call her father. “He’s too angry.”
“I’ll be back soon.”
“Don’t worry, Zander. We’re here.” Oscar’s gaze meets mine. I register his tight mouth. I don’t blame the guy. I’m sure he hadn’t planned on spending the day consoling his newly pregnant, sobbing wife.
After placing a soft kiss on Rose’s lips, I motion for Zach to follow me.
A heavy sigh leaves my body as we get out of the suffocating room.
“What the fuck was all that?” Zach asks as we stride toward his Porsche.
I slide into the passenger seat before searching for Beast’s car, but it’s long gone.
“I know only as much as you.”
“Fuck! Fucking hell!” he shouts, honking at a delivery van parked on the wrong side of the road.
There’s no time to think; it’s time to act. I dial Lukas, and he picks up after two rings.
“Lukas, can you come to Beast’s place immediately? ”
“All fine?” he asks, but I can already hear him moving.
“We found out who hurt Beast’s wife and Rose.” I give him a short rundown of all the craziness I learned this morning. It felt like I was watching a movie when Sophia recited what led to her taking such drastic steps.
Roxanne. I can’t fucking believe it!
“I’ll be there.” Lukas’s response is clipped before he ends the call.
Zach eyes me, pulling his gaze away from the road for a moment.
“What?”
“Why Lukas?”
“Because we don’t know what we’re walking into. Roxanne hired someone to kidnap Sophia right under Beast’s nose. Someone is fucking sick to torture a baby with a hot hook. I’m not walking in blind here.” I run a hand through my hair as my mind jumps from Beast, to Rose, to Sophia.
We park outside Beast’s driveway, where Lukas is already waiting for us. When we reach the doorstep, the main door is wide open, and everything in the house is in total disarray. Beast has fucking ransacked the place.
“Beast!” I shout, but there’s no answer. “Ash?” I try again. When I try to enter the kitchen, Lukas steps in with his gun drawn.
“Is that necessary?” I grimace.
“This is why you called me, Zander.”
We follow Lukas into the kitchen, and it’s empty. But the door that opens to the backyard is wide open. We find Beast in the greenhouse, causing havoc as he goes, emptying the plant pots as if they hold answers to his numerous questions.
“Ash!” Lukas shouts, grabbing his attention .
“She’s not here.” Beast’s body shakes with anger. His wild gaze jumps around, scanning through his surroundings.
“Where could she go?” Lukas asks.
“I don’t know. She never leaves the house except for groceries, but now her room is empty. She fucking left. I cannot let that woman slip away, Lukas. She has to pay for what she did to my family.”
“Calm down, Ash. We’ll find her. Tell me when you last saw her.”
Beast pinches the bridge of his nose and releases a deep breath, taking a minute to straighten his thoughts. “This morning. I told her that Zander had asked me to visit him in Cherrywood.”
“That’s good. It hasn’t been long. She couldn’t have gone far.” Lukas squeezes Beast’s shoulder once before dialing someone. “I need you to locate Roxanne, Ashcroft Miller’s housekeeper. She has our tracker on her phone.”
A muffled voice sounds from Lukas’s speaker, but I can’t make out the exact words.
“She might have trashed it. Hold on,” Lukas says to the person on the other side before turning his attention to Beast. “Doesn’t she have some property on the outskirts of town?”
Beast scratches his chin, his gaze confused, before he replies slowly. “It’s her brother’s, I think.”
“Give me the current location of the phone and look for the property owned by her brother.”
Once the call ends, we walk back to the front of the house. Lukas and I jump into his Jeep, and Beast and Zach follow us.
I recognize the area as Lukas slows his Jeep close to my dad’s property.
“Why are we stopping here?”
“Because that’s the house.” Lukas points to the broken- down cabin a few meters away from the place I lived as a child.
My insides twist as my gaze shifts between the cabin and my house.
Was Rose kept here?
Was there a time she and I lived close to each other?
Before my mind runs wild, fabricating fresh questions that each rip out a piece of my heart, Zach and Beast join us.
Zach points to my father’s property. “What the fuck. Isn’t that the house where we lived in with Dad?”
His words take me back to those happy memories.
“We don’t have time for a meltdown, Zander.” Lukas’s sharp voice pulls me back to now, and my eyes slide to Beast, who’s unlocking the safety on his gun.
“What the fuck are you doing with that?” My lips pinch together.
“I’d be stupid to go unarmed.” He’s already marching toward the rickety cabin.
“Fuck.” Lukas shakes his head in disapproval and runs to catch up with Beast.
When we reach the unkempt porch, Lukas peers through the window before opening the door with his foot. “Roxy?”
A loud shattering noise comes from inside, and we all make a beeline toward the source.
My feet halt at the sight of Roxanne standing in the kitchen, a knife in her hands that’s pointing toward us. I can’t believe she’s the same woman who cared for us all these years.
“Don’t come closer.” She waves the knife around. “You found her, didn’t you, Ash?”
For the first time, I notice how she looks at Beast. The longing. The love simmering through her eyes.
“What lie did she tell you? Did you forget that she left you alone, taking your daughter with her? That fucking bitch!” Roxanne approaches Beast, who stares at her incredulously as if he doesn’t understand what’s happening. “How can you believe her? I stayed with you. I comforted you when you were alone. We raised the boys together. We are a family, Ash.”
A sour taste fills my mouth.
She’s fucking sick.
She places her hand on Beast’s arm, and her touch seems to break his stupor. He grabs Roxy’s throat, crushing it with his big hands.
“Ash!” We jump into action, grabbing him from behind, trying to pull him away from murdering this maniac.
“I’ll kill you, you fucking psycho. You broke my family.” Beast struggles to break free. Fuck, he’s a strong man.
In all the commotion, the knife drops from Roxy’s hand, and Lukas kicks it away. He pulls a zip tie from his pocket and ties Roxy’s hands. After dragging her into the living room, he sits her on a chair and says, “Now you talk, Roxy.”
“You kidnapped my daughter from the hospital!” Beast screams before she can say a word.
Roxy’s face turns pale and sweat trickles down her forehead. “H-how do you know?” She gasps before her gaze shifts from Beast to me. For a brief second, her shoulders curl over her chest, and I catch a glimpse of remorse on her face, but it vanishes as fast as it appeared.
“I never meant to harm her. She was supposed to be our girl, Ash. Yours and mine. But my jackass brother spoiled everything. He got infatuated with your wife when he abducted her. He wanted to bring her back here again. But when I told him about Sophia’s pregnancy, he grew quiet. I thought he’d no longer be a problem. I was wrong.”
She rolls her eyes as if the story she’s telling is nothing but a light neighborly gossip.
“He threatened a nurse and stole your baby from the NICU. I only found out when I came here to see him months later. He’d already inflicted wounds on the girl. I knew he’d gone crazy.”
Beast barks a bitter laugh. “You’re talking about crazy? This whole fucking thing is crazy. I thought you were a friend, but you…you destroyed every fucking thing in my life.” He takes a step forward, toward Roxy, but Lukas intercepts him.
I tug on Beast’s hand, urging him to listen to Lukas. We still don’t know how Rose ended up at Kindred Hearts.
“I would visit the baby often, cleaning her and feeding her,” Roxy continues. “I even tried to steal her, but my brother threatened me with a gun. That’s when I knew things had gone too far with him. Finally, one day when I got a chance, I poisoned his stew. He was a worthless piece of a shit. No one paid any attention to the details of his death. Everyone was so happy that he was finally gone. But I had to do something about the baby. Over the years, I’d become attached to her, so I couldn’t just kill her.”
My heart lurches painfully, hearing her indifference and disregard for Rose’s life. We could have lost her so easily.
“But I also couldn’t leave her here. She had marks on her body. She had Sophia’s eyes. I knew the case was still open with the police. It could very easily be traced back to me. Plus, the girl was weird. She never cried, never made a peep. So, I took her away with me across the country and found a school for slow kids.”
“She is not fucking slow!” My pulse skyrockets, blood simmering through my veins. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Roxanne’s words, as if Rose was nothing but a piece of garbage she had to dump someplace, makes my skin crawl.
Roxanne continues her horrendous story. “I left the girl in a house near that school. I was waiting for someone to notice her, and on the second day, a woman found her. I immediately returned, and for some time, I kept tabs on what was happening, but I realized they closed the case and all was fine.”
“All was fine?” My entire body shakes with a wild mix of fear and anger. My insides boil as I think of what Rose had to go through. “You sick woman. Nothing you just spewed from your fucking mouth is fine. I can’t believe I lived with you, cared for you when you were nothing but another disgusting person from my childhood.”
I’m not shocked when Beast points his gun at her head. After hearing her words, I’d have done the same. “What you did to me, to my family, is beyond imaginable. There’s no word in the dictionary you can say to make it right. I lost my wife, my daughters. Rose, my baby, suffered so much because of you.” He chokes as he says the words, and I feel my throat tightening too. “My wife still lives in the shadows because of you. I cannot let you walk away from all this.”
As Beast’s finger glides toward the trigger, Lukas stands between him and Roxanne. “Ash, she’s not worth it. You just got your girls. Take your fucking life back. Don’t let a weak moment steal all that away from you. Once again.”
Beast turns to Lukas, his eyes dropping to his hands as the gun is pulled from his tight grip.
“Go home, Ash. Go to your family. Your wife. I’ll take care of Roxy. I’ll make sure she’s never a threat to anyone.”
I give Zach a nod and mouth for him to take Beast home.
My brother grabs Beast’s arms and leads him out.
I watch through the window as he opens his car door for Beast, and when they finally leave, I release a deep breath. But my mind stays unhinged, agitation coursing through my body.
Minutes pass by before Lukas comes to stand beside me. “I called the police. They should be here soon. I also recorded her confession in case she decides to change her statement.” He cocks his head toward Roxy, who’s tied to a chair .
I look away from the sick woman, her face reminding me of all the pain my girl suffered.
“You did well.” I pat Lukas’s shoulder awkwardly. When he doesn’t respond to my praise, I add, “I meant with Ash. You said the right thing.”
“It’s okay, Zander. I know you’re not a fan of me. But I’m also not as bad as you think.” He smiles, trying to lighten the air. But it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I understand how Ash is feeling at this very moment. He wants someone to pay for his lost time and his lost love. I was in the same situation, but the difference is, he has someone to go back to. He has someone to drag him away from this. I had neither.”
It takes me a minute to form a response at his unconventional admission. “I never thought about it.” I swallow the lump of embarrassment around my throat.
“It’s okay.” He shrugs, walking away.
“Rose likes you,” I say after him.
He laughs in surprise. “And that’s killing you.”
I chuckle, the weight of the past two days slowly lifting from my shoulders. I know back in Cherrywood things are far from normal. But there’s no more threat to Rose and Sophia. We can all move forward with our lives.
“Not exactly killing me, but I’m perplexed.”
“Why someone likes me?” He raises an eyebrow at me.
“No, asshole. But what does she see in you that I don’t?” I chuckle, hitting his back. He turns around, but there’s something I’ve wanted to say to him for a long time. “Lukas.” He looks at me over his shoulder. “Zach and Zane love you as if you’re our missing fourth brother. My girl adores you as if you’re a long-lost childhood friend. I think I’m blinded by irrelevant things to not see the good in you. I’d like to start afresh.”
He whirls around in a flash, a shocked expression etched on his face. After a beat, he swallows hard and nods. Before we can talk more, the sound of an incoming police siren grabs our attention. Lukas walks out of the house while I stay inside and keep watch on Roxanne.
Minutes later, he treads into the cabin with two armed police officers.
“She needs to be taken in for the murder of her brother and the kidnapping and assault of Ashcroft Miller’s wife and daughter. There are two cold cases that will need to be reopened.”
The two officers nod to Lukas, and we finally leave the suffocating place as police carry on with their business.
I jump into the passenger seat of Lukas’s Jeep, and he turns on the ignition. “Ready to go home?”
I give one last glance at my childhood house before saying, “Can we make a stop?”
We enter the bar Rendezvous. Although it’s a bright, sunny day, it’s dark inside the bar, with the blinds shut and sangria-colored walls allowing no light to reflect.
“What will you boys have?” a smiling bartender asks.
“Two Scotches neat,” I reply, flopping down on one of the barstools.
“I thought you got your girl back?” She peers in my direction after placing the tumblers in front of us. It takes me a while to notice the tattoos on her wrists.
I was at this bar after Rose told me about her past. It was the day I first called her my girlfriend in front of everyone.
“You visiting this bar often?” Lukas cocks his eyebrow at me before grabbing his glass.
“Nah.” I shake my head. “Just once.”
“Yeah, dude got his girlfriend that day. I guess it was a happy-sad day for you, huh?” She plays with her tongue piercing. She’s as talkative as I remember.
When she finally leaves us, attending to the two guys sitting on the other side of the bar, Lukas asks, “Why are we here?”
“I don’t know. I just want to breathe for a moment.” My mouth dries as Roxy’s words hit me again. “I can’t wrap my head around all this…information. I can’t unsee the image of Rose as a baby.” My hands tremble against the Scotch glass. “If he wasn’t dead, I’d have killed him myself,” I whisper, my head hanging low.
There’s a moment’s pause before Lukas replies. “No, you wouldn’t have. You have a lot to lose and nothing to gain.”
“But the anger rolling through me… I’m worried I’ll hurt someone. I’m scared I’ll hurt myself, and I don’t want Rose to see me like this—broken. I don’t want her to be petrified again.” My insides quiver just at the mere thought of her having another panic attack.
“I understand, Zander. I understand more than you want me to. But don’t underestimate your love. You’ll walk to hell and back before you let a scratch on her.”
“I’m sorry, Lukas.” I turn my head toward him. “I—”
“It’s okay. My story is for another time. Today is a good day. Embrace it. Beast got his family back. Rose finally knows about her past. You guys can move forward toward a bright future free of past secrets. A future filled with love.”
“I hope you get all that someday too.”
He stiffens beside me and then, without saying a word, throws back the Scotch.