Chapter 29
29
REMI
Before…
The thrum of my pulse intensifies as I hit send on the picture to Foster. The all-of-me picture.
And he promised to send his back.
I smile, clutching my phone and closing my eyes.
Yeah, it’s over for me. I’m done for him.
The flutters and tingles carry me up the trellis. I toss my bag by the bed, strip off my coat, and fall back on the mattress. While waiting for his reply, I scroll through our messages as a distraction. One stands out from the rest.
Foster
You’re dangerous, Remi Saint.
Shit . He still thinks it’s Saint and not Sinner. I blame him, though. It’s his own fault for distracting me with everything him the past few weeks. I could forget the whole world with how he takes over my mind.
Returning to my picture at the bottom, I consider whether to clear it up now or wait for his text. Before I decide, I hear a noise from downstairs. My gaze trains on the door as I wait for another.
Shouting breaches the pillows.
My gut twists, overshadowing the Foster high, and I sit up, listening for more. Only nothing else breaks through.
The tear inside me happens anyway, forcing me to make the choice all over again. Little girl or me.
I keep waiting for another sound. At least a few minutes pass before I get up. My screen’s dark. Foster hasn’t responded yet. I hope he doesn’t for a little longer, so his real doesn’t tangle with this reality.
A reality I’m a week from escaping.
Tucking my phone into my skirt, I kick the pillows out of the way, tired of not knowing. I ease the door open and quietly step into the hall, to the banister. As I grip the wooden railing, I scan the living room below. It looks like it often does—a lamp knocked over, picture frame on the floor, the fireplace tools scattered like they were thrown.
Except one thing doesn’t match all the other times.
My mother’s unmoving on the floor in front of the fireplace. She’s wrong, though. Blood runs from her nose and a gash to her forehead, but it also soaks her top and covers her exposed skin. It absorbs into the rug from what has pooled on the hardwood around her.
“Mom,” I shout, already running down the stairs.
I land on my knees beside her body. Because that’s what I’m looking at—my mom’s body.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. I check for a pulse. But I already know, blinking rapidly at the puncture wound on the other side of her chest just above the neckline of her sweater.
Then I see the blood on the fireplace’s hearth. The poker lying on its side, pointed tip wet and darkened with more.
I look down again, and my hand falls away from where her pulse used to be. A sob bursts out of me, my stomach roiling.
“…take care of it.”
My head jerks toward the kitchen—to the muffled voice.
Daniel appears from around the corner, on the phone. He stops when he sees me, surveying me on the floor, kneeling in blood. “Make sure Marlo’s the unit they send to the house.” He ends his call, and I can’t breathe as he holds out a hand, gesturing to the body—the body. “I heard a crash on my way in from the garage. Someone was running out the front door, and … she was already gone.”
I scramble to my feet as he steps forward, my skin throbbing with every pound of my heart.
“She was already gone,” Daniel repeats, tone steady. So fucking steady while my body’s near convulsing.
My eyes fall to the literal blood on his hands. “I tried to find the source of the blood and resuscitate her, Remi. The intruder attacked her. She must have fallen on the fireplace poker and punctured an artery.”
My phone vibrates. Foster’s text. His picture.
“The intruder,” I say, voice weak and not steady, “who ran out the front door?”
He nods and comes closer, but I side-step the body and then back up to keep the distance between us. I dart my gaze over him—no holster, no gun. The next step he takes, I run for the front door.
I have to open it.
I have to open the door because no one else has run out of it or they’d have left it open like I do. No one else was in the house. Daniel never came in from the garage. He never comes through the garage.
Every other word is likely true. The attack. Mom landing on the fireplace poker and becoming the body.
But it was him.
Daniel shouts after me as I run down the street. I run until my lungs heave and my legs ache. But it’s more. All of me gives out once I reach the town square. I bend over and empty the contents of my stomach. I continue to heave, even when nothing else comes up, like my body thinks it can purge what just happened.
My mom’s dead. And Daniel killed her.
* * *
They put me in a room at the police station. An interrogation room with the two-way mirror and a camera in the corner. There’s even a metal arch on top of a table where handcuffs attach. I have no idea how long it’s been since the female officer, Julie, with the apologetic eyes, draped me in a blanket and left me alone.
She found me mid-panic attack on the freezing ground in the square. I was hyperventilating and violently shivering, and she helped me breathe, then helped me to her car. My mind felt as numb as my fingers when I stupidly let her put me in the passenger seat. Then she brought me here. To the one place I should have been going after finding my mom murdered. After seeing the body.
Except she hand-delivered me to the king’s personal court. The gilded walls equally as rotten beneath as the ones I’ve wanted to escape. I can’t escape.
And the longer I sit here—the more my body warms and my mind emerges from the fog—the sicker I feel again.
The door finally opens, and I’m not even surprised when toxins invade the air.
Elvin.
Julie reappears behind him, but she stays by the wall, letting him approach me.
He repeats what I stuttered to her through my useless breaths in the square. Only he phrases my convictions as questions, doubt veiling the words.
When Elvin stoops down in front of me, I recoil in the chair. But he takes my hands anyway. I close my eyes, tears spilling down my cheeks as he apologizes for what I witnessed.
“…it can’t be easy to process … our minds like to play tricks on us.”
I struggle to breathe while he continues to try to convince me of what I know is a lie.
He knows it too. He just doesn’t care.
The next time the door opens, I don’t need to look as the footsteps enter, slow, steady, threatening.
“Are you okay, Remi?” Daniel asks, tone soft now. “I tried to go after you, but I … I couldn’t just leave her?—”
An award-worthy sob leaves him. I draw in poisoned air before opening my eyes. Fresh clothes. Clean hands. At least that’s what everyone else sees. Everyone except Elvin. And then Marlo when he walks in a second later, his hidden teeth showing in the once-over he gives me.
Julie shuts the door behind him, trapping us with the danger. The concern she aims at me seems genuine, but my gaze lowers to the tile floor.
“I found enough at the scene to bring the son-of-a-bitch in,” Marlo states.
“Did you hear him, Remi?” When I don’t answer, Daniel continues, “They’ve already caught the bastard who did this. Some addict piece of shit who terrorizes people for money. My guys spotted him only blocks from our house, tweaked out of his mind and talking to himself.”
I didn’t think my heart could hurt more, but it further breaks for the man.
They continue telling me the man’s history of mental illness. A previous B&E charge.
Nothing worthy of this.
Tears are streaking again when Daniel grasps my arm, helping me to my feet. His fingers dig in enough to hurt before he gently rests his hand on my shoulder.
“I’m going to take her home—” His voice actually breaks, an audible inhale following. “I’m sorry she was so confused when she got here. I can’t imagine the damage this caused.” He squeezes while they talk around me.
Marlo steps in front of me as close as the night in the kitchen as he stares down at me. “You might want to have her talk to someone.”
“I’ve already called Dr. Sood.”
“A psych eval?” Julie asks sharply.
My eyes jerk up. “What?” They flash between everyone in the room, but Julie’s the only one reacting. The others are part of the choreography and all hitting their marks.
“We’ll see how she’s feeling when we get out of here,” Daniel says. “Hopefully, now that she understands what really happened, she can begin processing. We’ll keep our options open. Whatever’s best for my Remi.”
I swallow against the acid churning in my stomach, feeling utterly helpless against his performance.
“It’ll help when the trash is off the streets and behind bars.” Elvin shakes his head off to the side, but his gaze shows the lie in his disgusted expression. “It’ll help both of you, Chief.”
My heart hammers harder as Daniel escorts me out of the room, handing Julie the blanket on the way. We walk through the precinct, officers lining the corridor in respect for their grieving chief. He guides me through the lobby. Out the door. The favorites trail right behind us.
Then Marlo opens the door to Daniel’s cruiser, and I stop existing for a second.
“In you go, Remi,” he says with a nudge.
My teeth chatter, but I force myself into the car. Marlo ducks in, reaching for the seat belt, so I grab it first, not wanting him touching me. He closes me in as Daniel slides behind the wheel. He gives a nod to the two officers and turns the engine over.
As we pull out of the lot, all the adrenaline from earlier assaults me at once. No one will know the truth—at least no one who isn’t loyal. He’ll get away with it. So long as he takes care of me.
“Do I need to take you to Dr. Sood?” Daniel asks, far colder without an audience. “Or are you going to accept what really happened?”
I don’t answer. I can’t answer. My mind races through scenarios, and all I know for certain is Daniel killed her. And the worst thing that can happen now is going back to the step-house with him.
Daniel’s still talking, retelling me the story he created, trying to gaslight me when what I saw is brutally branded on my soul. I frantically scan out the windows. I need to run. I need to get out of this car and away from him.
I slowly sneak my phone out of the hem of my skirt, but Daniel pulls up to a red light and glances over.
He sighs. “I think it’s best if you give me that, Remi. You’re clearly not in your right mind, and I’d hate for you to embarrass yourself more than you already have.”
My breaths grow flimsy, the surge of adrenaline somehow spiking higher.
It all happens at once. I swing at Daniel’s face, hitting as hard as I can with my phone and unbuckling at the same time. The impact catches him off guard, so I have time to throw open the door. I scramble out of the car, a cry wrenching from me when I fumble the phone to the ground.
But I don’t have time to grab it—even if I did, he has the tracker on, and I need to run, not mess with settings.
Daniel’s cursing and shouting and out of the car. All I can do is sprint toward the park.
Going to the right place this time.
I cut through the park, and the sound of Daniel raging fades. My lungs ache by the time I reach the other side, finally letting myself check behind me.
Nothing.
He’s nowhere in sight as I tear down the street.
Icy wind seeps into my bones as I run, and then I see the police SUV parked up ahead and push harder. Even his unit panics me, but I dash up the sidewalk past it. I pound on the door, shivering and shaking. It jerks open. Hot tears flood my eyes, searing down my face.
Roman’s nostrils flare, his jaw grinding when he grabs for me. “Fuck, Rem,” he says, pulling me inside.
The door slams, and my face is already buried in his chest, fists clenching the back of his shirt. I hold on to him for dear life.
“He … Daniel, he?—”
“I know. I knew the second I heard the call go out, but I couldn’t find you.”
I don’t even think it’s a sob that rips out of me this time. It’s more painful. A splintering rather than a tear inside. Like half of me has no purpose anymore, and the rest is more broken than ever.
“You’re safe now. I’ve got you.” Roman’s chin rests on top of my head, arms locked around me. “I’ve fucking got you, pretty girl. He’ll never touch you again.”