Chapter 45
Chapter forty-five
Abigail
The frantic energy of the morning has settled into something lazy and warm.
The perfect kind of winter afternoon. One that stretches instead of rushing.
Snow drifts past the windows in thick, lazy flakes, and the ranch looks hushed beneath it.
As if the whole world decided to take a deep breath at the same time.
Lucy is curled up against my legs, warm and heavy, her tail thumping every so often as she dreams. Avengers: Infinity War plays on the television at the guy’s request.
I’m snuggled beneath a blanket in the middle of the couch with my head resting against Lincoln’s shoulder, his arm comfortably draped around me.
Beau is at the other end of the couch, one of my feet propped in his lap as he absently rubs slow circles into the arch.
Lawson is in his armchair, one ankle crossed over his knee, a book open in his hands, pretending like he’s not interested in the movie, but I know better.
He hasn’t turned the page in at least twenty minutes.
Every so often, he reaches into the bag of peanut M&Ms on the side table next to him and pops a few into his mouth.
Jasper is on the floor in front of me, his back against the couch, head tipped back so he can see the TV as I mindlessly twist my fingers through his hair.
It’s all so peaceful.
Safe.
Lincoln’s the first to speak in a while, and when he does, it’s quiet. Thoughtful. “Hey, Abs?” I hum in response, my fingers still twirling strands of Jasper’s hair. “Can I ask you somethin’?”
My fingers still, and Beau’s thumb pauses a fraction of a second against my foot. Lawson closes his book and looks over at us.
“Yeah,” I say softly. “Of course.”
Lincoln doesn’t look at me right away, but I feel his body tighten for a moment before he takes a deep breath, allowing himself to relax. “You don’t ever have to answer anything you don’t want to. You know that, right?”
“I know,” I say, offering him a soft smile.
He nods once. “You’ve mentioned her a few times, but we don’t really know much about your sister.”
The word sister lands heavy in my chest.
Kat.
Something inside me shifts. Curls inward. My hand falls from Jasper’s hair, and he must feel it immediately. His head tilts slightly, as if he’s silently asking my hold on him to return. To ground myself to him.
So I do.
“She’s not—” Linc continues carefully. “You’ve said she’s missing. But we just… we want to know what that really means. If you’re comfortable telling us. She’s important to you, which means she’s important to us.”
I swallow as tears sting at my eyes.
“I don’t talk about her much,” I admit, my voice sounding strange to my own ears. Too quiet. Too tight.
Lincoln threads his fingers through my hair. “We noticed.”
“It’s just been easier that way,” I reply.
Beau doesn’t say anything, but his grip on my foot firms just enough to let me know he’s still there. Lawson sets his book on the table next to him and rests his arms on his knees, concern etched plainly across his face.
I take a breath.
Then another.
“She was older,” I finally say. “By four years. Which meant she decided very early on in our lives that she was in charge of me.” A ghost of a smile tugs at my mouth.
“She used to braid my hair before school. Every morning. Even when we were late, she said it was important to look your best even when you didn’t feel it.
And when we were teenagers, we fought over everything.
Clothes. Makeup. You name it. And then a few years later, she became my best friend all over again.
We went shopping. Got drinks together at bars.
Went dancing. You name it, we did it together.
Until—” The words stall in my throat. “She was loud. Sharp. She took up space in a room like she dared anyone to challenge it. And she loved so fiercely. She loved me in a way that felt bigger than anything around me. She loved me in a way that made me feel invincible just because I had her. Each of us had a few boyfriends over the years, but nothing was ever serious. As soon as the guy figured out who our parents were, who our parents knew, they bolted. But for the longest time, neither one of us minded. We had each other.”
“When things started getting bad… when our parents got into trouble and started owing the Bratva money, people started circling Kat and me like we were something to be picked clean. But she took it all on herself. At the time, I didn’t even know half of what was happening.
” I shake my head slightly. “She thought she was protecting me.”
“Kat didn’t die,” I say. “At least not that we’ve ever confirmed. She’s… she’s just gone.”
Silence stretches, and I force myself to keep going before I lose my nerve.
“She’s been missing for a year and a half,” I continue.
“We were supposed to meet for coffee one morning. Same place we’d gone a hundred times.
I got there early. But she… she never showed.
” My throat tightens. “I waited. For hours, I waited. I called her. Texted. I left and came back. I told myself maybe she overslept. Maybe her phone died. Maybe—” I laugh weakly.
“I don’t even know what I thought. I told you that I was supposed to marry Aleksandr, but what I didn’t tell you was that Kat was supposed to marry him first. She was actually living with the Novikov’s at the time, so I wasn’t allowed to just show up to their house.
So, I just had to wait.” A small tear slides down my cheek before landing on Lincoln’s shirt. “I haven’t seen her since.”
Jasper mutters something under his breath. I don’t quite catch it, but the venom in his tone lets me know it was nothing pleasant.
“She wouldn’t just disappear,” I say quietly.
“Regardless of her and my parents’ arrangement with the Novikovs, she would never just leave me.
Because she knew if she left, then I would have had to—” I stare at the muted TV screen for a moment, reminding myself not to fall apart.
“You guys know the rest. Well, the most important parts anyway. After Kat disappeared, I was arranged to be married to Aleksandr. Then… he died. And then there was Maxim.” I shake my head at the memories of him.
Aleksandr and his dad were not good men, but Maxim…
he was something else entirely. “I didn’t choose any of it.
It was like my life just kept… moving on without me. ”
Lawson’s voice is the first to break. Calm, but tight. “The Bratva. They’re responsible for Kat’s disappearance.”
It’s not a question, but a statement.
I nod. “I can’t prove it. There was no body.
No evidence. Nothing I can take to the police that wouldn’t get me laughed out of the room—or worse.
” My fingers curl into the fabric of Lincoln’s shirt, at the knowledge of how many people in that city are in the Bratva’s back pocket.
Police included. “But I know. I know they’re responsible.
And my parents,” I add, the words tasting bitter. “They just let it happen.”
Jasper’s hand slams against the floor as he pushes up onto his knees. “I want to fucking kill them.” The words are instant. Not a threat meant to scare, but a fact.
“Jas,” I say, reaching for him.
Lawson’s jaw is clenched so tight it looks like he could crack a tooth, and Beau’s eyes have gone cold in a way that makes something deep in my gut twist. And Lincoln…
he doesn’t speak at all. But his breathing has changed now.
It’s slow and controlled in a way that tells me he’s barely holding it together.
“I don’t want that,” I say quickly, hoping to calm the four of them.
“I don’t want revenge. I don’t want blood.
I don’t want to have some emotionally cathartic moment where I tell my parents how everything bad that’s happened to me is their fault.
I don’t want to carry any more of that with me. What’s in the past is in the past.”
Jasper, torn between fury and concern, searches my face. “They took your sister, Abbie.”
“I know,” I whisper. “And if I let myself live in that anger, it’ll take me too.”
There’s a part of me that wants to believe she’s alive.
That she’s out there somewhere and she’s safe.
But there’s a smarter part of me, one that lived in the world she so desperately tried to shield me from when my parents were all too happy to throw me in headfirst, that knows she’s gone.
They’d never have let her leave, and as far as I know, she didn’t have the resources to get out on her own.
Jasper exhales hard, dragging a hand down his face before settling back against the couch, close enough that my fingers thread through his hair once more.
Lincoln presses his forehead against my temple. “You don’t have to be so strong. Not here,” he murmurs. “It’s okay to want more out of the people that hurt you.”
“I don’t want more from them. Not anymore,” I say.
And I mean that. Maybe there once was a time when I wished my parents weren’t who they were.
That life wasn’t what it was. But that’s a child’s dream.
“I don’t want more new lives or new homes or new names.
The only thing I want from them is my sister back.
” My voice cracks on the last word. “And I don’t think I’ll ever get that. ”
Beau’s hand moves up and down my calf as he looks at me like I’ve just handed him something precious and shattered all at once. “It’s okay to hope,” he says quietly.
I shake my head. “Hope hurts.”
Lawson stands then, crossing the room in two strides before crouching in front of me next to Jas. He looks at me carefully. “Then we’ll carry it,” he says. “The hope. The anger. The grief. Whatever you don’t feel like you’re strong enough to hold, let us carry.”
His thumb brushes beneath my eye, catching a slow tear. “You don’t have to be alone with this. Not anymore. But just so you know,” he adds, “you are strong enough to carry anything.”
I look at them as they surround me, listening without trying to fix, furious on my behalf, but still respecting what I want. “I don’t want to live in the past anymore. But I don’t want to forget her either.”
“You won’t,” Lincoln says immediately. “Not with us.”
Jasper nods. “She’s yours. That makes her ours now, too. We won’t let you forget her.”
My chest aches as I press my face deeper into Lincoln’s shoulder and allow myself to cry.
And for the first time since that morning at the coffee shop, it doesn’t feel like I’m carrying her disappearance alone.
Not anymore.