Chapter 17 #2
I barge into Bones’ office without a second thought. He sighs, drags a hand down his face, and looks up at the ceiling like he’s asking for patience from the heavens. Tough luck. I’ve got shit to talk to him about before I go back out.
“Jinx retrieval still set for next Friday?” I ask as I step inside.
“Yeah.” He watches me like he’s already bracing for bullshit. “I can send Fang with Mindfuck if you’re not up for it.”
“Can’t.” I drop into the chair across from him. “Fang doesn’t have time to comb through the intel. He won’t be ready.”
“You sure?”
I nod. “Yeah. I’m sure.” I rake a hand through my hair. It feels like there’s barbed wire inside my lungs. “It wasn’t Adora who planted the drugs in my saddlebag.”
He goes still.
“What?”
“Things are a lot more fucked up than what we thought. I need to look deeper into what actually happened. But first, I bring Jinx in.”
That fucker tortured Temperance in unspeakable ways. Unfortunately for him, and whether Temperance likes it or not, she’s Bones’ woman. Which means Jinx’s ending was never going to be pretty.
Bones leans back slowly, face hardening. “Dom. You could barely handle talking to her father. You spiraled into a bender for a month after that. You still can’t talk to anyone about what happened inside. It took me dragging you halfway to an alcohol infused grave to get it out of you.”
I fold my arms, jaw tight. “I know.”
I run my tongue over my lower lip, thinking about the pile of shit I’m about to dive into.
“But I have to do this. I’ve been avoiding the past for too long. Time to dig it out.”
He studies me. I can see the war in his eyes.
“Just be careful,” he says quietly.
“Always.” I flash him a crooked smirk so forced my teeth ache.
He leans forward, forearms on the desk. “Good. Now tell me what the fuck that stunt with Adora was. When we talked about you taking her, we agreed you’d keep her for a day.
Maybe two. Get your pound of flesh, then kill her.
Clean. No chance of getting in too deep. What the fuck happened to that plan?”
“It went to shit.” I shrug.
“And?”
“And it’s a good thing it did.” I meet his eyes, jaw tight. “She was just as much a victim as I was. More, actually. I’ll give you all the shitty details later.”
I study him for a beat. “How come you stopped me?”
His gaze sharpens, then he scoffs. “You were clearly out of your mind. I couldn’t risk you turning that gun on yourself next.”
He sucks in a deep breath. “Fuck, Dom, I saw you at the bar the night you brought her here. You were smiling. At her. I haven’t seen you smile like that since you were twenty. It freaked the brothers out. Freaked me out too. It didn’t take a genius to realize you’re in fucking love with her.”
I look down, exhale slowly. “You were right to stop me. Thanks for that. If you hadn’t…”
He nods once, jaw tight. “Now, you gonna tell me why the fuck you snapped? After a whole year?”
I grit my teeth. “It’s stupid. Doesn’t matter now.”
He doesn’t let it go. “It matters. I need you to tell me what happened this past year. You married her, Dom.” His eyes narrow, his voice drops. “And I wasn’t there.”
It hits like a truck. I hold his stare. “You would’ve shot her before we even made it to the courthouse.”
He crosses his arms, like I just insulted our mother. “No, I fucking wouldn’t have, asshole. I would’ve punched a wall, flipped a table, maybe taken a swing at you — sure. But kill her? Not if you didn’t want me to.”
A deep sigh starts growing in my chest, but I push it back down.
“I just… I couldn’t tell you. You were drowning in your own shit with Temperance, and I was barely holding it together.
And I wasn’t ready to admit why I was actually marrying her.
Not even to myself.” I shake my head. “It is what it is. I’m sorry.
If she ever talks to me again, maybe we’ll get a redo. ”
He smirks, but there’s a sudden weariness in his eyes. “That’s some wild-ass wishful thinking, brother. But I get it.”
I scoff and push up from the chair. “Tell Mindfuck to get ready. If he runs his mouth while we’re on the job, I swear to God, I’ll shoot him in the ass.”
I leave him laughing behind me.
The house feels dead.
Not empty. Dead.
Because she’s not here.
And without her, every wall is rotting. The darkness crawls, eating away at every trace of the life we had between these walls. It’s suffocating. Poison in the air. Like this place was once something living — breathing and warm — and now it’s just a corpse, bloated with memories and regret.
I can’t stay here. I can’t sleep here. Not without her. I’ll keep seeing her in every shadow, every ray of light. I’ll go full-on crazy before I even have a chance to fight for her.
The pain’s crawling up my chest, spreading like a curse with every minute I spend here. My bones feel too heavy, my mind paralyzed. Every piece of me is frozen in agony.
The silence is louder than a war zone, and I’m standing right in the middle of it. Her presence lingers everywhere, on every surface, in every corner. The air smells like vanilla and sin, just like her.
I don’t know how to move inside these walls without her.
Without the sound of her bare feet dragging across the floor in the mornings, like it was too much of an effort to lift them.
Without finding the coffee mugs she used all over the house because she got distracted reading and forgot about them.
The couch still has the blanket she used last. Her favorite book is on the armrest, like she just went for a walk to the lake outside and she’ll be back anytime now.
I stare at that book like it might start speaking to me. Like it might tell me what she’s feeling. What she’s thinking. If she truly hates me now and there’s no going back. Or if she’s just hurting and needs to heal her heart first.
I have to get out of here. Now.
I only need a few things from this place. Something to make me feel closer to her even now, when she’s so far away from me. And something that I know will make her feel better. At least a little. A small piece of comfort in the ocean of despair that I threw her in.
I turn away before the grief chokes me.
For the first time in fourteen years, a place feels too big. And I feel too fucking small.
Adora
The first thing Ria does when we step through the door is kiss two fingers and press them gently to a photo on a shelf right beside the entrance.
“Hi, Mom. I brought visitors,” she whispers, soft and reverent.
The picture pulls my attention. A woman — her mother, clearly — looks back at me with Ria’s exact features.
Same face. Same smile. Same mischief tucked in the corners of her lips.
Her eyes are a warm, rich brown, not Ria’s blue ones, but the resemblance is uncanny.
I don’t even know her, and still, my chest tightens.
That kind of love… I wonder how it feels to have it.
Then it hits me — this is a ritual. That photo is there because her mom is gone.
She turns to me with a bright smile like she didn’t just gut me with a simple gesture of affection. “Let me show you your room. And then we’re having muffins and hot chocolate while we gossip.”
She walks me through her place like she’s unveiling a castle.
Truth is, the place is small — really small.
One bedroom, a half room with a bed squished into it, a bathroom, and a compact open-concept kitchen-living combo where a bubblegum-pink couch dominates the space.
But it’s warm. Lived in. Loud in color and soft in atmosphere.
Plants everywhere. Wall art that looks like someone either had a vision or an accident.
Mismatched furniture painted in unapologetic yellows and blues and wild pinks.
It screams, but somehow it feels like a hug.
Just like her.
“Okay!” she claps, startling me. “Hot chocolate time. Oh, and we have to set your first mandatory therapy reminder! It’s hospital law now, for you. Emotional breakdowns are only allowed under Dr. Monroe’s supervision.”
She skips over to the wall calendar and circles a date — red on top of another red circle. I blink. And then I blink again.
“I’m pretty good at remembering stuff,” I say, still watching her. “But... how do you know which circle is for what? There’s, like, a massacre of circles going on. You literally just circled over an existing one.”
She taps the marker against her chin thoughtfully. “It’s not about the color. It’s the size. They’re all different. That’s my system.”
That’s not a system. That’s a personality disorder.
I can’t stop a smile forming on my lips.
She tosses the marker onto a nearby tray like she’s just solved every secret quantum physics has, and spins toward the kitchenette. Humming a little off-tune song under her breath.
“I feel like milk chocolate today,” she calls out. “But I’ve got dark, white, and marshmallow fluff if you’re fancy. What’s your poison?”
“Milk’s good,” I answer, sinking into the pink couch that swallows me whole. It smells like sugar.
For the first time in days, I feel like I can breathe, even if just a little. My heart is still bleeding, and it won’t stop anytime soon, but for now, I can rest.
“I’ve been experimenting with some mango and blueberry muffins,” Ria calls out, her back to me as she moves around the kitchen like she’s dancing with her tools. “You’re the first to try them, so I expect brutal honesty. If they don’t pass the test, they’re not making it to the shop.”
“Sure,” I reply, watching the way she flows between the cabinets. “But full disclosure — I’m not the best judge when it comes to sweets. I’m a bacon and steak kind of girl. Sugar is just... sugar. It all tastes good. Now bacon? I can give you a full analysis down to the cut and smoke level.”