Chapter 28
Twenty-eight
KNOX
Jax will live. It sucks ass. I’m sure he’s seeing stars in Hope’s eyes that aren’t actually there, but he’ll live and that’s better than the alternative.
Of course, Gauge isn’t that lucky. He’s still alive.
Jax isn’t the best shot. It looked like he got him in the head, but the bullet is buried in Gauge’s cheek, just under his eye.
He’s still gasping, gaping, his puffy eyes rolling around trying to find something to land on or someone to help him.
“Huh, he’s still holding on,” Dimitri says.
“Yeah, well, strength will fade fast,” I promise.
“Get Coach’s body,” I tell Dimitri and lean down to Gauge.
“I’ll bring it inside,” he says and sprints to the tree we buried him under.
Gauge tries to reach out to me. I snort. “I’m glad you’re not dead. I want you to enjoy the burn. Consider it an appropriate welcome to hell.”
I grab him, toss him over my shoulder, and hear him groan and whimper with every step I take toward the cabin.
I step inside, my eyes landing on the ass I shot earlier. I let Gauge’s body glide off my shoulders and he falls to the ground with a thud.
It doesn’t take long for Dimitri to get inside with Coach’s dried corpse. God, the smell.
He tosses the corpse on top of Gauge and grabs his laptop and bag.
“Cleansing by fire seems appropriate. You got everything?” I ask.
He nods and holds his laptop and the guy’s phone up.
“The kerosene is in my bag,” he says and hands it to me.
I rip open the bag, grab the kerosene, and dump it. This cabin isn’t fit for the living. Too many terrible things have happened in it. If it’s not haunted, it’s cursed. If it’s not cursed, it’ll be a constant reminder to Hope of what happened and it’ll leave a loose string for someone to find.
That’s not an option. Hope isn’t going to have to look over her shoulder anymore. She’s not going to struggle. She’s not going to constantly push herself to outrun her past.
It’s staying dead.
It’s staying quiet.
Jax, Dimitri, and I will make sure of it. We’ve already proved exactly what lengths we’ll go to for her, what we’ll do to protect her, and what happens when someone crosses that line.
Once the floor has a shimmering layer of kerosene down, I flick my lighter. Dimitri motions for us to back up, and I oblige. Once we’re out of the danger zone, I bend down and make sure the kerosene takes light.
It doesn’t take much. One spark and it all goes up. Gauge howls and screams. But the fire is warm, clean, right.
Watching it climb up the sides of the cabin as we edge further away might as well have the same power as watching the ball drop on New Year’s Eve. It’s a new chapter.
Jaxon snorts. “Better than fireworks, huh?”
“My… Coach?” Hope asks.
“They had him out of the grave,” Dimitri answers. “He’s in there too.”
“Dead,” Hope whispers.
“Just like any video of you that tries to get posted,” I promise.
Dimitri’s already facing her. He cups her face in his hands and presses his forehead to hers. “No one will ever see you like that again. It’s done. And we’ll make sure the police track down everyone who tries.”
She trembles and peeks down at his chest before bending over and kissing on the spot where her initials hide beneath his clothes. She does the same for Jaxon. I watch with reverence before Hope holds up the knife.
I rip my own shirt down the front. If she doesn’t put her initials on me, carve herself into my skin as a fucking reward for all of this, I’ll just have to do it myself.
“There’s no one else but you, Hope. Not for any of us. Give me a scar I want. A scar I can appreciate. A scar I’ve earned,” I whisper.
She stands on her toes to kiss me and I’m happy to close the distance, feasting on her mouth as if we’re not all murderers, as if we’re not all guilty, as if we’re not all fucked-up monsters trying to survive and become something better.
I feel the first line of her cut and hiss as I draw back from the kiss. She doesn’t stop. The H isn’t perfect, but it’s her. Once her initial is on me in full, I take the knife and carve a heart around it.
Jax laughs. “Always have to stand out, don’t you, Knox? You know you’re past proving yourself, right?”
“You’re all mine. We’re alive. We’re together… We need to take care of Jax and leave this…” She looks at the fire devouring all the good and bad memories made here, burning along with the people who refused to let the worst parts of her life die. “Leave this all behind.”
“Nothing has ever sounded better,” Jax says before wincing. “Maybe a kiss to push down the nausea?”
“Let me guess, you’re asking me now that we’re in this for life,” Dimitri snorts.
I almost smile, but Hope laughs. It’s bright, it’s free, it’s wild, and most importantly… it’s real.
It took blood, fire, and time to get here, but we did.
DIMITRI
We need to wrap this up, no more loose ends. Even though I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to give him a chance to fuck things up, but Hope kept pointing out we had to close this for good.
“Tell my dad I’m in his office,” I order his secretary without stopping or explaining why half of Jax’s face is covered in gauze, or why all of us are wearing practice jerseys, including Hope.
It could practically be a dress on her, but if it was, I have a feeling that none of us would be focused on the police, and all of us would be focused on her again. Jaxon sits, only when Hope offers to sit on his lap, and I take a seat as well.
Knox crosses his arms behind us. “If this is a fucking mistake…”
“We’ll know before we hand anything over,” I finish for him.
He’s going to prove himself or out himself, one way or another.
I can’t control the hammering of my heart, my sweaty palms as I clutch my laptop tighter.
I shouldn’t care about him, it shouldn’t matter what he thinks of me.
Nothing matters.
“You’re alive,” is the first thing my dad says as he steps inside his office. His eyes shift from me, to Hope, and land on Jaxon.
“It’s done,” I say, drawing his stare back to me.
My dad sighs and sits in his black leather chair. “It’s never done.” He shakes his head. “I heard there was a fire in the woods.”
“It was beautiful,” Jaxon praises and earns a slight nudge from Hope to zip it.
I slide my laptop over his desk. “Everything is in there. All the dirt, all the names. Everything I could find after I had access to the server.”
My dad’s hand lands on the laptop, his jaw set in stone. I can see the doubt, the questions.
“Just do the right thing,” I say.
His eyes close with a sharp breath and he slides it back to me. “So you got some names; doesn’t mean anything.”
I sense the defeat coming from Hope. The loss of power.
“We know there are more who have access to the server, I saw that. I buried the code deep, but it’s a matter of days before they notice what happened. Before they notice that videos start disappearing, that they can’t reach their funds.”
“Hours, not days,” Knox interjects.
I grab the gun and put it on top of the laptop. “We killed Coach with your gun, same as the two burning in the cabin. Your. Gun.”
He shakes his head. “Dimitri, I—”
“This is your time, the window you need to shut this shit down. Once and for all,” I say and push the laptop towards my dad again. “What would Mom want you to do?” I ask and stand. “With all you told me about her, she would… she would want you to do the right thing.”
I nod to Jaxon and Hope and turn to leave.
Please, Dad, do something good for once.