28. Tyler
My heart thundered as I scrambled to the end of my bed, putting myself between Indiana and the intruder. I searched the dimness in my kitchen for the asshole behind the voice.
“Don’t fucking move!” the bastard said.
The dim glow from the trailer park lights outside filtered through the lace curtain, casting long shadows that stretched like fingers across the cramped space.
“Okay. Okay.” I raised my hands. “Calm down. What do you want?”
“You.”
“Okay. Now you have me. Let’s go outside.” I tried to see the man in my kitchen, but the shadows were too dark. He was as tall as me but wasn’t built like a fighter. I clenched my fists, determined to protect Indy.
“You took everything from me.” The voice cut through the silence like a jagged shard of glass. It was vaguely familiar, and yet it wasn’t.
“Who are you?” I inched closer, staring into the darkness. Behind me, Indiana’s ragged breathing was like an alarm screaming in my mind.
The asshole was breathing loud, too, like he’d run a marathon or he was scared out of his fucking mind.
His silhouette was a dark smudge against the faint light. His stance was wide like he was ready to attack. Yet, there was a sense of discomfort about him, too.
Hoping he couldn’t see me very well, I inched closer to him.
My eyes adjusted to the darkness, and I saw something in his hand. Fuck. A gun.
“Listen,” I said, “I don’t know who you are but?—”
“I fucking thought I knew who you were. You lied to me. To us.”
My heart launched up my throat.
“Owen?” My voice was steady despite the adrenaline pumping through my veins.
Had Wesley’s twin brother found me?
“You killed my family.”
“I’m sorry. I truly?—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Easy.” As I tried to calm him, my mind raced. “Let me turn on a light so you can see me.”
His gun hand trembled, but when he didn’t respond, I turned on the strip lighting that ran along the hall ceiling.
Fuck me. He is exactly like Wesley’s ghost.
This was Wesley’s face, twisted with grief and anger. His eyes, twin pools of Wesley’s, gripped me in their deadly rage. The same eyes that had laughed alongside his brother’s now narrowed with hatred. Yet he seemed to be having an internal battle. A war between blood and retribution that he had probably been waging for two years.
Raising my hands, I inched closer.
“Stay there.” His finger twitched on the trigger, a movement so small yet screaming volumes.
“Okay, okay.” I raised my hands higher and slowly turned around, showing him I was unarmed, with my back to him, I mouthed to Indiana to stay down. Her wide eyes matched the fear racing through me.
I faced Owen again. His chest rose and fell, and his arms trembled. He was a bomb set to detonate.
“Owen,” I said, low and urgent, “I never meant to kill Wesley.”
“But you did.”
“Yes, and I regret it every single day. But he shot me twice. In my back and chest.”
“You should have fucking died.”
“I know. Where’s your mom?”
His hand twitched around the gun. “She’s dead.”
“Oh, jeez. Owen, I’m so sorry.”
“Fuck you. Stop lying.”
“I’m not lying. I loved your mom.”
“You fucking killed her.” He snapped the gun up again, his eyes wild, a caged animal cornered by grief.
“No. Wait.” My mind tumbled back to that shootout in the warehouse. Nikki’s eyes had been on me when she’d cut Ebony’s throat. When Ebony slumped to the ground with blood pouring from her neck, I fired my gun at Nikki as she sprinted away. Blood splatter proved that I’d hit her.
“I didn’t know she was dead. I honestly thought she’d escaped. I thought you both did.”
“Why did you do it?” Owen’s voice was ragged, laced with a pain I understood all too well.
I choked back my guilt and loathing for the twisted lies I’d told to this boy. “I’m sorry. It was my job.”
“Wesley and I, we . . . we—” His words were charged with anger and sorrow.
“I never expected to fall in love with your mom or you boys. But I did. And I wanted to help you get out of that life. I tried Owen. I tried.”
“How?” he spat.
“I begged Nikki to leave Albert. I said I’d take you all into witness protection. I would look after you.”
“Liar.” His voice cracked like a whip.
“I’m not lying.” I inched closer.
“I’m sick of your bullshit.”
“Let me help you. Before you do something you can’t come back from, Owen. End your family legacy here.”
“You ended it when you killed everyone. You’re a fucking murderer.”
“Your father was evil, Owen. He didn’t love you.”
“Shut up.”
Taking a step closer, I leaned forward, and tilting my head, I pulled back my ear to show him the burn scar. “See this? Your dad did this with a lit cigar.”
“You probably deserved it.”
“He did that to me because I stopped him from beating up your mom in a drunken rage.”
He clenched his jaw, but his eyes belied him.
“He beat up your mother. Abused her. She protected you from all that, and I tried to protect her and you and Wesley.”
“But you killed them.”
“And I hate myself for that. Wesely shouldn’t have been in that warehouse. I told you boys to stay in the car. I was protecting you. Why did he get out of the car? Why?”
“It’s my fault, okay?” A reflection of my own guilt stared back at me. “I knew something wasn’t right, and I told Wesley to follow you, but I should have gone after you. Me.”
He slapped his chest, and rage simmered in his eyes, taking me back to our first months together, where every minute with him was accompanied by blind teenage rage.
“It’s not your fault.”
He aimed the gun at me, but his hand trembled.
“Don’t! Don’t shoot. You’re a good boy. You always were.”
“Shut up.” His chin quivered.
“I loved you and Wesley like my own sons. And your mom. You were family to me.” The truth burned in my chest, an ache that wouldn’t fade.
“Family?” Owen spat the word out like venom, but his eyes betrayed him, glossy with unshed tears. “You don’t kill family.”
His hand shook, and the pistol quivered with his indecision. He wasn’t the same boy who used to laugh in the face of danger. He was fractured by loss.
“Every night when I close my eyes, I see Wesley’s face.” The confession tore through me, raw and exposed. “I hear his voice, asking me why. There’s no peace for me, Owen. Not ever. I see Wesley’s ghost.”
“What?” His bottom lip wobbled.
“Wesley’s ghost. I see him all the time.”
“Good. I hope he haunts you forever.”
“You know why he haunts me, Owen? Because we loved each other, but we shot each other. Yet he died. And I lived. There’s no reasoning behind that. He’s as confused as I am.”
“Shut up! Just shut up!” His plea was a crack in his armor.
I risked another inch with my hands raised in surrender. “I get it. You want justice?”
“Justice?” he blurted. “I want fucking revenge.”
“Hey,” a man’s voice boomed from outside. “Is everything okay in there?”
“But at what cost, Owen? Spending your life in prison? Is killing worth that? You should live. Live for Wesley . . . he would want that. Walk away.”
My trailer seemed to hold its breath. There was only Owen, the gun, and my desperate plea to save a boy born into a legacy of revenge wars.
“Killing me won’t fill the void Wesley left behind. I will forever live with the guilt of what I did to your family. Don’t let my murder be the guilt that burdens you. It’s not worth it. I’m not worth it.”
“You don’t know what it’s like. I see him every time I look in the mirror. He’s looking at me. Glaring at me.” The gun dipped a fraction, and Owen’s eyes locked onto mine, a storm of love and hate swirling within.
“I know.”
“You don’t fucking know,” he screamed and yanked the gun’s aim back to my face.
“I’m calling the police,” the man outside yelled.
Good. Call the cops.
I raised my hands higher. “Owen. You’re right. Sorry.”
We stared at each other.
“I know Wesley would want you to live.”
“Shut up!” The gun wobbled in his hand.
“Owen, listen to me. You don’t want to do this.” I took a step, slow and measured, and the bullet wound in my back stung like a deadly warning.
“Back off!” His finger tightened on the trigger.
I froze, hands raised.
“Owen. Stop this now and walk away. I won’t tell anyone you were here.”
“Bullshit. You’re a fucking liar!” His words boomed around my trailer.
“The police are on their way,” the man yelled outside.
“Don’t let this be how this ends. Wesley wouldn’t want this.”
“Shut up!” The gun shook in his hands. “You don’t know what Wesley wants.”
I charged at Owen and grabbed the weapon.
The gun exploded.