Chapter 18
MADDISON
“Maddy, can you hear me?” My aunt Ellie’s voice fills the darkness surrounding me.
I want to call out to her, but I’m too scared to open my mouth. I’m sitting in a closet in the dark, hiding from the police who showed up here because one of my friends’ parents overdosed and died in the living room.
I found the woman’s body, sprawled out on the floor, with a needle in their arm. My mother and father had left the house, but a few people were sleeping on the sofa.
I knew the woman on the floor with a needle in her arm was dead, though, the instant I walked into the house after getting home from school.
It wasn’t the first time I’ve seen a dead body, but that’s not too strange for where I live.
Still, I imagine that most eleven-year-old Royal children probably haven’t seen a dead person.
I hug my knees to my chest and scoot back further into the closet. Part of me wants to stay here, where I don’t have to go out into the light again, where I’m forced to see bad things—
The door cracks open and light spills into the darkness.
My aunt Ellie is standing in the doorway.
“I’m so sorry, Maddy,” she tells me as she offers me her hand. “I never should’ve left you here.”
I place my hand in hers, and she helps me to my feet. “It’s not your fault,” I whisper. “I have to live here, no matter how much I don’t want to.”
She’s quiet for a bit with a frown on her face. “I’m…” She smooshes her lips together. “Do you want to come stay with me for a few days?”
Relief cascades over me as I nod.
It’s always better when I stay with her. In fact, I often wish my aunt were my mother—
The images around me shift. Suddenly, I’m running through my aunt Ellie’s house, terrified as she runs with me and ushers me into her bedroom closet.
“Whatever you do, don’t come out of here,” she whispers, then the door clicks shut.
I’m sitting in the darkness again, and for a while, the air is quiet. But then I hear loud voices that turn to shouting. It grows louder and louder, then I hear a few gunshots before everything grows quiet again.
I remain still, my heart pounding in my chest as the closet door opens up. I’m so scared I almost scream, but then my aunt Ellie steps into the doorway.
I start to relax, but then I notice the blood all over her clothes.
“Everything’s okay,” she assures me. “I just need you to stay here for a bit longer. It’s for your own safety, Maddy.”
I nod, and she closes the door again.
I sit there for what feels like forever, wondering why my aunt was covered in blood.
I jolt awake. The lights are also out, which only adds to my panic. Little gasps slip from my lips as I sit up and scan the darkness encompassing me.
“What is it?” Finn asks, and his voice brings me a drop of ease in the wave of panic flooding my body.
“It’s just too dark,” I tell him. “I can’t get my bearings.”
“Hold on.”
I hear rustling and then soft light filters through the room as he turns on a lamp that’s on the nightstand.
He rolls onto his back and then sits up, worriedly looking me over. “You had a nightmare.”
I want to deny it, pretend to be tough, but I’m too drained at the moment. “How can you tell?”
“It’s all over your face.” He grazes the back of his hand across my cheek. “What was it about? Being in this room?”
“Oddly, no.” I inhale and exhale before lying down.
“It was about my real mother. I think it was more of a memory, though, than an actual nightmare.” I rest my arm on my head as I gaze up at the ceiling.
“Lately, I’ve been remembering memories that I've apparently forgotten. I wasn’t sure why, but after the one I just remembered, I’m guessing I forgot it because it was extremely traumatic. ”
He lies down beside me, props up on his elbow, and rests his cheek against his hand. “Can I ask what it was about? But you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
My cheeks puff as I blow out a breath. “It started with the memory of when I found a dead body in the living room of my fake parents’ house.”
“You found a dead body,” Finn repeats slowly, as if he believes he misheard me. When I nod, the color drains from his face. “How old were you?”
“Eleven.” My voice is barely a whisper. “It wasn’t the first time I saw a dead body.
But I’d never seen one in my house before.
” I stare at the ceiling as I speak. “The person overdosed, and they had a needle in their arm. I had gotten home from school when I found them on the floor. I could tell right away they were dead. There were also other people in the house, but they were all too high to notice. I called the police, but then I had a panic attack and ended up hiding in the closet until my aunt Ellie, or well, my mother, came and took me to her place for a few weeks.”
“Did the police call child protective services?”
I snort a disdainful laugh. “I’m sure they did, but no one gives a shit about kids on northside.
I’ve been smacked around, left at stores, been in the middle of a drug raid, and I still always ended up back at that house.
” My lips quiver as I seal them firmly together, trying to get a grasp on my emotions.
“I know my mother was trying to protect me from my real identity falling into the wrong hands, but I’m still having a difficult time wrapping my head around why she thought me living in that hellhole was any better. ”
He absentmindedly twists a strand of my hair around his finger. “Did she know how bad it was?”
“Yes. She visited me all the time, but always left. It’s why I learned to take care of myself from an early age and to never trust anyone.”
He cups my cheek and angles my face toward him. “You can trust me. I know it might take a while for you to believe me, but I promise you can. We’re in this together.”
I revolve to my side, so I’m facing him. “I’m going to work on my trust issues. I kind of have to, considering the situation that we’re in, because if we are going to get out of here, our trust needs to be solid.”
“Agreed.” He strokes my cheek with his hand.
I’m not positive why I’m letting him touch me like this, other than I’m tired.
That’s the reason I attempt to convince myself anyway.
The brutal truth is that I find comfort in his touch as we lie in this bed, trapped in this room, with fresh wounds of traumatic memories haunting the space around us.
“I remembered more, too. Right after that happened, after I found that body, and I went to live with Ellie, something happened where she was freaking out and made me hide in a closet. I heard a lot of yelling, then gunshots.” I force down a tremulous breath.
“And then when she opened the door again, she had blood all over her.”
Finn goes rigid, and his fingers, which are tangled in my hair, freeze. “Did she shoot someone?”
I elevate a shoulder. “I’m not sure, but I think so. And I’m wondering if she did it to protect me because she’s not a killer.”
A crease forms between his brows. “How do you think she didn’t get caught? I mean, if she shot someone?”
“I have no idea, but at this point, anything is probably possible. Maybe she had someone help her cover it up. I don’t know… All I know is that with the amount of blood that was on her, I really doubt whoever was on the receiving end of that came out of it alive.”
Finn mulls this over, his fingers leaving my hair and skimming down my arm. “Maybe my mom helped her cover it up,” he says, inching closer to me to keep our conversation as private as possible. “She’s helping her right now, right? So maybe she helped her cover up the deaths back then.”
My brows draw together. “Why would your mom do that, though?”
He skims the pad of his thumb along my jawline. “I’m not sure, other than she didn’t want my father getting his hands on you.”
“What do you think is the point of him keeping us here? Do you think he’s going to keep me here until I… Until I have a baby?” I ask as he trails his fingers along my shoulder, down my arm, and to my hand.
He tangles his fingers with mine. “We’re going to get you out of here before that. I said you can trust me. Well, trust me with this. We’re getting out of here. I promise.”
I wish I could say I wholly believe him. But while I do think he means his words, I’m not so convinced we’ll be able to find a way out of this prison of a bedroom.