Chapter 16
Sixteen
AURELIA
Istill feel him, his cologne on my skin, no matter how hard I scrub. My body still hasn’t recovered. I still feel aftershocks of him, of what he did. I wrap my arms around myself, but it doesn’t help. The feeling is still here.
He didn’t just touch me. He took something. The memory I had of him before, I never had, and even that now is replaced with flashes I can’t escape. The way his hands moved. The way his voice dropped. The way I reacted.
And the worst part is… I think I like it.
I’ve never felt this way before. My whole life, it was just Daniel. But I never burned for him like this. Never wanted more. Never found myself replaying moments, craving them, hating myself for it.
Now I do. For a stranger. For the way he made me feel.
I press my fingers to my lips.
I think I’m addicted.
I know his name now. But I still don’t know who he truly is.
I know he kept his promises. So, I have to keep mine.
A piece of paper is in front of me, edges already crumpled from how many times I’ve picked it up and put it down. Ten ways to kill him and get away with it. I can write the steps. But when I try to picture actually doing it, my hands go still.
I wouldn’t be able to.
What is wrong with me?
I drag in a breath and force my eyes away from the list.
The table in front of me is worse. There are bones scattered across the surface.
I sit here, staring at them, trying to make sense of human anatomy in seconds. I mixed Daniel and Lilibeth bones together in the same box last night. And now I have to separate them.
My fingers hover over them before I start separating piece by piece. I try to remember what belongs to who, but everything looks the same after a while. Everything feels the same.
Dasha mentioned once she had a friend in the police. An idea came to me that maybe her friend can check if Daniel’s bones truly belong to him or did Nathaniel lie to me.
I need to know if he’s really gone.
Because until I do, I won’t be able to breathe without wondering if he’s out there somewhere… waiting to come back.
I lift each bone, one by one, turning it in my hands. In some logic in my head, I start to separate them. The bigger ones go to the right. The smaller ones to the left. The only bone that’s already on the left is the one with her wedding ring still looped around it.
I swallow and look away.
I have to finish this before the mailman comes. I have to send it to Dasha.
My fingers hover over the piles again. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve never done anything like this before. I press my thumb against one bone, then another, measuring them against my own fingers like that will somehow make it clearer.
It doesn’t.
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. My hands drop to my head, fingers dragging through my hair, pulling it back from my face as I squeeze my eyes shut for a second.
Focus.
I reach for the last bone and place it on the right side.
That has to be it.
The rest… I just assume they belong to Lilibeth. I don’t let myself think too hard about it as I gather them, and slide them into a plastic bag. Daniel’s remains go into the box.
I stand, grab the tape, and seal the box shut, running my palm over the top.
Done.
I step back, then sit down again, picking up the pen. And I start to write to Dasha.
I sniff, tears slipping down. I kiss the paper and slide it with the money into the envelope, and drag my tongue along the edge to seal it. Just in time, the doorbell rings.
I grab the box and hurry from the staff kitchen into the hallway, my pace getting quicker until I reach the front door.
When I pull it open, the mailman is there, just as he promised. Eight in the morning, not a minute off.
“Good morning,” he says. “Do you have everything ready?”
“Here,” I say, pushing the box toward him, then the envelope. “They go to the same address.” The words come tripping over each other.
“Ugh.” My palm presses to my forehead. “I’m sorry. Good morning.” I let out a shallow breath. “That was rude.”
I reach into my back pocket, pull out the money, and hand it to him. “For your trouble.”
He presses his lips into a thin line, then nods. “Thank you. It should arrive in two days.”
“Thank you,” I say, already closing the door.
The latch clicks, and I lean back for a second, exhaling as I step further inside. My eyes move on the phone. The cord is loose, stretched longer than it was before, twisted from where he wrapped it around me last night.
I take another step and I stop in the middle of the hallway just as I hear movements above.
He comes down the staircase, wearing a white shirt, and black trousers. His hair is still wet from the shower, two strands slipping over his forehead. When his gaze finds me, his eyes look darker, deeper shade of blue.
“What,” I gasp. “What are you doing here?”
He lifts a brow. “It’s my house.”
Heat rushes to my face. My gaze drops to my feet.
“Are you going to do that often?”
“What?” He keeps walking down the stairs. “Take a shower?”
“No.” I let out a short laugh, though my heartbeat climbs higher with every step he takes. “I meant... are you going to come here more often?
He laughs.
“Uhm.” His jaw tightens. “Do you want me to go?”
“No,” I say too quickly.
As much as I hate admitting it, I have not seen anything. No shadows, no people, nothing I could call ghosts since he stayed here with me last night.
He steps closer. “I want the list, Kitten.”
I take a step back. “It’s not done yet.”
He takes a step closer. His hand wraps around mine, pulling me toward him, the other lifting to cup my cheek, then the other, holding my face in place. “Maybe you need a little motivation.”
My throat tightens as his face moves closer.
“Maybe,” I whisper, my eyes falling shut.
His scent reaches me. The smell of the ocean. The same scent I remember from the blazer at the hospital.
His lips press against mine.
Behind my closed eyes, images break through in sharp flashes. It comes back to me.
That night from six years ago.
It was 1987, a month after he married Lilibeth.
Daniel and I had gotten into another fight after he saw the invitation to Nathaniel’s house. Even though Nathaniel was married now, Daniel was still jealous of him.
The words kept coming out of his mouth like poison. He called me slut, whore, his regret. He told me he would make me sorry I had ever met Nathaniel, and all I wanted was to get out of that house and see him.
I had made a mistake a month ago when he called.
I had said things I didn’t mean. I had no choice.
Daniel knew that if I left, he would do everything in his power not only to ruin me, but my family, too.
He locked me away again, inside the closet, and left me a small knife.
Then he told me I had to carve thirty cuts into my stomach, and he would let me go.
Thirty for the thirty days that had passed since I answered Nathaniel’s call. Even he knew I shouldn’t have answered it.
I started carving. My white shirt turned red, soaking through with blood.
I could barely see in the dark, but I still dragged the blade across my skin repeatedly.
By the time my head began to spin, the closet smelled like blood and sweat.
My fingers had gone numb. My stomach burned.
I kept going until the knife nearly slipped from my hand.
The next thing I remembered was waking up in a car near the Rosewood Residence.
I still don’t know what he wanted to do.
Maybe he thought I had killed myself and wanted to blame it on Nathaniel.
Maybe he had another plan. But the car was empty when I woke up, so I pushed the door open and stumbled out.
I walked and walked until I saw the light glowing from Nathaniel’s house.
I rang the doorbell, and Victor answered. Nathaniel stood on the staircase when the door opened, and he didn’t even say a word before he ran to my side.
I remember he took me to the guest house, let me shower, and gave me one of his shirts to wear. After that, I wandered into his bedroom, where he kept a piano for some reason, and I noticed the room was no longer empty. It was filled with Lilibeth’s things.
Every time I got bullied at school, I used to play notes by letter so he would understand me without asking too many questions. I sat at the piano and placed my hands over the keys. I kept pressing D and A, over and over.
He came closer, then sat beside me. “Who did this to you?” he asked.
I played D and A one last time, and then I heard him say, “Daniel.”
I only nodded.
I remember the way he hugged me after that. The way he told me everything would be fine, that he was still there for me, that even if he was with someone else, he was still my friend. He was still going to protect me.
I remember crying, tears falling, and the pain in my stomach that came suddenly. I was bleeding again.
I blink through the blur of tears and open my eyes to his.
He is here.
Right in front of me, just like before.
My palm finds his cheek, and my voice comes out in a whisper. “I remember.”
His eyes shine, almost glassy, fixed on mine. “You remember?” he asks.
“I’m sorry,” I choke, the words breaking out of me.. “I’m sorry. Out of everyone, I forgot you.” My other hand comes up, holding his face like I’m afraid he might disappear. “I’m so, so sorry. You were the only person worth remembering, and I couldn’t remember you.”
“It’s okay,” he says softly, pressing his lips to mine. “It’s okay.”
“If I ever forget again, please don’t leave.” My tears fall faster, slipping past my lashes. “Please stay.”
“I’m not going anywhere, Kitten.” His thumb brushes under my eyes, catching each tear. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Everyone left me. Everyone moved on.” My voice trembles. “But you kept coming back. Please… please don’t stop.”
He kisses me again, slower this time, like a promise. “I won’t.”
“Your promises are the only ones worth believing.”
“I lost you once. I’m not losing you again.” He says, pulling me closer.