Chapter 66
Sixty-Six
SEBA
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.
I snap like someone’s called a play, pivoting and chasing after her. The choked sounds coming from her throat ricochet off the stucco walls of the complex, driving knives into my chest.
“Andrea, please.”
She whirls around, lip quivering, “It’s you. My contact on the inside. It’s you.”
“Sweetheart—”
“I don’t want more excuses, Seba!” She shouts, backing away from me. “Just let me go.”
“Not a chance,” I grit out, marching after her. “You’re not pushing me away again. Not without hearing the whole story.”
“Fuck you.”
I catch her wrist.
She shoves me. “You should’ve told me!”
“I tried! I tried over and over, but you refused to listen. Every time he pressured me to lure you in again, I thought, this will be the time—this will be the time I can explain it all to her. But you stopped seeing me— the real me. You iced me out. So I gave you everything I had in the only way you’d take it.
From someone else. Because God forbid, it be from me.
God forbid, I sacrifice years of my life to destroy the man who tore the three of us apart. God fucking forbid.”
“God fucking forbid you called me back that night! You could’ve come for me— we could’ve— I don’t know, run away together until Cade got better or something, but you chose to avoid me like it was my fault!”
I recoil. “Your fault?”
“He’s my father!”
Crowding her space, I growl, “Get that out of your beautiful head. You did nothing wrong. Nothing. And you’re right, I could’ve handled it better.
I should’ve reached out to you sooner, but I was nineteen, Drea.
I know it sounds like an excuse, but I was so fucking lost and so fucking scared.
He was threatening the only two people in the world who matter to me and in that moment, it was either save myself or save you and Cade. I’ll always choose you and Cade.”
A strangled whimper. “No one asked you to be a fucking martyr.”
“Yeah? And what would you have done if he threatened either of us?”
She’s quiet. Ash pale. Tears streaming down her cheeks.
“That’s what I thought,” I scoff. “I did what I had to do and I don’t regret it.
Cade got a chance to get professional help and you—” Fuck this hurts.
“You got to be free— free of the church, of your father, of your past. A chance to live for yourself for once because all you’ve done is live for everyone else. ”
She’s trembling, gripping my hand back. “You fucking idiot, I’m not free.
I haven’t been free since the day you two moved in next door.
” She shakes her head. “You have no idea how hard I fought to keep from hoping…” Her voice breaks.
It breaks me too. “From praying it was you behind those messages. I wanted it so badly to be you. But I convinced myself that you were one of them.”
“I know, sweetheart, I know,” I murmur, my arms circling her— holding onto her like she’ll vanish into smoke if I don’t.
“So much time wasted… hating you when we could’ve been working together,” she cries, face buried in my chest.
“Shh. It wasn’t wasted. We’re gonna get him. I just handed over three more boxes of evidence Sinclair had me pick up from Dr. Larson’s place. They’re closing in and you’re gonna break the story.”
She peels back, peering up at me through bloodshot eyes.
“Me?”
“You think I sent you all that evidence for fun?”
A sniffle and a glare.
The corner of my lip lifts. “I gave you the fuel. You’re gonna light him up.”