Chapter 19 Annabelle
T he attic smells like cedar and old books, warmed by the last touch of sun through the peaked dormer window.
Blankets are stacked on a full mattress in the corner, and fairy lights hang crooked across the beams, half of them burnt out, the other half glowing like lazy fireflies.
The walls are slanted, the floor creaks with every step, and I can’t remember the last time a space made me feel so… safe.
Derek sits behind me on the mattress, knees bracketing my hips, hands working through my braid with careful fingers. I should be exhausted. I should be scared. But up here, with him wrapped in flannel and silence, I feel suspended in something rare.
He finishes tying off the end of my braid, then presses a kiss to my shoulder. “Not bad, huh?”
“For a man who works with oil and engine belts? Impressive.”
He grins. “I told you, mechanics are versatile. You think I can’t handle hair after tuning up a '68 Thunderbird with a seized crankshaft?”
I tilt my head back to look at him. “I have no idea what that means, but it sounds very sexy.”
He leans in, voice dropping. “I could teach you. Engine basics. Or braid basics. I’m good with my hands.”
“That,” I murmur, “I already know.”
“Not exactly the honeymoon suite,” he breathes into my hair, “but there are no bars, the roof doesn’t leak, and the mattress doesn’t squeak unless we make it.”
“That’s a challenge, isn’t it?” I ask, tilting my face toward his.
His grin is all boyish sin. “You married me. You know what you signed up for.”
And maybe I do. Maybe I signed up for a love so fierce it scares me. For a man who makes me want to stop running even when I know the past is catching up.
Despite the handcuffs, the storm, and our legal disaster ahead, I feel safe up here. Safe, and warm, and just a little bit like we’ve found something no one else can touch.
“You signed up to marry a fugitive?” I ask
He laughs, low and warm, the sound settling into my bones.
“Let’s just say, we’re not Romeo and Juliet. We’re the version with a better lawyer and a stronger pulse.”
“I don’t think we’re quite out of the woods, yet,” I say quietly, because hope still feels dangerous.
“Don’t worry. Sounds like Caroline will come through and we’ll get your marriage to Mike annulled.”
I press close to Derek, letting his warmth shield me.
Downstairs, voices echo from the kitchen as Blake, Misty, and Derek’s parents prepare dinner. There’s laughter, the clink of mismatched plates, and the rhythmic thud of Walter Fields chopping carrots like the world isn’t falling apart outside.
Then comes Lena’s call: “Dinner!”
Followed by Blake’s familiar drawl: “Don’t make us climb those attic stairs and drag you down!”
Derek helps me up, and we sneak one last kiss before heading into the real world.
The kitchen glows with candlelight, accented by the gentle twinkle of battery-powered fairy lights strung across the cabinets.
The storm knocked out the power about an hour ago, but it doesn’t feel like an inconvenience.
It feels like a storybook. Outside, the rain has sluiced back in, and after yesterday’s postponement, the May Day race has been cancelled again—the track too waterlogged, and the wind too fierce to risk even a single lap.
The smell of beef stew fills the space, steam curling from a chipped pot on the table, and there’s a mismatched lineup of dishes and Mason jars for glasses.
Walter Fields is carving thick slices of bread with an unnecessarily large hunting knife, grumbling about “losing a damn fridge full of leftovers if the power doesn’t come back.”
Misty’s corralling forks. Lena lights one last candle and mutters how the blackout gives the place ambience.
Blake leans against the fridge, arms folded, smirking.
“About time,” he says as we walk in. “I thought maybe you two were up there installing a skylight or something.”
Derek claps him on the shoulder as he passes. “Nah, just checking the insulation. Annabelle gets cold if the draft’s bad.”
Blake raises his eyebrows. “She seemed warm enough this morning when you carried her into the kitchen with that smug look on your face.”
I press my knuckles to my mouth to hide the smile threatening to break loose.
Walter chuckles. “You boys still think women are impressed with horsepower and lifted suspensions. Lena married me when my car was barely running.”
“That’s because you told me you could fix it by Sunday,” Lena calls from the table. “Took you three years.”
“Exactly,” he says, settling into his chair. “She got a man who’s in it for the long haul.”
We all laugh. The food is simple and perfect. Stew thick with potatoes and carrots, and fresh bread slathered in too much butter. Blake and Misty bicker about the best feed for sows—again.
Walter sets down his spoon with a grin. “You know, the last time we had a blackout like this, Derek nearly torched the porch trying to rig backup power.”
Derek groans. “Dad?—”
“No, no, let me tell it,” Walter insists, grinning widely. “At the ripe age of twenty-eight, Derek thought he could wire a lawnmower engine to a car battery to keep the TV running for some big NASCAR race. Ended up lighting the carburetor on fire and singeing off half his eyebrows.”
Blake snorts into his drink. “You smelled like burnt hair for a week.”
Derek turns toward him. “How do you remember that? You were eight. Annabelle and I had only just started seeing each other back then.”
I remember the time clearly—the way Blake’s eyebrows were still growing out after the accident, ten years later, when Annabelle came back for one of her rare visits.
Too many memories tangled together, from Blake’s boyhood injuries to the bittersweet nights I’d spent with Annabelle, a decade of history and heartbreak woven tight.
“Oh, you don’t forget the smell of burnt hair.”
Derek lobs a crust of bread at him. “Still got the race on, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, and blew our fuse box in the process,” Walter says.
“Mi casa, su casa, Dad.”
Misty grins at the exchange. “I swear, you Fields boys are the only people who turn mechanical failure into a family tradition.”
Walter lifts his glass. “Some families pass down heirlooms. We pass down cautionary tales.”
I sit back in my chair, belly full, heart fuller.
As the laughter fades and everyone digs into second helpings, Walter leans back and rubs his stomach. There’s a pause, a shared weight settling into the space between us, like we all know how rare this moment is. Then Blake raises his wine glass.
“To legal loopholes, secret land deeds, and the two crazy people who might just get it all sorted.”
“To Annabelle and Derek,” Misty echoes.
Glasses clink. I blush.
And for the first time since that courthouse in California, I let myself believe we might be more than just survivors. That maybe—just maybe—we’re actually married. Because it sure as hell feels like it.
Outside, the storm rumbles on, but here in this kitchen, it’s background noise. I’m surrounded by people who love loudly and messily. This isn’t just Derek’s family.
It’s mine now.
After dinner, the candles burn low. Lena shoos everyone to the living room with tea and leftover pie, ignoring Misty’s attempts to help clean. I step outside to join my sister on the front porch. Misty leans against the post, mug in hand, watching the fireflies thread between the trees.
“I went back,” Misty says suddenly, her voice low. “To what’s left of Huntz’s house. I don’t know why. Maybe I needed to see it ruined with my own eyes.”
I glance at her, surprised. “You went alone?”
She nods. “Didn’t stay long. But I found something—half-buried in the office, under the edge of the safe. It was scorched and muddy, but intact enough to maybe matter.”
Annabelle straightens. “What was it?”
“Ledger. Full of numbers and initials I don’t recognize. Might be nothing. But Caroline has it now.”
She shrugs, but the weight behind her eyes says otherwise. “Felt like it wasn’t meant to survive the fire.”
My jaw tightens. “Then maybe it was meant for us.”
We stand in the silence for a moment, letting the weight of her words settle. Then the screen door creaks open behind us, spilling laughter into the night. We follow it in.
Derek pulls me onto his lap on the loveseat while Blake and Misty argue about a three-legged pig they once saw at a county fair and whether or not it should’ve won Best in Show.
It’s all so…normal.
And maybe that’s why the guilt creeps in.
Because this cozy living room, with its threadbare couch, framed photos, and soft hum of comfort, is a world away from the hell I crawled out of. And I know it won’t stay untouched forever.
Derek runs his hand lazily up and down my thigh beneath the blanket. His touch is comforting, casual, like we’ve done this a hundred times. But my nerves are anything but calm.
Caroline’s words echo in my head— get the evidence together . The gun. The journal.
I can’t breathe easily until I know both are in my hands. If Mike finds them, it’s over. If the authorities find them without context, it’s a loaded weapon and a pile of accusations. But if I bring them forward, with my truth, we still have a chance to control the narrative before it swallows us.
I glance at Derek. He’s laughing at something Blake said, head tipped back, eyes soft in a way I don’t see nearly often enough. But there’s a heaviness beneath it—a quiet sag in his shoulders, a slowness in the way his smile lingers like it’s costing him energy to hold onto it.
The kind of tired that doesn’t sleep off easy.
An hour later, he’s asleep beside me, out cold in minutes.
But me? I can’t stop thinking.
So I press a kiss to his cheek and slip out of bed while he’s still snoring.
For once, I’m not running. I’m choosing.
Him. This place. This love.
Once the journal’s destroyed and the gun’s where it can’t hurt us anymore, maybe I’ll finally be free.
My feet make no sound on the stairs. I wrap myself in Derek’s oversized flannel, the sleeves swallowing my hands, and pad into the mudroom to pull on boots.
The rain has stopped, but the world outside is still soaked, and the air is thick with that post-storm quiet that always feels like a held breath.
The moon hangs sharp and bright above the trees, and two fields down, the RV waits near the edge of Derek’s garden.
I cross the field behind the house. Every crunch of gravel sounds like a gunshot. Fear coils low in my spine, thrumming in my ribs with each step.
Derek’s porch light casts a dim glow over the front step as I slip through the screen door, closing it softly behind me to check on the dogs, even though I know Derek already has. Rain returns, soft at first, then steady—falling in rhythmic sheets that blur the edges of the night.
They’re curled up near the wood stove, tails thumping lazily when I approach.
“Hey, babies,” I whisper. “Just a quick check-in, okay?”
I pour fresh kibble into their bowls, refill the water, heart aching as their noses nuzzle my hands.
“You’re safer in here,” I murmur, and mean it.
Outside, the storm surges again. Wind claws at the trees.
My boots squelch through the mud as I cross the garden.
I reach the RV, fumbling with the lock, my rain-slick fingers shaking.
The door creaks open. The smell of old fabric and something faintly like us greets me.
Soap, dust, and the kind of memory that never quite leaves your skin.
I step inside, closing the door gently behind me.
My heart pounds like it’s trying to break free from my chest. The faint glow through the fogged windows slices the darkness into ribbons, turning everything inside into ghost shapes: the cluttered counter, the ripped bench cushion, the cracked mugs in the tiny kitchenette.
I drop to my knees, fingers scrambling with the latch under the bench.
Come on, come on.
The compartment creaks open. There it is. My small, dangerous stash. The gun, wrapped in a towel. The battered black journal, its corners frayed. My breath catches. My hands shake.
I tell myself I’m being paranoid. Just get the journal and go. One more minute and I’ll be back in his arms. I sit on the edge of the bench, the gun heavy in one palm, the journal in the other. My conviction in the right hand. My acquittal in my left.
I zip the journal into my coat. I check the gun—loaded, safety on—then notice my bootlace has come undone. I set the gun on the back shelf and crouch to fix it.
And that’s when I hear footsteps.
Soft. Deliberate.
Someone’s outside.
I freeze.
The rain masks most sounds, but this? It wasn’t wind. Not an animal. It was someone.
I move fast, slipping into the RV’s tiny bathroom. A damp cubicle with a toilet, shower, and sink squeezed into one narrow stall. I shut the door and crouch low, breath shallow in my throat.
And it hits me that I left the gun on the shelf.
Fuck.
The RV door creaks open.
Pause.
Footsteps. Measured. Testing. Walking the aisle.
Another pause. Then the cabinet doors open.
Then close.
Don’t check the bathroom. Don’t check the bathroom.
I hold my breath until something brushes my shoulder.
I glance down.
Eight crooked spider legs crawl across my collarbone.
My scream is instinct. Sharp and raw. I fall out of the stall, door crashing open as the intruder moves fast. Too fast.
Rain roars. Lightning flashes.
And then I see him.
Mike.
Just as a cloth clamps over my mouth and nose.
Sickly sweet.
Chloroform.
He lifts me into his arms, dragging me against his chest like a twisted mockery of an embrace.
“Hello, Belle,” he murmurs, voice like poison. “Miss me?”
I thrash. Eyes wide. Hands flailing.
But my limbs go slack.
The last thought before darkness takes me is one I can’t scream:
I left without telling Derek.
And now?
Mike has me.