Chapter 50
Chapter Fifty
Emilia
My legs ache from the forty-five-minute run with Bridget, the gruelling two-hour session I spent with Kieran, and the half-hour lesson in knife throwing with my favourite tattooed girl this morning.
Two months ago, I’d laugh if someone told me that’s how I would end up spending my days off, but now… now I just feel invigorated. Ready. Alert.
I shift on my feet and lift my hand to knock on Number 14 once more.
“Mils?” I turn to see Kayla’s husband, dressed in black overalls, jogging down the street towards me.
“Jace,” I greet, smiling at him. “How you doing?”
His smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but he nods. “Alright, I guess. Rayden’s looking out for me, so… yeah, I’m okay. You?”
“Yeah.” I nod back. “Heidi and Sam for me.” And Claudia and Jordan, but I choose to keep that quiet.
“At least,” he pauses, the words stuck in his throat, “they’re over halfway now.”
“Yeah,” I murmur. “Did Rayden pass on my message?”
“That they’re alive?” I nod. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Small blessings, right?”
The silence that settles between us is thick with everything we’re scared of. Everything we don’t know.
I shift on my feet. “Do you… miss her?”
Jace looks up sharply, lets out a raspy breath. His eyes drift towards the houses across the street, to his and Kayla’s. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I do.”
His voice is raw and laced with so many emotions that it trembles. His fingers curl into a fist, and his throat bobs. I’ve seen his exact pained expression somewhere before.
In Rayden’s eyes years ago when I refused a relationship.
“You like her.” The words slip out of me, quiet but certain.
A flicker of a smile confirms it. “Maybe,” Jace says.
“You should tell her,” I say softly.
His gaze drops to the pavement, and his brow creases. “Maybe. Maybe not,” he murmurs. “Depends on how she comes out of this. How messed up she is when it’s over.”
“Jace—”
“But I won’t leave her to go through it on her own,” he says, tone sharp. “Never.”
Before I can say anything else, the door swings open. Heidi blinks in surprise, gaze flicking between us. “Hey,” she says.
“Hey.” Jace straightens, running a hand through his curly hair, his expression clearing. “I just wanted to check you were okay, Mils. I’ve got to get to work.” He shoots Heidi a half-smile before heading off down the street.
“Is he okay?” Heidi asks.
I frown, staring at the retreating man. “I’m not sure,” I admit. Heidi sighs sadly, before gesturing for me to enter. “Where’s Sam?” I ask as she closes the door. I slump onto their sofa, dropping my navy bag beside me.
“He went for a run,” she says. “Claudia and Jordan?”
“Working today.” She smiles, collapsing beside me, curly ponytail bouncing as she does so. “I have something to show you,” I tell her.
Her eyes widen. “What?”
“Promise you won’t judge me?”
She scoffs, rolling her eyes and giving me a scowl. “I would never judge you.”
I grimace, bracing myself as I grab the sleeve at my elbow, yanking it up.
She’s a deer caught in headlights, eyes wider than Anna’s sneer. Her mouth gapes, and her entire body freezes. I peer down at the black outline of the peacock butterfly, and a surge of warmth twirls calmly through my gut.
“What?” she exclaims, eyes flitting between mine and the ink. “How? When?”
“Jordan and Claudia know a guy.”
“It’s beautiful,” she utters. “I want one!”
“Slow down, Heid.” I smile.
She rolls her eyes. “So you can have one, but I can’t?”
‘You’re basically my little sister.”
“I’m nineteen.”
I nod, reaching over and nudging her shoulder. “That’s younger than me.”
She kisses her teeth. “And yet, you planned on getting one the minute you turned eighteen.”
“Things change.”
“No, they don’t. You have one.”
I giggle, reaching out and pulling her into my arms. “I’m just trying to keep you out of trouble,” I say.
“What about keeping yourself out of trouble?”
“Don’t worry about me.”
She snorts. “I worry every damn day.”
“I’m fine,” I assure her, though my voice trembles as an image slams through me: Zac and Kayla hanging from the ceiling, their wrists bound with chains, dangling like meat. My stomach twists, wrenching violently.
Heidi pulls back, studying me. A frown crosses her features. “Liar.”
I force the images out of my mind, pressing them back until my head aches from the effort. I force a smile. Her lips purse. She isn’t buying it, not for a second, so I grab the first distraction I can think of.
“There’s this… girl,” I tell her. “Claudia and Jordan introduced me to her.”
“Right?”
“Her and Zac… they used to… you know.”
“Oh, Mils…”
“And she won’t fucking shut up saying shit about how he doesn’t like me—”
“Did you punch her?”
A laugh bursts out of me. I shake my head. “I wanted to. I always want to.”
Heidi’s lips twitch. “You should.”
“It’s fine,” I say quickly, forcing the words out.
“It’s not like I want Zac for myself.” Something sour coats my tongue the second the words leave my mouth, but I swallow it down, not ready to unpack that.
I exhale. “She’s… such a bitch,” I mutter.
“And she’s been around for so long. I’ll never be able to compete with her. ”
Heidi’s brow lifts. “Do you want to compete with her?”
I look away. Yes, I do.
“Mils—”
The front door opens, cutting her off. Sam steps inside, panting from his run, red tee wet with sweat, his hair damp, dangling onto his forehead. His face brightens as his eyes settle on me. “Mils?”
“Hey.” I smile, grateful for the interruption. “You’ll never guess what I brought you.” I grab my bag, unzipping it and yanking out a book.
He laughs, stepping closer and taking it from me. “I never thought I’d see this again.”
“Figured it was time I returned it,” I say, slumping back into their couch cushions.
He grins, flicking through the wrinkled pages, the broken spine flat on his hand. “Heid, this is that one I told you about. Mils and I were obsessed with it just after the war,” Sam says. “She’s had my copy for three years.”
“Oops,” I murmur, offering a sheepish smile and giving him a weak shrug.
Sam chuckles, passing the book to his wife, before sinking onto their armchair.
We spend the next hour trying to convince the book-hating Heidi to give it a chance, teasing and bargaining until she finally relents with a groan.
The day slips by like a fairytale, the three of us laughing and chatting, the outside world fading to nothing.
And even when Zac’s tortured, bloody body slams into my mind every few minutes, it can’t quite shatter the peace of this moment. It’s one of the calmest days I’ve had since they dragged him away.