Chapter Twenty-Three Violet
Chapter Twenty-Three
Violet
I pulled the curtain aside and peered out.
The cruiser parked at the curb didn’t ease the weight pressing against my ribs.
The flashing console lights of the police car cast faint glimmers against the dark glass.
The officer sat inside, unmoving, a silhouette against the glow.
To anyone else it might have been reassuring.
To me, it felt like a massive neon sign letting everyone know I needed a watchdog.
All I could picture was the SUV and the man standing outside of it, watching me, all but chanting my name.
A neighbor walked past, head ducked. He didn’t glance at me, but I saw his mouth move. I knew it was probably just a good night to someone on his phone, but my mind supplied the worst: a chant, a prayer to whatever god they served in Ohio.
Every creak of the walls made me twitch. The hum of the fridge cut like a blade. My home—the place I once thought of as a sanctuary—had turned into a prison cell.
For the rest of the evening, I busied myself the best I could.
I showered, changed into leggings and an oversize sweater, and cooked enough dinner that there would be leftovers if Grayson came by hungry.
The motion kept me upright, but not whole.
While the food cooled on the counter, untouched, I poured a glass of red wine and sank onto the couch.
A rom-com flickered on the TV, its laughter a mockery of my silence.
Every so often, headlights from passing cars cut across my blinds, splashing my living room in pale stripes that made the picture frames blink. I drank another glass of wine. I felt exposed, like the world held its breath and never quite released it.
A news ticker crawled across the bottom of the screen. A missing girl from Ohio. The name mattered, of course, but it was the state that meant more to me. I squeezed my eyes shut, and when I opened them again, the ticker was gone and the couple on screen were intimately embracing.
When the knock came, I was already moving.
I made sure it was Grayson before opening the door, and the instant adrenaline and endorphin hit rushed through my bloodstream.
Grayson filled the frame. His jacket was zipped to his throat, his hair messy like he’d been running his hands through it in frustration.
His eyes were shadowed in a way that made my stomach dip.
He looked at me, then at the cruiser that still sat at the curb, and back again.
“You good?” he asked, his voice rough and moving through me until I shivered. But there was something underlying his voice. He sounded uneasy, like he carried something with him from wherever he’d been.
“I’m good.”
I stepped aside without a word. He came in, and the house instantly seemed smaller, safer, as if the walls had shifted closer to keep out the dark.
“Hey,” I managed, hating how thin my voice sounded.
He shut the door, slid the bolt into place, and only then did his hands rise to rest on either side of my face, gently grounding me.
He was steady, his thumbs warming circles on my skin, as if silently saying everything would be okay.
“You all right?” He seemed taken aback by my question.
Something flickered in his eyes, the tension he held easing, but something else taking its place. “I’m good, baby. Now.”
We headed into the kitchen, where I heated the food for him, and then we sat on the couch and just talked about our days.
He’d already told me—quietly, carefully—about the new body they’d found, the woman strung up like a warning, her chest carved open and empty.
He hadn’t wanted to bring that horror into my house any sooner than he had to.
He wanted to know it all—the good and bad . . . the dark parts. I told him about everything: the man outside the café, the SUV with the same Ohio plates waiting at the corner when I got home.
“The man was out of his car. He stepped out from behind it. He wanted me to notice,” I said, hearing how steady my voice had become. “They want me to know they’re there. They are done hiding. And Grayson—” My voice broke. “I know my time being free of them is ending.”
His jaw went rigid. He muttered something vicious under his breath, then reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a flash drive. He set it on the coffee table with a soft click that seemed too loud in the silence.
“Schafer, the PI I work with, pulled information for me,” he said, voice low, controlled, but under it I heard fury leashed tight.
“The SUV traces back to a leasing company in Ohio. Paper trail’s a mess with subcontractors that don’t exist, cash payments with no real receipts.
Seems sloppy, but I think it’s all intentional. ”
I stared at Grayson, my chest tight, and shook my head.
“You didn’t need Schafer to tell you about the Ohio plates .
. . I already know what that means. That’s where they came from—where I came from.
Ohio isn’t just a state on a map; it’s where the cult was born, where Marcus built his kingdom of blood and lies, where they branded me as theirs.
They’re telling me I’ll never really outrun Ohio. ”
His eyes locked on mine, sharp and unflinching. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
We sat in the hush of my living room. The cruiser outside idled, headlights cutting through the blinds every time a car passed.
“They’ve already made mistakes. They’ve left tracks. Ones we can use.”
We. The word landed sharp but warm. With Grayson, I didn’t feel like prey.
Before bed, Grayson cleared the house with me. Room by room, flicking light switches with the back of his knuckles, eyes sweeping corners, checking the locks on every door. When we circled back to the kitchen, I froze.
A shadow flickered right outside the back door—brief, but enough that my breath caught.
“Grayson,” I whispered, but he was already moving. He pulled the curtain aside.
The yard was still. Too still. And then I saw it. At the very edge of the porch light sat a small, ordinary-looking box. My throat closed, and I felt my hand come up, curling around my neck. Every instinct told me what was inside.
“I know what’s in there,” I whispered.
“Stay inside.” His expression hardened, unreadable, as he unlocked the back door and stepped out barefoot into the yard.
For long moments he didn’t touch it. He crouched, studying the box, knife sliding from his pocket. He cut the tape, peeled back the flaps. I couldn’t see over his shoulder, but the way his body went still, the way his shoulders locked—it had my heart pounding, and my knees weakening.
Grayson stood slowly and carried the box back inside. The door locked behind him with a solid click. He set the box on the counter, and I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe. My throat worked around words that wouldn’t come. My gaze flicked from the cardboard to his face. His expression was haunted.
“Is it . . .” My voice cracked.
“A heart,” he said flatly.
My knees buckled. I braced against the counter. “Oh my God.”
He exhaled long and steady, then opened the flaps wider. My stomach flipped as the smell hit me. Metal. Flesh. Inside a clear plastic bag sat a bloody heart, still wet, still obscene in its completeness.
“Whose—” My voice died in my throat.
“The woman I told you about earlier,” he said quietly, as if reading my thoughts.
“A woman. Strung up. Posed. She’d been cut open.
Her heart was missing. And . . .” He paused, jaw tight.
Grayson hesitated, his gaze searching mine as if weighing how much more I could take tonight .
. . how much more he was willing to share.
“They wrote something in the dirt beside her.”
“W-what?” My grip on the counter hurt.
For a moment his eyes flickered away from mine, and I felt it. It was that tiny fracture in his usual steadiness. He was holding something back. I didn’t know what, but the silence around it felt heavier than the heart on the counter.
Then he swallowed hard, the muscle in his jaw jumping. “She is ours.”
My skin prickled with cold sweat, every hair on my body standing on end.
It was like something unholy had been dragged into my home and set between us on the counter.
My chest caved in on itself. My own heartbeat thundered, desperate to stay inside me.
Panic swallowed me whole—ragged breathing, trembling fingers, the desperate urge to bolt into the night and never look back.
“They’ll never stop,” I muttered. “Not until they have me. I can’t keep letting this happen.
” For one terrible moment, I thought: Maybe if I gave myself up, no one else would die.
But then a strange quiet spread through me, a hollow calm that felt just as dangerous as the panic had.
My pulse slowed. My breaths steadied. Because I knew. I had always known.
Grayson’s jaw clenched, his voice low and savage. “Don’t fucking think about it,” he growled, as if he could hear my thoughts.
The box sat heavy on the counter between us, a grotesque offering. They’d brought the victim’s heart to my door. And the truth settled in my bones like ice.
One way or another, I would have to end this.