Page 201
“Dad,” I cut in before my other parent ends up getting shot, my voice soft but stern. “I would never let her die, and you know that. Please just trust us.”
His glare sears through me, but I don’t look away, my entire body beginning to shake from the mix of adrenaline, shock, and panic.
Scoffing, he turns away, muttering under his breath, “I can’t fucking believe this shit. Adeline, what the fuck have you gotten involved in?”
I frown. “I didn’t even do anything, Dad.”
He turns back to me with incredulity. “You think I didn’t see the three of you kill those men in cold blood? The little crazy one—”
“Don’t call me crazy!” Sibby screeches from beside me, causing me to flinch, the pitch hurting my ears. I pause, noting how manic she looks right now. Her chest is pumping, and her brown eyes are wild, like she’s a tiger cornered in a small cage.
Dad must see it, too, because he trains his glare onto me. “Don’t sit here and act like you’re the daughter I raised,” he barks. “You just murdered someone.”
“He was going to kill Mom,” I defend, in disbelief he’s lecturing me right now. He’s in shock and angry, and taking it out on me.
He clenches his teeth, baring them at me as he spits, “If she dies, this will be all your fault. That bullet hit her because of you!”
His words feel like a bullet of their own, hitting me right in the chest and punching the air out of my lungs.
“What?” I choke out.
“When you were fighting with that guy, and the gun went off,” he barks, his face reddening. He stares at me like… like I’m a monster. “The bullet ricocheted and hit your mother.”
My mouth opens, speechless. I remember it ricocheting but never saw where it hit, distracted by the man I was fighting with.
Wave after wave of guilt slams into me, and fuck… this is my fault. I blink, my vision blurring with a fresh wave of tears. It feels as if my chest is cracking wide open, my heart spilling out right alongside my mother’s.
“She’s not the one that pulled the trigger,” Zade barks, defending me.
Huffing, he turns around and stares out his window, vibrating with fury.
“This is your fault, too,” he accuses snidely, directing it toward Zade. “The both of you. None of this would’ve happened if it wasn’t f
or your criminal boyfriend, Adeline.”
Zade turns his head to my father, the leather steering wheel groaning beneath his tightened fists, and for a moment, I’m convinced he’s going to completely snap it in half.
“I think it’s best you shut your fucking mouth from now on, or else I will do it for you. As you’ve made clear, I’m not a good man, and I care very much about how you talk to Addie. That man was holding a goddamn gun to your daughter’s head. This is nobody’s fault but the people who broke into your home.”
Dad meets his stare, words on the tip of his tongue. In the end, he shakes his head and turns to look out the window again, content with where his fingers are pointing.
The car falls into a weighted silence, the four of us conflicted for different reasons.
I look down at my mom, a sob working up my throat as I stare down at her pale face. My tears drip onto her cheeks, but I don’t dare remove my hands from the wound to wipe them away.
“I’m so sorry, Mom. I don’t want to do this life without you, so stay with me, okay?”
Try as I might, my PTSD is beginning to resurface as Zade whips us into a driveway within twenty minutes, driving up to a wooden cabin with a warm yellow glow emitting from the windows. I recognize this cabin—barely.
Zade brought me here right after he found me, and I hardly remember a thing about this place or Teddy, just that both the house and the doctor were warm and inviting. Opposite to the memories of a different doctor that are currently sending my blood pressure through the roof.
“This is Teddy’s house?” I ask, my hands numb.
Flashbacks of waking up in a make-shift hospital, an old man with pale blue eyes and a deranged smile beneath his bushy mustache leaning over me, asking me to come with him. My heart pumps wildly, and it feels like it’s cracking my rib cage from the force.
The second the car comes to a stop, Sibby is scrambling out of the car as if she was stuck underwater with no air. She storms off somewhere, muttering about having to leave her henchmen behind. None of us have the mental capacity to worry about her in this second.
“Yes. I know you might not remember much, but his name is Teddy Angler, and his son is Tanner. They’re good friends of mine,” he answers, shutting the car off and hurrying to the back door.
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 55
- Page 56
- Page 57
- Page 58
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 113
- Page 114
- Page 115
- Page 116
- Page 117
- Page 118
- Page 119
- Page 120
- Page 121
- Page 122
- Page 123
- Page 124
- Page 125
- Page 126
- Page 127
- Page 128
- Page 129
- Page 130
- Page 131
- Page 132
- Page 133
- Page 134
- Page 135
- Page 136
- Page 137
- Page 138
- Page 139
- Page 140
- Page 141
- Page 142
- Page 143
- Page 144
- Page 145
- Page 146
- Page 147
- Page 148
- Page 149
- Page 150
- Page 151
- Page 152
- Page 153
- Page 154
- Page 155
- Page 156
- Page 157
- Page 158
- Page 159
- Page 160
- Page 161
- Page 162
- Page 163
- Page 164
- Page 165
- Page 166
- Page 167
- Page 168
- Page 169
- Page 170
- Page 171
- Page 172
- Page 173
- Page 174
- Page 175
- Page 176
- Page 177
- Page 178
- Page 179
- Page 180
- Page 181
- Page 182
- Page 183
- Page 184
- Page 185
- Page 186
- Page 187
- Page 188
- Page 189
- Page 190
- Page 191
- Page 192
- Page 193
- Page 194
- Page 195
- Page 196
- Page 197
- Page 198
- Page 199
- Page 200
- Page 201 (Reading here)
- Page 202
- Page 203
- Page 204
- Page 205
- Page 206
- Page 207
- Page 208
- Page 209
- Page 210
- Page 211
- Page 212
- Page 213
- Page 214
- Page 215
- Page 216
- Page 217
- Page 218
- Page 219
- Page 220
- Page 221
- Page 222
- Page 223
- Page 224
- Page 225
- Page 226
- Page 227
- Page 228
- Page 229
- Page 230
- Page 231
- Page 232
- Page 233