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Chapter forty-one

Patrick

Rosemary and garlic drifts through the kitchen, and the pan hisses as I stir the sauce gently on the stove.

Levana’s sat at the table, thumbing through the pages of a baby book. Her hair falls in soft waves, catching the light every time she tilts her head.

I glance down at the ring on her finger.

Mrs. Dalton.

My chest squeezes with something too big and too soft to name.

It’s perfect. All of this. So fucking perfect.

So why won’t my hands stop shaking?

I glance at the back door.

Locked.

Double checked.

I wipe my hands on the dish towel, and glance at Levana again. She doesn’t look up.

The music on the speaker skips, just for a second. I go to check the connection. The light’s still glowing blue.

Still paired.

Still playing.

Huh. Strange.

I turn back to the counter and start slicing the bread, watching as the blade drags through the crust, scattering crumbs across the cutting board in little clusters.

Between one slice and the next, the air shifts. Drops a few degrees. And a breeze brushes the back of my neck, just enough to make the hairs there prickle.

I glance back at Levana.

She’s still at the table. Peaceful and unbothered.

Can’t she feel that?

“Everything good over there baby?” I ask her.

She nods without looking up. “Mhm. Just reading about sleep patterns.”

Her voice grounds me. But it’s brief.

Too brief.

Because the moment her voice fades, the room tilts.

Not much—just enough that I have to grip the edge of the counter for balance.

The music is gone.

Dead silence.

There’s only the ticking of the clock above the stove, each second hitting louder, like a hammer inside my skull.

The silence bends.

What is that?

Whispers stir at the edges of my hearing, so faint I almost miss them.

I can’t make out the words, only the rhythm, curling and rising like breath fogging on glass.

They melt seamlessly, warping into something else…

Why the fuck is Mara laughing again?

“Stop,” I whisper. “Stop. Focus on the food.”

The music snaps back, and I hum along to it, trying to drown her out. But the cackle snakes beneath it, slithering through the baseboards, tapping on the windows, twisting around my brain.

My ribs crush against my lungs.

I hum louder.

Stop. Stop. Stop.

The click is so faint, I almost convince myself I imagined it.

Almost.

I spin on my heel and make a move toward the stairs.

The hallway stretches like a tunnel. The air thickens. Wraps around my bones. The shadows look wrong.

I catch the sound again. It’s the soft rattle of a doorknob.

“No, no, no, no—” I lunge for the back bedroom door. The locks are in place. Still twisted tight. Still secure.

I check them again.

And again.

I slam my palm against the wood. “Don’t you fucking dare unlock it, Mara. Don’t you dare.”

Mara’s laughter tears through from the other side, sharp and high. It doesn’t even sound human anymore. It scrapes down my spine, echoing through the hallway like it’s coming from everywhere at once.

How the hell is she doing this?

“Shut up,” I snap at her.

“You shut up, Patrick,” she snarls back through the barrier. “You lock me in this fucking room like I didn’t build this life with you. Like we didn’t grow up together. Like I didn’t carry your children. Like I didn’t say those vows and mean every damn word.”

The door rattles under my hand, but it holds.

“I mattered. Not her. Me .” Her voice drops, thick with venom. Then her tone shifts into a lilting sing-song voice, like a twisted nursery rhyme. “And she’s going to leave you. She’s going to leave you. She’s going to leave you.”

She bursts into cruel, wild laughter again.

A floorboard creaks behind me and I spin—fast—arm already swinging before my brain catches up.

“Patrick!”

Levana’s voice hits me square in the face.

My fist is frozen in the air, half a second from hitting her shoulder, her face, I don’t even know.

She flinches hard, stumbling back, breath caught in her throat, eyes wide and wet.

“Jesus—fuck,” I pant, dropping my arm. “Why would you sneak up on me like that?”

“I didn’t,” she says softly, voice trembling. “I—I was calling your name. I thought you heard me.”

But I didn’t.

All I heard was Mara.

All I felt was fear.

Levana’s breathing fast now, her soft belly rising and falling with every shallow inhale, her chest flushed.

And the look in her eyes…

Like she’s afraid of me.

No, no, no.

My stomach plummets into the depths of hell, just as the smoke alarm screams to life downstairs.

The sound cuts through the moment like a knife, and my heart stops.

Just as suddenly, it slams back into motion, violent and disoriented .

Fuck.

I whip around and bolt down the stairs, two at a time, lungs already burning before I hit the bottom.

The kitchen’s choked with thick, blackened smoke.

The pot’s boiling over on the stove, sauce bubbling like it’s alive, red streaked black where it’s burned against the metal.

I wrench it off the flame and fumble for the knob, twisting it off, off, off, as my hands shake violently.

The wooden spoon’s charred slightly on the edge. I grab it anyway, scraping at the crust hardening around the rim, watching as it flakes off like dried blood.

I have to fix it.

I can still fix it.

“Goddamn it,” I mutter through clenched teeth. “Goddamn it, Mara.”

The alarm’s still screeching overhead, piercing my eardrums. And the music’s still crackling from the speaker, warped and useless.

And beneath it.

Her laughter.

Still fucking laughing.

“ We’re going to take her.”

“We’re all going to take her.”

“You’re never going to have her.”

“You don’t deserve her.”

“You don’t deserve those babies.”

“You never deserved any of our children.”

Too much.

Too loud.

Too fast.

“Stop,” I sob. “Stop it. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.”

My eyes snap to the window. Then the door.

The lock.

The curtains.

The gap at the bottom—too much gap.

There was definitely someone in the garden today.

They were watching.

I know they were.

She says they’re going to take her.

They’re coming.

She’s going to leave.

She’s going to run.

Alexander will never be fixed.

My family—broken all over again.

They can’t take her.

She can’t go.

No. No. No. No. No.

My breath’s ragged in my throat, my heart clawing at my ribs like it wants out.

I can’t feel my hands or my tongue. I can’t feel anything except the burn behind my eyes and the snapping of my frayed nerves.

There’s a creak, and my head shoots up.

Levana’s standing in the kitchen doorway.

Barefoot.

Silent.

One hand curled protectively around her bump.

Her eyes are wide.

Terrified.

“Baby,” I croak. “Don’t—don’t look at me like that.”

I take a step toward her, and she flinches.

It sends a nail straight through my chest.

“Baby, no—” I whisper, holding my hands out. “It’s me. Just me.”

I wrap my arms around her before she can move again, and pull her tight against my chest.

The shadows are moving. Crawling through the cracks in the house. Curling under the doors.

What if Elliot’s in them?

What if the nurses are?

What if something else is?

Something worse?

My breath hitches.

“I’m so sorry. I’m just scared, Levana,” I whisper. “I’m scared of losing you. Of losing our family.”

She shushes me gently, and her fingers brush against the space between my shoulder blades.

“Don’t listen to Mara, okay?” I beg her as I squeeze my eyes shut. “She wants to split us up. She wants to make you leave.”

“I won’t,” she says. “I won’t listen.”

I bury my face in her hair, filling my lungs with her scent. Our scent.

She won’t leave. She loves me. She won’t leave.

Her hand keeps moving against me, gentle and slow, and after a moment she whispers, “Why don’t I take over with the food, okay?”

I don’t want her to. It should be me looking after her. But we need to eat. So I nod. “Okay.”

“Good,” she says. “Go and sit down. I’ve got this.”

I nod, but I don’t move at first. I hold her a second longer, clutching her as if she might slip through my fingers like sand if I so much as breathe in the wrong direction.

But eventually, she pulls away slightly, and I loosen my grip.

She steps back carefully and turns to the stove.

I watch her steady herself against the counter with one hand, the other palm brushing gently over the soft curve of her belly.

Our babies.

Safe.

For now.

I sink into a chair, clenching my hands in my lap.

Mara’s still laughing, but it’s faint now. Thin and distant.

I rub my hands together under the table, trying to force the tremor out of my fingers.

Trying to feel grounded. Human. In control.

I can’t lose my future.

Not again.

I have to protect her. Protect my babies.

Mally and Dolly are safe at their grandparents, thank god.

But Levana and the babies… Alexander…

Nothing’s guaranteed.

I have to protect them.

It’s not just a promise. It’s my job. My duty.

As a father. As a fiancé. As someone who loves them.

So if I have to tighten things, monitor every second, put locks on the locks, cover the drains, seal every crack, shut out the world piece by piece until there’s nothing left but us.

Then I damn well will.