Page 95 of Deadly Blooms (Psychic Unraveled #1)

My entire life—every goddamn piece of it—had been one big lie.

The thud of my heart slammed against my ribs, loud and hot, pounding out a rhythm of indignation. Hatred poured in thick and fast, flooding me with venom I didn’t even know I had left.

But then my eyes caught hers.

Maggie.

A single glance. A lifeline in the wreckage.

And somehow, the fury slowed—didn’t vanish, but it simmered just under the surface.

My father always said honesty was everything. That man was only as good as the truth he told.

But he knew.

He knew what happened behind the headmaster’s door. The bruises. The beatings. The way they’d break me down until I was silent and submissive.

And worse.

So much worse.

But he never stepped in. Never pulled me from that place. Never even looked at the man who wrecked me.

Not once.

And for what?

Because I saw Nan weeks after she died? Because I believed she was still with me, brushing the hair from my face like she used to, whispering that I wasn’t alone?

Was that really so fucking wrong?

Why not let a kid have that? One small thing to hold on to when the rest of the world kept taking?

Had I still believed—really believed —that I could see my Nan again…

That she didn’t just blink out when she died…

Maybe after Bec and Wren died, I wouldn’t have spent the last decade drowning in cheap whiskey, fucking strangers, and chasing monsters just to feel something.

Maybe I could’ve healed. Moved on. Built something that didn’t rot me from the inside.

But I didn’t.

I buried that hope.

Ripped it out by the roots and replaced it with something colder. Cleaner.

A truth I told myself so often it calcified in my bones.

When you’re dead, you’re dead. There was nothing after.

No afterlife.

No ghosts.

No coming back.

“Graham, we’re going to need your help.”

Maggie’s voice yanked me from the vicious loop spinning inside my mind.

I shut my eyes, gave my head a hard shake. Snap the hell out of it.

“Yeah,” I rasped, my voice almost still locked inside. “What is it?”

“We need to move the driver’s body into this room.”

I blinked. “We really shouldn’t move the bodies, Max. Ya know… little thing called evidence.”

My shoulders fell, I already felt the migraine Nettles was gonna hand me when he showed.

If we were shifting corpses around, everything had to line up perfectly when they come storming in. And that was no simple task. I’d only done it once before—back during the Chiefton case, with Derek’s help.

He told me the body flipped during a reanimation. I didn’t even ask what it meant. I didn’t care. But now, knowing what I know now. There was an entire line of cases that I’d looked the other way on because Derek’s explanation was ‘unbelievable’.

Training said: D on’t touch anything .

But experience. Experience said sometimes protocol’s just another way to make sure nobody makes it out alive.

And hell, I trusted Derek. Even when I thought he was batshit crazy.

At least he wasn’t the kind of guy to get his rocks off puppeteering corpses like meat marionettes.

“When did the driver die?” I asked.

“I don’t know. But he’s in the room down the hall.”

I flicked my eyes over my shoulder and found the room Maggie attempted to escape from. My grip tightened on my pistol as I approached. The light on my barrel cut through the dark like a scalpel.

And then I saw him.

Jesus Christ.

My stomach knotted. Acid rose in my throat.

Strung up like a fucking side of beef—naked, swaying from a rusted meat hook embedded in his spine. Two long incisions stretched across his torso—one low, tracking where his belt would have been, the other splitting from navel to sternum.

But that’s not what made me want to punch a hole through the wall.

It was the goddamn toes. The way they scraped faint tracks in the blood on the floor. Like he was still trying to stand. Still alive. Still fighting.

She didn’t just kill the poor bastard.

She carved him open while he was breathing.

Something had to have snapped in her.

She got sloppy tonight.

The driver’s murder—it wasn’t part of the plan. No signature, no theatrical posing, no roses. Just blood and guts and rage. That wasn’t like her. Not her M.O. Every other scene had intent. This one. Pure cleanup.

Panic cleanup.

Maybe she never meant to kidnap Maggie at all. Maybe it spiraled. Fast. Too fast for her to control. And when she lost her grip, she did what any desperate lunatic would do—she tied up the loose ends.

Her driver—the one who probably did the actual grabbing—was one of them.

I didn’t touch him. Just holstered my weapon and pulled out my phone, and snapped a few pictures. As much as I hated the idea of having a butchered corpse in my gallery, I needed photos. If we moved him, we needed to get it exact.

I backtracked fast, heading for the red room again.

“Max, I don’t think we should?—“

My lungs seized when I rounded the corner.

What in the ever-loving hell was going on?

Maggie was off to the side, shielding herself—arms raised—eyes wide. Black entities swirled above Portia’s corpse like a goddamn tornado of shadows. And right in the middle of the storm was Silas.

Still glowing that pea-soup green like he was the one sane ghost in this fucked-up rave from hell.

The air had turned cold, and the coagulated blood was thicker than before, sticking to my boots like tar as I edged toward Maggie—but I stopped short when a spirit cut between us.

I did not want to be part of this. Not even a little. But here I was—front row to death and whatever the hell came after. How was this even real?

The spirits moved with intention. Like wolves with a carcass—circling, snarling, waiting for their chance to rip in. They dove. One by one. Tearing through Portia’s soul like meat.

Each wailing spirit took a turn shredding her, devouring what was left of the woman who orchestrated all of this. And when they were done, her body was just a hollow shell—lifeless, vacant, useless to whatever sick power used to pulse through her.

As each spirit finished, its black mass shifted—flashing white, like a soul finally absolved—and then vanished, leaving behind a silence so deep it howled.

Only it wasn’t silent. Not really.

My heart pounded in my ears and I realized I still hadn’t breathed since I walked into this room.

I think it’s over.

Case closed. Soul-gnawed bitch neutralized. And I was more than ready to get the hell out of this goddamn horror show.

“I thought you said we needed all the bodies in the room for this to work,” I muttered, reaching for Maggie’s hand, steadying her as she limped toward me.

Maggie’s squelching steps made my stomach churn. Her brows knitted together, arched with worry as she scanned my face.

“We didn’t even get the chance to do anything,” she said. “The spirits just… took over and consumed her.”

She reached out, gently grasping my chin, turning my face side to side.

“You okay? You’re whiter than a ghost.”

I scanned the room, “Speaking of which—where’s Silas?”

She shook her head, frowning. “I don’t know. You think he moved on?”

Distant sirens cut through the quiet, and just like that, reality punched back in. “It doesn’t matter right now. We need to get you out of here. Can you walk?”

She glanced down, suddenly remembering, “Oh God… the adrenaline must’ve masked it.”

A gash tore across her calf—angry, deep, still seeping. She inhaled sharply.

“That bitch cut me when I was trying to get away. I think I can… maybe just help me—” She tried to put weight on it.

Nope.

She buckled instantly, nearly collapsing.

“Yeah, no. We’re not doing that. ”

I scooped her into my arms, cradling her against me. Blood and filth seeped through my shirt, soaking into my skin. I held her tighter.

Every step felt like carrying the ruins of everything I’d ever loved.

Becca.

Wren.

…

Maggie.

We pushed through the cellar doors into the night. Into freedom, or into whatever hell came next.

Squad cars and ambulances flooded through the gate, sirens blaring, lights flashing in a chaotic strobe. The driveway and side yard vanished beneath a wave of emergency responders.

As EMTs and officers climbed out, their expressions shifted—determination evaporated into horror. A few of the rookies went sheet-white. Sheffield puked in a bush. Shell just… stared. First at me, then Maggie.

She knew.

She knew exactly where I was.

What was about to happen.

Rain lashed our faces as responders swarmed around us. It rinsed some of the blood off Maggie’s skin, off my arms but not enough—not nearly enough to ground me.

I was stuck. Frozen. My mind fractured.

Maggie was pulled from my grip, medics barked orders I couldn’t hear. Everything faded—except her. She remained my only focus—tunnel vision.

She was alive.

But it wasn’t enough.

The familiar weight settled in my gut like a curse I couldn’t outrun. The smell of death clung to me, invaded my nose, coated my tongue. My stomach rolled. I heaved. But nothing came up.

I wasn’t standing in the yard anymore.

I was back in that hotel room.

Blood on the walls.

Becca. Wren.

It was my fault.

Again.

The flashing red lights of Port Grey blurred—flickered—and became the lights from Douglas, Wyoming.

No.

No.

Not this time.

I wasn’t there. I was here . Port Grey.

But if I had been there… she’d still be alive.

I couldn’t do this again.

My body locked up, muscles seizing as the panic set in. I couldn’t stop it. The images bled together—the basement, the hotel room, the blood, the bodies. The past devouring the present.

I was suffocating.

I couldn’t breathe.

The air not only too thick, it was liquid with guilt. Every breath drowned me, but it was heavy and made me sputter.

Donovan’s face flashed behind my eyes, twisted in lust and violence as he crouched over Becca, ruining her.

I saw them—their precious, sweet, lifeless faces.

But I was too late.

Rebecca’s lifeless body was still warm in my arms. Still mine for one last moment.

And Donovan? He was dead now. Made sure of it. I emptied my magazine and beat him to a bloody pulp. His face became unrecognizable by the time they stopped me.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, my lips brushing Rebecca’s forehead as I held her to me. “I should have been there.”

My hands trembled as I smoothed her dress down, covering the bruises on her legs—trying to make it right in the smallest way possible.

It wasn’t enough.

I was trapped in that hotel room again—the walls closing in, too small, too dark. The love of my life, dead in my arms.

And my sweet little girl?

Lying on the bed beside us, her tiny hand still curled around her teddy bear. Peaceful.

Too peaceful. Just like a sleeping angel.

Not again.

Please not again.

It was all my fault.

I should’ve been there.

The thrum of my pulse filled my ears with deafening defiance. My skull pounded with every heartbeat, each one a drumbeat of failure. The world around me—this one and the one in my head—warped. Warped sound, warped light, like I was underwater.

I didn’t even know what was real anymore.

Then, a hand clamped down on my shoulder.

My muscles coiled, instinct firing—I was ready to break someone in half— until I jolted, snapping back into the present.

Nettles.

Of course it was Nettles.

He said something, but it was garbled and distorted. I blinked hard and zeroed in on the dark purple bloom spreading across his cheekbone. That shiner had set in nicely.

Finally, I registered his words: “Good work there, Locke.”

He patted my shoulder like he hadn’t just left me for dead.

Good work.

Those two words tasted like acid.

I shrugged off his hand.

“ Good work? That’s it? No apology? No ‘sorry for not listening’? No ‘you were right, and I fucked up’?”

My voice rose, throat raw. I wanted them to hear. Every last one of them.

Nettles frowned, trying to keep his bullshit composure. “Look, at the time we had nothing to go on other than your hunch. I’m glad you followed your instincts. Even if it was against orders.”

“Fuck your goddamn orders!” I snapped.

My eyes locked on his, and I couldn’t look away . Not because I owed him anything. But because if I blinked, I’d break his goddamn nose and then some.

He was lucky I was too tired to swing.

Or maybe I just wanted him to live with it.

“Graham. I should’ve locked you up for more than an evening after that stunt you pulled with the Ohio kid.”

Nettles’s jaw worked like he was chewing on the next sentence, but he clamped it down. His mustache twitched—tight-lipped and flinching, like the words might betray more than he wanted.

“You did good today, Locke,” he said, even, measured too careful—like I was a ticking time bomb and he didn’t want to set me off.

Too late.

Fuck you.

His praise was too little, too late, too scripted to mean a damn thing.

I bit back the snarl rising in my throat. “Forget it.”

My fists clenched. My pulse wouldn’t quit. My vision rippled at the edges.

“I’m cashing in the PTO I’ve racked up. I need time.” I forced the words out, my jaw tight enough to crack.

Nettles nodded once. “That’s fine. In fact, I recommend it.” He almost sounded like he meant it. Almost. “But we need your report to close the case.”

“Portia’s dead. She kidnapped and tortured Maggie. In the basement, you’ll find body parts that’ll match the victim. Her driver’s gutted in a side room. The guy on the floor next to her? That’s her brother. Good enough?”

I tugged at my T-shirt’s collar, it felt like a noose tightening, strangling.

“You don’t need her motive. You don’t need our sources. You don’t need to know how we found her. You’ve got your bodies.”

I knew the truth. But I couldn’t give him the rest.

Couldn’t tell him about Derek.

Couldn’t tell him about Maggie.

Couldn’t tell him that we followed ghosts through a trail of blood.

“Actually. I do,” Nettles said, his jaw tight. “You know that. Protocol says?—”

My jaw clenched, and I spun around to face him one last time.

“I am so tired of hearing about protocol ! Does it look like I give a damn about protocol after wading through six inches of blood and intestines? Maggie’s safe. The bad guys are dead. That’s all that fucking matters! ”

“Don’t stonewall me, Locke. You know how this works. This isn’t just red tape. You screw this up, they walk. Do you really want that on your conscience?” he said, leaving no room for argument.

“Yeah, well, if Portia starts walking, I’ll be the first to apologize.” I blew out a breath, and turned away, wiping my face.

I hated that he was right. I hated it even more that I had to fish some sort of traceable evidence out of my ass that didn’t involve my psychic girlfriend or hacker buddy committing multiple felonies.