Page 29 of Her Wicked Knights (Their Hallowed Queen #3)

Tripp

Axel left so fast he forgot his keys, which was good, because it gave my father a chance to grab his cell phone and kiss mom goodbye before following him.

I would think having my dad with them will make for an even more awkward car ride back here, but I'm glad Axel isn't alone right now.

Unfortunately, that means I'm the only one who can be here for mom, and as much as I love her, I don't think I'm qualified to try and help her through the fact that her best friend is dead.

I've tried figuring out what to say, trying to imagine what I'd want anybody to say if it was Rev or Marley, but that just felt like it put razor blades in my throat.

I drove her home in silence once I managed to get her to stop crying enough to get her out of Mrs. Windham-Hayes’ party.

She stayed silent, and I had nothing to say so I didn't even try to speak.

But when we pulled into our driveway, in the half-second where the headlights lit up on the Lavignes' house with the front porch light on, she lost it.

I tried to convince her to get a shower, I made her tea that she hasn't touched, I googled what to do when someone is in shock once she stopped crying and started acting like she didn't hear me.

Nothing has helped, so when Colton tells me he's on his way, I'm grateful for the reinforcements.

He didn't tell me he was on his way with Rev and Marley.

I haven't figured out how to make my own mother feel better, let alone what to say to Marley. I don't think there's anything to say, though. Nothing will make it not true. Nothing will make it better.

Turns out, though, Marley is exactly what mom needed.

She flips a switch the minute she sees Rev lift her into his arms and carry her in the house, turning on her mom mode and throwing the pillows off the couch, letting them land unceremoniously on the floor.

It's so out of character, I want to shake her, to snap her out of whatever this is, but instead I watch her direct Rev to set Marley down as Marley says something about how she could have walked.

Rev sits with her against him, because the other choice would pretty much just be to drop her onto the couch.

I notice the way she clings to him, her fingers full of his black shirt.

I don't think she even realizes she's clinging to him.

Instead of being jealous, though, I'm grateful.

I'm absurdly fucking grateful that he was there, that he was with her when the deputies showed up.

Marley looks at us all, a little lost, and then mom swoops in to pull her into her arms.

I'm not sure who sobs first, and then I'm not sure whose cries are whose as they devolve together. I scrub my hands over my face, rubbing my eyes, which are fucking burning. When I glance up, I'm surprised to find Colton staring at me.

He tips his head toward the kitchen, and as much as I don't want to leave either of them, it would probably be a good idea to give them a minute to fall apart together, without worrying about who's watching them.

Rev waits for me to go first and then follows me into the kitchen, which shows evidence of how frantically I've been trying to ease my mother's grief.

There are tea bags on the counter and spilled honey and an open cannister of sugar.

Colton grabs the bottle of whiskey I left uncapped when I poured a shot's worth into her chamomile brew and tips his head back, taking a long swig.

Rev takes it right out of his hand when he finally drops it from his lips, and I watch him take a long drink too, wincing when he passes it to me. I shake my head, because I don't need it. I need coffee or something, because I suddenly feel ancient.

"Something's not right about this." Colton shakes his head, and I note the way his fists are clenched, like he's just waiting for someone to fight.

"No shit." I snap, careful to keep my voice low. "Marley's parents are dead."

Rev drags his fingers through his hair, pacing back and forth and cutting a glance back at the sitting room we left my mom and Marley in.

"I'm aware. I mean, with Jake and Audrey."

"Seriously?" I sneer. "You're really thinking about them right now? Our best fucking friend is falling apart in there. I think I just watched my mom's heart break, and you're worried about whether Jake's fucking the whore you don't even care about."

"Tripp..." Rev warns, glancing toward the sitting room again. I clench my fingers in to fists; they suddenly ache, like they need stretched.

"That's not what I'm worried about. Shut your fucking mouth and hear me out or go try to make yourself useful with Marley but let me fucking talk."

I throw my hands up and let him have the floor.

"They've been weird for months. I don't mean sneaking around or flirting, I mean, like... toxic. Like they're hiding something."

"And what about it?" Rev asks. "How do you think that's relevant to anything?"

"I think they committed murder." Colton says seriously.

I scoff. As much as I dislike the two of them, they're just lousy people, not fucking murderers.

"As in whose murder?" Rev asks, though there are only three people that I know of who have been murdered around here.

"Jenny?" I laugh. "Why would they do that? Jenny wasn't friends with either of them."

"No. But that night Mr. Lavigne found her body... we were at the beach house, remember?"

"Right. As in, not here, in Serenity Hollow."

"No." Colton agrees. "But Audrey and Jake showed up together. Late."

"We were late too." Rev reasons. "They were probably just fucking."

I squint at him, wondering if he realizes he just implied that that's what we were doing when we were late. It absolutely wasn't.

"Okay, but it was Audrey's party. She shouldn't have been late. She should have been there early to set up."

"Audrey doesn't exactly care about what she should do." Rev says, which is about the nicest way he can say Audrey cares about nothing other than Audrey.

"No." Colton agrees. "But she was acting really strange. She got sloppy drunk fast and tried to suck my dick in the middle of the kitchen. When I took her to the bedroom, Jake grabbed her and told her to keep her mouth shut."

"I guess he's tired of sharing her mouth with you." I shrug.

"How is the head, by the way? With that forked tongue of hers?"

I want to laugh, because it was a pretty fucking funny quip, but I don't have it in me right now.

"She had scratches all down her back, and she was really weird about them."

"Scratches?" Rev asks, and I decide I must be missing something, cause I'm not sure how that's relevant.

"All over. I thought maybe Jake was throwing her around or something, you know. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

He's right about his assessment of Mayor North's acrid personality. But I can't imagine Jake being violent. He's too much of a pussy. Then again, you've got to be a little bitch to hit a woman... even if that woman is Audrey Graves.

"And?"

"I broke into his house a few days later and woke him up with my knife against his balls.

" Colton says calmly, as if he's just saying he went out and collected the mail.

"I warned him if he ever fucking hurt a girl again, I'd cut them off.

And I warned him if he ever hurt Marley, I'd cover him in honey and leave him in the woods for nature to take care of him. "

"Fuck, Colt," Rev shakes his head. "What does this have to do with Jenny?"

"He cried." Colton grins, just the slightest bit, as he no doubt remembers having Jake at his mercy. "He fucking sobbed. Said he didn't want to do it, that he was sorry, that he'd never do anything like that again, but Audrey made him do it."

"Audrey made him... hurt her?"

"Maybe." Colton shrugs. "Or Audrey made him kill Jenny."

I roll my eyes, because we're back to square one here. "And why would Audrey make him do that?"

Colton rubs the bridge of his nose, and I notice how tense he is. "I don't know. I think it's got something to do with Whit, though."

Rev's eyes find mine, and suddenly what Colton's saying doesn't sound all that insane after all.

"He does have cult leader vibes." Rev says, almost like he's thinking out loud.

"Marley said her dad wouldn't talk about the case after that first night, but she did say he was closing in on someone. He said they were just waiting on a DNA analysis, but she's been so reclusive lately because her dad asked her not to go out with anyone. Not Jake, not Audrey, not even us."

"That's why she's been such a homebody the last few months?

" I ask. I had noticed how he would pick her up from work after her closing shifts, and how he seemed to sit in his cruiser in the driveway a little longer each night when he came home, like he was keeping an eye out for something.

I assumed it was because of the night that Colton broke into his house and then mine before narrowly being caught.

But what if it's because he suspected someone close to Marley of being responsible for Jenny's murder?

"Okay." Rev says. "So, what do we do with this information? Do we give it to the police? Do we confront Audrey and Jake?"

"Fuck no." Colton snorts. "The Lavignes are dead because he was suspicious of them."

"Allegedly, according to you." The truth is, we don't know what happened. All the deputies said when they informed us was that they'd been shot, and shootings in America are unfortunately rampant.

"We can't let them know we know unless you want to be next." Colton reasons.

"Your theory makes sense..." I say cautiously.

"Except, why would they kill the sheriff if they had the killer's DNA?

When it comes back, wouldn't they be able to link it to them and put them away for three murders?

And why kill Ginny? You really think the sheriff was telling his wife his suspicions as pillow talk at night? "

"They're dumb." Colton reasons. "Maybe they didn't think that far into it."

"Or maybe they have an in with the sheriff’s department. Maybe they got someone to lose their DNA?"

"Or maybe they know they aren't in the system." I say slowly. After all, it's not like everybody's DNA gets recorded at birth. Most people don't ever get entered into the system, unless they commit a crime or submit it to some sort of seedy online genealogy company.

Rev points at me, and Colton nods. "If they don't think the DNA will come back with a match to them, then nobody has any reason to look at them as suspects, or to ask for their compliance to submit a sample."

I hate to think that Jake or Audrey could be responsible for Jenny's murder, let alone for Marley's parents. But I also can't deny, he's made some great points.

"So, again, what do we do?"

"We wait." Colton says. I begin to tell him no, that Marley and Hadley deserve justice, that my mother deserves justice. But he cuts me off.

"We play it cool, we collect information, and then when it's time..." He glances from Rev to me, making sure we're following.

"We take them down."