Page 160 of His Trick

I swallowed the lump in my throat and sighed. “Yeah. Just a second.”

That damn bag haunted me. I could feel the pull to it like strings, guiding my feet across the floor.

I needed to know. What did Care Bear bring that night? What was left behind?

Taking a deep breath, I left the mirror and entered the closet, kneeling down and unzipping the bag I’d stared at every night.

A letter poked out of the zipper, and I lost my breath.

Dear Sunshine.

The nickname ruined me.

He knew. Somehow, he always fucking knew the exact way to break me with a single sentence. I couldn’t breathe as I opened the paper and read his beautiful words to myself.

Dear Sunshine,

If you are reading this, you probably threw my ass in jail, but I’m hopeful you still give me conjugals. I deservethis, Baby Boy. Don’t feel sorry for me. My sister is dead, and I should feel sorry about that, but I don’t. Because you matter more, and opening your eyes was too important. I love you so fucking much. You’ve always been my light, Baby, and I know that you aren’t hiding anymore and can see you have always been both. Darkness needs light to survive. I never knew how much I needed you until you came into my life. I guess I lived my entire existence in darkness that I didn’t realize how much I needed your light, until it wasn’t there anymore. Xanthy’s dying wasn’t a bad thing to me. She wouldn’t have made you happy. Hell, she never made herself happy. You may be mad at me, but if you ever deserved anything, Shiloh, it’s freedom. You had to stop using her as an illusion of humanity. You were never bad to begin with. I love you. There’s one thing left in this fucked up fairy tale of ours. My final apology to you. The last step to you getting back your true light…”

He leftme a detailed list of victims—his victims.

There were stories with receipts, video footage, and painful precision of each kill.

His father’s sins were carried out with his hands, which included my mother’s name.

I couldn’t look away from the screen.

He saw me that night.

The CCTV footage showed me as a kid, sitting in a damn car while my mother was killed, and Carrington saw me, too.

He told me he wouldn’t hurt me.

All the videos showed Carrington and his victims, but what I never dreamed of…was that he was just as much a victim, too. Those people used him, raped him, and their deaths were deserved.

“Oh, Care Bear, I am so sorry.”

Every name and video was a story written to me with love hidden in the cracks of guilt.

He…saved me all those years ago. He was the beginning of our story…

And the end.

Two Weeks Later...

The victory tasted like ash.

Because Carrington wasn’t here to see it.

He wasn’t here to smirk at his father being dragged away in chains.

He wasn’t here to taunt the man who broke him so many times.

He wasn’t fucking here at all.

The prison smelled like bleach and old sweat, nothing surprising there with the rot inside its walls.

What surprised me was how calm I felt walking through the metal detectors by myself.