Page 57

REMI

The moment I get out of my car, I know something is wrong.

A strange weight settles in—a breathless, electric wrongness, as if the very air has thickened with unspoken dread.

The street outside glows in the early light, yet every flash of sunlight feels cold, sterile, untouched by comfort.

I don’t speak, but it’s as if I’m tuned to the frequency: something is off, hideously off, and it pulses through me.

My skin prickles, my thoughts turning jagged. The world itself seems to lean away from me, holding its secrets close, waiting for the moment when everything finally tips and the truth comes crashing down. As I look up at the house, a realization hits me square in the chest.

This place is no longer my sanctuary.

I don’t know how I know. The feeling is off somehow. Even though the street is the same. The road is the same. The house is the same. It no longer feels like my safe haven.

I hate that I feel this way.

I force myself forward, step by step, the soles of my shoes scuffing against the uneven path that leads to the front door.

Each step seems to echo in the quietness—too loud, too calculated, as if the house itself is listening.

The morning air presses in, intense and detached, and for a moment, it feels like I’m travelling through water, every advance slowed by an unseen resistance.

My hands clench and unclench at my sides, searching for something steady to anchor me.

The porch looms closer, paint cracking in familiar strips, but today even its welcome feels like caution.

I pause at the bottom, heart beating hard, and look up at the door.

The handle glints, catching the pale morning light.

I swallow hard, tasting copper at the back of my mouth.

One breath, then another, before I climb the steps and reach for the key in my pocket, my hand trembling ever so slightly.

With every inch, the certainty grows: whatever used to wait for me beyond this threshold is gone, replaced by a silence that hums with the promise of secrets.

I brace myself, not just because of what could be inside, but because of the knowledge that opening this door means stepping through the last remnants of security I ever had.

The key is cool and familiar in my hand, its worn ridges pressing grooves into my palm as I slide it into the lock.

I expect the usual resistance—the faint click, the silent greeting of home—but the key turns easily, too easily.

There’s no catch, no shift of tumblers. The lock yields with a loose indifference, and an icy thread winds through my gut.

It’s already unlocked.

My breath stalls, suspended on the thin ledge between panic and denial.

I press my palm flat against the door, feeling the hollow thump beneath my skin.

For a heartbeat, I hover there, disbelieving, as if the wood itself might offer reassurance.

But the knob turns beneath my hesitant grip, and the door swings wide open at the gentlest shove, quiet and subdued, baring the threshold to whatever waits inside.

The threshold yields beneath my hand, and I step into a darkness that feels unnaturally dense, as if the air itself has thickened in warning.

At first, it’s the silence that strikes me—an absence so complete it roars.

My eyes adjust, and the world sharpens to a tableau of ruin.

Furniture is overturned, cushions gutted; books and photographs litter the floor, pages torn from their spines, glass shattered into starlight across stained rugs.

There are footprints—muddy, smearing through the destruction, evidence of chaos made personal.

A gasp escapes me, sudden and sharp, bursting into the thick silence like a stone thrown into still water.

My hand flies to my mouth, fingers pressing hard as if to trap the sound before it can echo through the wreckage.

The taste of fear prickles on my tongue; I stand frozen, eyes wide, heart hammering, the world narrowing to the ragged breath behind my trembling palm.

My entire life is inside this house. Every single thing, from the time I was born until now, has been obliterated. It’s turned into a dump of the highest grade, and everything I spent so much time working on is ruined. It doesn’t appear that anything is salvageable.

My feet carry me across the threshold, each step tentative, as if expecting the floorboards to splinter beneath my weight. The destruction is consuming, a tidal wave of loss threatening to drag me under. But I force myself to move, to look, to search for something that may have survived.

I skirt around the broken glass, the crunch sharp under my shoes, flinching each time the fragments shift or snap.

My gaze darts from corner to corner—there, the toppled bookcase, its shelves splayed open like a wound; here.

My heart hurts at all of my romance novels scattered along the floor.

Pages are ripped out. Books are destroyed.

My eyes sting as I continue to survey everything in front of me.

The remnants of a lamp, shards glittering in dust-laced sunlight.

I kneel beside an overturned box. My hands shake as I sift through the contents.

There are old letters, their ink smudged by some careless liquid, and from years of wear.

There’s a childhood photograph torn along my smiling face, as if someone wanted to wreak havoc on me.

Then, there’s a necklace tangled beyond repair. My throat tightens, but I keep going.

In the living room, cushions spill their stuffing onto the floor, a snowdrift of fabric and foam. I dig through everything, hoping for something that’s escaped unharmed. Yet every treasure I uncover is damaged or broken. I press onward, refusing to let the ache in my chest paralyze me.

Kitchen drawers are opening and some are hanging downward, their contents scattered across sticky linoleum.

I sift through the mess, searching for something—anything—intact.

A coffee cup, chipped but whole. A recipe index card with only the corner scorched.

I set these aside, a pitiful pile of almosts, and move on.

They come suddenly, those tears—at first trembling on the precipice of my lashes, shimmering prisms that blur the chaos before me.

Then, with a single, shuddering breath, they surrender—breaking free, carving cool, clear trails down the heat of my cheeks.

Each tear slips silently downward, a quiet testament to everything lost, to every memory shredded and scattered across the wreckage.

I do not wipe them away. I can’t bring myself to.

In their descent, there is a strange kind of truth; the ache spilling outward, proof that even here, amid ruin, the feeling of agony persists.

“Remi!” I hear someone yell my name, but I’m too focused on the carnage to reply.

My entire world is caving in around me. I can’t breathe.

A crushing pressure twists around my chest, sharp and unbending, as if unseen bands are binding tighter with every frantic beat of my heart.

Each breath I try to draw is shallow, snatched and unsatisfying—air rasping in my throat, failing to soothe the ache blooming beneath my ribs.

I clutch at my shirt, fingers digging into the soft fabric. I am desperate to anchor my spiraling panic, but the sensation swells. My lungs refuse to fill, caught in a vise of sorrow and dread, leaving me suspended between the impulse to scream and the raw need just to inhale.

“Oh, god. Remi!” I vaguely hear Knox’s voice over the steady pounding of blood in my ears. Before I can think about it, his blurry image is before me, his warm, soft hands cupping my cheeks as he directs my attention to him.

“It’s … all gone,” I release around a cry. My entire body shudders violently as the pain becomes too much and releases.

“The police are on their way.” Knox does something completely unexpected. He grabs me to him in a hug, completely surrounding me in his scent, his warmth. I attack him, clutching to the back of his shirt as if he’s an anchor holding me together during a raging storm.

I bury my face in the crook of his neck, hot tears spilling in waves, soaking the collar of his shirt.

My sobs come raw, ragged, pulled from somewhere so deep I didn’t know the pain could reach.

His arms tighten, holding me closer, and I collapse into the embrace, letting everything—fear, heartbreak, exhaustion—pour out of me.

There is no holding back, no quieting the storm inside.

My knees buckle, and he catches me, bracing us both as I shatter in his hold.

The world narrows to the steady thud of his heartbeat against my cheek, his steadying hands in my hair and on my back, his whispered words lost beneath the sound of my grief.

I press in tighter, clutching at him like he’s the last solid thing left, letting my anguish soak into him until I am empty, wrung out, dazed by the force of my own sorrow.

The distant wail of a siren can be heard over my sobs. All too soon, we’re not alone inside. Boone, Tripp, Knox, and now a cop is inside my home, looking at the wreckage—a home I specially crafted from years and years of love.

“Everything is ruined,” I hiccup on a sob. “All my books. My pictures. Everything.”

“Ma’am?” The nice cop steps over the debris, making his way toward me. Knox only releases me enough so I can look up at the cop in front of me. He’s a nice beta male, with kind eyes and a quiet understanding. “I need to ask you some questions, please.”

I nod.

The officer kneels down beside us, careful to keep his tone gentle, his notepad balanced on one knee. “Can you tell me where you came from?” he asks, voice pitched low as though he’s afraid to shatter what little composure I have left. I try to focus, blinking through the haze.