Page 38 of Saving Sparrow (Slow Burns & Tragic Beginnings #2)

Now

“How do I get him back?”

“You don’t.”

Hours later, I still sat in front of the fire, unable to get those words out of my head.

“You don’t…”

“You don’t...”

“You don’t...”

They held such finality, leaving no room for negotiation.

Maybe I shouldn’t have shown up here alone.

Maybe I should’ve brought a therapist along.

It was arrogant of me to think I could do this by myself.

But who would have flown hours into a brutal storm for a stranger who wasn’t even sure his husband was here?

Amelia wasn’t exactly known for her honesty.

She’d only given me a tiny morsel of information to get rid of me after I’d tracked her down.

I’d tried searching for Elliott myself first—after the authorities failed to find him—but all I could offer the private investigator was his name and that he’d spent some years in Alaska after leaving a religious community.

That hadn’t gotten us far, so we’d shifted our focus to finding Amelia.

“How did his parents die?”

“Good question. Maybe Sparrow can give you the answer to that.”

She’d then murmured something under her breath, refusing to give me any more answers before kicking me out. For all I knew, everything she’d said was a pack of lies.

Quentin would’ve gotten more out of Amelia. If he could have, he would’ve set the world on fire looking for Elliott. I wasn’t like him. I wasn’t as strong.

He wouldn’t have agreed with that assessment of me, and knowing that only made me miss him even more. If I was strong, it was because of him. Because he’d made me believe in myself. Without Quentin, I was just an imposter pretending I could do what felt like the impossible.

Until now, I hadn’t fully grasped how little I knew about Elliott. Much of that was because he knew so little about himself, and the rest he’d either omitted or lied about.

“Why, Elliott?” I whispered into the room. Didn’t he know we would’ve loved him through anything?

I sighed because he wasn’t the only one to blame.

We’d all been too obsessed and in love to care about much else.

This experience had aged me beyond my twenty-seven years, though, and made me wiser in such a short span of time.

Love wasn’t enough, and the things that scared us wouldn’t go away simply because we ignored them.

Elliott’s past scared him, and so we’d made him a promise to ignore it.

“No more before.”

I understood how stupid we were now.

Pacing seemed like the next best thing to do, so I spent a good deal of time doing that, constantly checking the clock. We’d had dinner, so I assumed that meant it was late evening right now. Although I wouldn’t have put it past Sparrow to be purposely leading me to believe that.

I glanced at the bedroom door, still ajar, itching to leave the room and go exploring on my own.

Was Sparrow asleep right now? Was Joshua awake? Was the other alter? Did we have a… visitor ?

If the answer to all those questions was no, that meant Sparrow had control and was wide awake in this house somewhere. Did I really want him to catch me roaming around?

“If you disturb anything in this house, if you venture to areas you don’t belong… I will make you regret it.”

Goose bumps rose along my arms. No, I didn’t want him to catch me roaming around.

But Sparrow was tired, always tired. I took a gamble that he was asleep, or that one of the other alters was awake. Because if they were, that meant they were locked inside their room, leaving me free to snoop around.

I thought about what Quentin would do in my situation and let out a wry chuckle.

He’d likely have tied Sparrow up and dragged him out of here or charged down every hall, kicking in doors in search of Elliott.

Either option would’ve made the situation worse.

This couldn’t be fixed with shouted orders or brute strength.

Maybe I was better suited to save Elliott after all.

With that in mind, and a strengthened resolve, I strode for the bedroom door.

The window at my end of the hall rattled, startling me. I spun to face it, hand flying to my chest. Creeping over to it, I rested a palm on the thin pane. The glass was so frigid it felt like placing my hand over fire. Sparrow was right; if the fall didn’t break me, the cold definitely would.

Something creaked in the distance behind me. I wheeled around too fast, causing my healing injuries to scream at me. The hallway was empty aside from me, and I exhaled, bracing my hands on my knees.

The bandage on my elbow flapped open for the second time, and I ripped it off, balling it up and stuffing it in my pocket. I winced as cool air brushed across the rug-burned skin, reminding me I needed to move away from the window. That I needed to move in general.

My throat tickled, and I broke into a cold sweat at the thought of my cough outing me. I’d taken two more pills and was feeling much better already, so I proceeded with my plan, hoping for the best.

I placed an ear against each door as I edged down the hall, holding my breath to better hear any movement on the other side.

There wasn’t any, and I backed away from the last door nervously.

If Sparrow wasn’t locked in one of these bedrooms, then where was he?

I realized how much I’d been counting on him being inside one of these rooms, because now I’d need to find him first before nosing around.

I glanced toward the grand staircase, my legs refusing to move.

I won’t go down… I’ll just peek over. Promise. I lied to myself over and over again until my muscles relaxed, enabling me to inch closer to the mezzanine.

The foyer was empty, but I couldn’t see far beyond the threshold of the living room from here. I squatted slowly, grinding my teeth through the aches in my joints to peer between the loose balusters. It only gained me an additional inch or two.

I noticed a recess along the far wall to my left. Getting up hurt more than stooping down, and I grimaced, gaze darting around when my knee cracked loudly.

The light of the wall sconce flickered as I approached the dark opening. A bad omen, maybe? My steps became hesitant, growing heavier, but I pushed past the fear to keep going.

Pressing my hands against either side of the archway, I squinted through the narrow opening. My eyes adjusted, and a spiral staircase that led to a metal door appeared. With one last look behind me, I scaled the stairs.

The heavy draft coming from beneath the door made me shiver, and I wished I’d thought to put on a sweater.

But if I went back to the room, I might lose the courage it would take to return.

Feeling more than seeing the steel hinge and padlock on the door, I realized I’d be forced to head back without answers anyway.

The doorknob was missing, and the hole that would’ve been left behind felt cemented over. I tugged on the body of the padlock, and the shackle popped free. It hadn’t been pushed in all the way.

The flickering sconce at the bottom of the stairs went out completely, turning the darkness even blacker. My harsh breathing echoed around the tiny stairwell. Instinctively, I took a step back, arms flailing when my foot slipped from the thin iron step.

Less than halfway down, I gripped the railing, stopping the progression of my fall. I trembled as I fought to hold back my scream of pain. My back and ribs throbbed.

I waited to see if the noise had caught Sparrow’s attention. When no footsteps sounded, I strained to haul myself up, panting and sweating once I’d made it back to the top.

Feeling around for the lock again, I removed it from the hinge, slipping it into my pocket. Bracing myself for the inevitable groan of the old door, I slowly pushed it open, grateful the noise wasn’t too bad before stepping into the attic.

Moonlight shone through the partially open window up ahead, providing some visibility. It wasn’t nailed shut, but it also wasn’t big enough to fit through. A frigid breeze blew in, and I turned back to the door just in time to see it swinging closed from the force of the draft.

I caught the edge of it before it slammed shut and possibly alerted Sparrow to my being up here. I eased it closed, then rested my forehead against the cold surface, shivering again.

The tickle in my throat grew worse. I turned away, coughing as quietly as possible into my shirt. The cough wasn’t as wet now.

With slow steps, I moved deeper into the dust- and cobweb-filled space, pausing when my foot landed on a loose floorboard. “Shit,” I mouthed. The creak felt like yet another warning.

Moving past the stacked boxes and crates, I stepped on something hard and cold, mouthing another curse as I grabbed hold of a wooden beam. I lifted my sock-covered foot, and a marble rolled away from me, bumping into a storage chest.

Sidestepping other potential hazards, I continued over to the window. It was stiff, forcing me to exert myself to inch it closed.

I’d begun questioning my decision to come up here when my gaze met a framed portrait—or painting, maybe?

—against a wall. I couldn’t tell which with the filthy sheet covering it.

A cloud of dust exploded into the air when I removed it, choking me.

I coughed into my shirt again, trying to muffle the sound.

The moon still offered some light in this part of the attic, but I pulled on the long string dangling near my head, illuminating the single bulb hanging from the ceiling.

I squatted down to get a better look at what I was seeing. A family portrait.

This had to be Elliott’s parents. He looked just like his mother.

Pale and delicate, hair the same coppery shade of red, eyes the same vibrant blue.

She stood next to a man whom I presumed to be Elliott’s father.

She barely cleared his elbow. Elliott got his height from him—but not his build.

Sparrow was lean, but had more definition than Elliott.

Elliott’s limbs were willowy with only a slight curvature of muscle.

I peered closely at his father. At the strict line of his brow, his graying hair… He’d had Elliott later in life. He appeared much older than his wife.

Elliott sat on a stool in front of them. He couldn’t have been older than seven. He seemed sad, his eyes shining as if he’d been crying. His parents smiled for the camera, and there was a crucifix hanging in the background.

“Elliott was born into a cult.”

Sparrow’s shocking words over dinner played in my head. I thought back to Elliott’s prayers, to the times he’d unknowingly whisper them at the oddest moments. I thought about the night the prayers stopped too, the first night he’d watched me and Quentin making love.

Next, I knelt in front of the wooden chest. Worn Bibles and other religious motifs were stacked inside. I pulled out a couple of folders, rifling through the loose papers inside for any information I didn’t already have. The headline of a newspaper clipping caught my eye.

“Communal settlement raided by authorities after the suspicious death of a young boy,” I breathed. I read the rest quietly, my blood rushing to my ears as the information sank in.

Elijah Holland, leader of the cult God’s Chosen, taken into custody but later released of all charges related to Gideon Keller’s death.

Gideon. The clipping floated from my hand.

“I knew a boy named Gideon once. We kissed, and that kiss ruined everything.”

Turning to the family portrait again, I stared into the evil eyes of Elijah Holland.

I snatched up the clipping, desperate to find out Gideon’s cause of death. Much of the ink had faded, making the details illegible.

“Damn it.” I raked my hands through my hair. Why hadn’t we asked more questions? Why weren’t we mature enough to know that the hidden details mattered? To know we couldn’t start a future with Elliott until he’d faced his past? Maybe because we all had things we’d been avoiding.

I quickly re-stacked the papers surrounding me into the folder, placing everything back in the chest. I was about to close the lid when my gaze landed on the pile of Bibles again.

Picking one of them up, I opened the cover.

The pages were hollowed out. Frowning, I reached inside the hole, shocked at what I pulled free.

A skeleton key.

I hopped to my feet, hurrying to leave everything as I’d found it before leaving the attic, key in hand. I doubled back to turn off the light, then situated the padlock on the door before heading for the hall of rooms.

I felt overwhelmed. Which door did I open first? And what if Sparrow was behind one of them? Or someone worse?

My headache came on hard and fast, causing me to sway on my feet. “Breathe,” I told myself as I leaned against the wall. “Breathe.”

Once calm and rational again, I realized I couldn’t open a door.

Not yet. Sparrow may have found it pointless to lock me in his bedroom after I’d already gotten out, but there were other ways he could’ve chained me to that room.

He either trusted me just enough not to trap me in there again or now felt too guilty to.

Either way, I couldn’t risk the progress we’d made by rushing into a room I had no business in right then.

I’d need to be strategic about it. I couldn’t afford to have the key taken away from me.

Moving as fast as my body would allow, I entered my temporary bedroom, searching for a place to hide the key. Grabbing the roll of adhesive tape from the bathroom, I used it to tape the key under one of the nightstand drawers.

I was too amped up to sleep, adrenaline coursing through me. Before I knew it, I’d reached the end of the hall again, only now my muscles didn’t seize up when faced with the stairs.

Against my better judgment, I found my way to the foyer, looking around as I tried to decide where to go next. Drawn to the living room for some inexplicable reason, I took the ten steps needed to put me on its threshold—and came face to face with a seething Sparrow.