Page 87 of Saving Sparrow (Slow Burns & Tragic Beginnings #2)

Now

My heartbeat pounded in my ears. “Ellie?”

His frantic gaze took me in, and then the room. “W-why are we here? How are you here? What’s going on?”

“It’s okay, it’s okay.” I wrapped my arms around his trembling body. “Just please try to stay calm. I can’t lose you again.” I didn’t know if the rules were still the same, but I couldn’t take any chances until we could get him help.

“B-but what’s happening?”

I held his face between my hands, his tears running over my fingers. “I can’t tell you everything just yet because if you panic, you may go away again.” I didn’t need to be a doctor to know that unloading his trauma onto him right now was a bad idea.

“G-go away?”

“I’ll tell you everything later.”

“Tell me now. Not knowing is scaring me more, Guelly. What do you mean, I may go away again? And…” He reached a hand behind himself. “Why is my back sore?”

“I… I…” I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want him scared, but I didn’t want him gone either.

Elliott dug his nails into my forearms, and I could see the worst-case scenario building behind his gaze. “My parents—”

“Can’t hurt you. They can’t hurt you ever again, Ellie.”

“T-they’re still d-dead.”

“Yes, and they’re never coming back.”

“You’re sure?” His trembling intensified, his teeth chattering. I had to tell him. I had to show him.

“Positive. I’ll prove it to you once we calm you down.”

He ran his hands over my chest, feeling for a heartbeat. “This isn’t real,” he cried. “How are you here?” The last time he’d seen me, I’d taken a bullet to the head.

“I didn’t die.” I held his hand to my heart. “I’m real, Ellie. I didn’t die.”

Elliott let out a sob, crawling onto my lap, kissing me. Love and hope became a potent mix, setting the foundation for all the healing we needed. He broke the kiss, and I could see the question he was too terrified to ask.

“I’ll take you to him,” I breathed.

A little more life flashed in his eyes. “He’s okay? Quentin’s okay?”

“He’s alive.”

Elliott searched my expression. “What does that mean? What does any of this mean?” He took several deep breaths when I stayed quiet and concerned. “I’ll stay calm, I promise.”

“Alright, okay. Just… wait here a second.” I went into the closet to grab his overnight bag. It was too cold outside for what he had on, and I wanted him dressed and ready to go the moment I explained some things. I opened the chest containing the bag, with the ring of keys sitting atop it.

“Whose things are these?” Elliott asked from behind me. I turned to see him holding a pair of Sparrow’s boots.

“I… Um…” I didn’t know where to start.

Elliott walked over to the open chest. “How did my bag get here?” He dropped the boots, stepping back when he spotted the keys.

“Please,” I begged, sliding a palm along his neck. “Don’t get worked up.”

He closed his eyes, relaxing in increments as I rubbed at the pulsing vein in his neck. “Tell me,” he whispered. I opened my mouth to say the words, then closed it, terrified. “Tell me,” he insisted.

“I believe you have something called dissociative identity disorder.” I more than believed, but I’d let a doctor officially diagnose him.

“What?”

“Calm,” I reminded him. “I believe the gaps in your memories are due to your not having been present in those moments.” I didn’t run down the list of alters or mention how I’d spent my time here.

I explained the basics of what DID entailed, and I let him know one of his protectors saved him from his parents.

“They took me to the basement.” His gaze went vacant. “I saw a hole in the ground. I remember being scared.”

“Do you want to go to the basement?” I asked. “Do you want to see their grave?”

“No.” He shook his head. “I believe you. I-I don’t need proof. I don’t want to see it.”

“Okay, let’s go then.”

“Wait.” He grabbed my arm. “I want… I…” His grip on me tightened.

“What is it? What do you want, Ellie?”

A million things played out in his gaze, and I didn’t care what it was, what he wanted. I’d give it to him. I’d give him anything. He licked his lips. “I want to burn this place down.”

I squeezed his hand, a sense of rightness coursing through me. “I can help you with that.”

Elliott changed, and we strode from the bedroom with purpose. I grabbed my bags from the reading room, zipping the gifts Sparrow gave me inside.

“Where’d you get those?”

“I promise I’ll tell you later.” I led him to the foyer closet.

Elliott hesitated when I held Sparrow’s coat open for him to slip into. I let him wear mine instead, while I wore Sparrow’s. It smelled like him, and the sense of grief that hit me was unexpected.

“Are you okay?” Elliott asked, searching my pain-filled gaze.

“Yeah. Ready?”

He released a heavy exhale. “Let’s do it.”

I found cans of gasoline in the garage. We grabbed them after backing the car down the plowed driveway. “Are you sure?”

“Besides you and Quentin, I’ve never been more sure of anything.”

“I’ll take the upstairs,” I said as we headed back inside. “If it becomes too much—”

“It won’t. Leaving it standing is what would be too much. I-I have to destroy this place once and for all. I have to let it go.” We kissed hard before I raced up the stairs.

I unlocked each door, doused it with gasoline, and grabbed the jewelry box from Joshua’s room.

I slipped it into the coat pocket, pausing at Sparrow’s bedroom, feeling an odd desire to preserve it.

I approached the bed, letting my head hang as I remembered everything that took place in that room, good and bad.

Bittersweet emotions left me short of breath.

“Guelly?” Elliott’s voice shook me from my thoughts, the sadness in his eyes splitting me open. “I saw the rooms.”

“I hadn’t meant for you to.” How long had I been standing here?

He blinked, setting his canister down on the bed. “This is where you slept.”

“Yes,” I said, threading a hand through his hair.

“How did he treat you?” He seemed afraid of the answer.

I’d told him about the gatekeeper and his role, but not that I was ever Sparrow’s prisoner.

“Better by the end,” I admitted. Elliott touched the scar along my brow, and his trembling fingers smelled like gasoline.

He traced a few other scars I didn’t have before arriving here. “I’m so sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything to be sorry for. It wasn’t you.”

He looked so fragile and lost, yet he was here trying to be strong, trying to put an end to the pain. “Do you see him when you look at me? Do you see whatever he did to you?”

“No,” I said decisively. “All I see is everything he ever did for you .” I’d forever be grateful to Sparrow, and I suspected I’d always miss him, too.

“What was his name?”

“Sparrow.” I believed he deserved to know the name of the man who’d protected him.

“You cared for him.” He searched my eyes for the truth.

“Yes.”

“Thank you,” Elliott breathed. He picked up one of the cards from the nightstand, reading it. “What’s your favorite color… What did he say?”

“Brown.” I grinned, heart hurting.

Elliott kissed the corners of my watery eyes. “Mine too.” There were a slew of unasked questions in his gaze. I tried to decipher them. Do you love Sparrow? Do you prefer him over me?

I wasn’t sure if I’d guessed right, but I answered them anyway.

“You are who I want to spend my life with. You are the one I can’t live without.

You are part of my forever and ever, Elliott.

” This kiss was less frantic but just as urgent.

It said we could survive anything together.

It said time and circumstances hadn’t diminished our love. It said we’d come out of this stronger.

I grabbed the box of matches from the mantel, then we headed for the porch.

“Wait here,” I said once we got there. I ran back inside, jogging down hall after hall until I reached the basement. I hurried down, opening the hidden door in the wall.

I set the box of matches and canister down, then quickly removed the chunks of concrete covering Elijah and Sara’s grave.

Sweaty and out of breath, I poured the remaining gasoline into the hole, then set it on fire.

I wanted whatever may have been left of them burned to ash, leaving no traces behind.

I handed Elliott the matches once I’d stepped onto the porch. He lit one without hesitation, tossing it inside. The fire reached every corner, burning everything in its path as it spread its wings. Hopefully, the place would be nothing but cinders by the time anyone noticed.

We got into the car, watching until Elliott’d had his fill. “I’m ready to go home.”

“Our home is different now,” I warned. After leaving the hospital, I couldn’t go back to the house we’d exchanged our vows in. Not after everything that had happened there.

“My home is wherever my husbands are. Take me wherever we can be together.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said, choked up. “I’ll do my best.” We drove away, never once looking back.

Elliott slept the whole plane ride while I watched for signs he wasn’t himself. I had a feeling that would be our new normal. In between, I managed to find a psychologist and a physiatrist who both specialized in DID. I reached out to schedule an appointment.

After we landed, we headed straight for the facility Quentin had been in since his hospital release.

I’d visited him only once. The nurses and staff were put under strict orders not to let me back in—not to let anyone in—and eventually, not to accept any calls.

He’d pushed his mother away, too, but then so had I.

I spent weeks splitting my time between trying to break into the place and searching for Elliott. After my second arrest, I devoted all my energy to finding Elliott.

“He’s in a dark place,” I said from the parking lot. “He thinks he failed us, and he thinks he’s no good to anyone in the condition he’s in.”

“We’ll tell him that isn’t true. He’ll listen now that I’m back,” Elliott said, but I could tell he feared he might not be enough.