Page 44 of Sin (Salvation #1)
Cassidy
“What’s up?” Mercer Saint asks as I almost run into him as I’m exiting my classroom after my last final exam of the semester.
“Sin had something come up and asked me to give you a ride to your hotel,” he explains.
“Thank you for going out of your way,” I tell him and mean it.
Mercer and I have actually become bona fide friends in the last few months.
I’ve become truly fond of the wildly talented artist. “Maybe we all can have dinner tonight,” I suggest, having come to really enjoy the nights the four of us have gotten together and hung out.
“If by ‘all’ you mean to include Devlin, then good luck with that,” Mercer says with an obviously false, careless tone. “He’s gone. I haven’t seen him for a week, and I don’t know if I’ll ever see him again.”
I reach out to put my hand on his shoulder, knowing that Devlin’s absence is affecting him more than he is willing to admit, when my phone rings. It’s my mother calling. “Give me one second,” I tell Mercer, and hit answer.
“Cassidy,” my mother says, using her little-girl voice that usually means she needs something from me. “I need you to come home. I need your help.”
“Mom, is something wrong?”
“No, honey, I just need to talk to my baby boy.” I hear Gideon’s voice in the background. “I have to go, honey, but come home now. I really need to see you.”
“What’s wrong?” Mercer asks, noting my distress at the call.
“I’m not sure, but I think I should go see her just to be sure she’s okay.” I know Sin wouldn’t want me to go to the house alone, but surely, he wouldn’t mind if Mercer is with me. I turn to Mercer. “Would you mind if we made a detour before you take me back to the hotel?”
Mercer pulls up to the security gates. Oddly, no one is manning it and the gates are open. Since the intense media scrutiny after the Digger Mcree scandal hit, there have been three guards on at all times.
Mercer shrugs and drives through. “Just park in front of the house,” I direct him. “This is going to be a short visit. I just need to make sure my mother is all right, and then we can go.”
“Let me just text Sin about our little detour and tell him I’m gonna be the plus one at the romantic dinner he has planned for you tonight. I’ll meet you in there in a minute.”
“Sounds good,” I tell him and head inside. “Mom,” I call out.
She doesn’t answer. I walk farther into the house until I reach the great room. She’s sitting on the couch in histrionics, watching television. Sin fills the screen. I walk closer, trying to hear what he’s saying over my mother’s crying.
“The truth is the crimes he’s committed are much worse and include manslaughter. I’m posting here today to announce that my father, the Reverend Gideon Brandt, killed my mother.”
“They keep playing it over and over,” she cries. “Everyone will have seen it. He’s ruined us. What will people say?”
“Mom,” I go to her side and grab her arm to lift her up off the couch.
“We need to get out of here. “I don’t know what caused Sin to post his reveal now, but it’s sure to set Gideon off.
We both decided his indictment against his father would include a revelation about our true relationship.
We knew that with the intense scrutiny, the media would discover our secret, and this way, we could at least have control of the narrative.
I don’t want to be anywhere around him to witness his reaction.
You need to come with us. It’s not safe to be around Gideon right now. ”
“You’re on his side.” She yanks her arm away from me and slaps me hard. “You believe Sin’s lies.”
“Of course, he does, Sheila.” Gideon Brandt walks into the room.
“Haven’t you listened to the entire video?
” He’s overdressed for a weekday. He’s wearing his Sunday black suit with diamond-studded cufflinks.
My whole body freezes when I spot his other accessory.
He’s carrying a pearl-handled gun. “Our two sons are fucking like the sinful beasts they are. They’ve conspired to bring shame and destruction down upon us.
The only solution left to me is to rid this house of the pestilence they’ve brought to it. ”
The front door opens, and I hear Mercer’s footsteps along the hall.
“Run,” I yell, but he must not hear me, and he walks into the room. A loud, horrible bang fills the air, and Mercer falls to the ground, blood spreading out beneath him.
My mother runs at the sound of the gun going off. She doesn’t even look behind her to see if her husband just shot her only son.
Gideon looks at Mercer unconscious on the floor. “Wrong one,” he says unconcernedly. “We’ll have to wait for his comeuppance. You’ll draw Sin here eventually.”
I dive to the floor and yank off my Thurston sweatshirt and put pressure on Mercer’s stomach wound. Then I grab a throw from the couch, hoping to stave off him going into shock by keeping him as warm as possible.
“You’re going to be okay,” I keep repeating, but I don’t know if Mercer understands me; his eyes are glassy and far off.
“You should stop wasting your limited time with him,” Gideon says coldly, watching me try to save Mercer’s life. “You should use your time to atone for your wrongdoings against me.”
“Let me call for medical care for him, and I’ll make amends,” I promise. “I’ll do anything. Just don’t let him die.”
He aims the gun at me, and I instinctively flinch. The table lamp shatters above my head, sprinkling Mercer and me with shards of glass. “That’s for your lies.”
I begin to breathe heavily. My inhaler is in my backpack—which I left in the car.
I try to calm myself down by moderating my breathing, but stress has always affected my asthma attacks, and being held at gunpoint by my deranged stepfather while I’m desperately trying to save my friend’s life is definitely triggering.
“Looks like you may not make it until Sin gets here.” Gideon takes out his phone and begins to film me as I struggle to breathe, while still trying to help Mercer. “My son is not the only one who can make a video. Let’s see how he likes watching you die.”