Page 42

Hope: Trust of resilience.

I s it worth it anymore?

I stared at the wall across from me. The images of Judas falling to his death replayed in my mind over and over. I couldn’t shut off my brain. Every time I closed my eyes, it just got worse.

Was it worth your pounds of silver, my brother?

Boom!

Judas. God, my own brother. It didn’t make sense.

Nothing made sense. Judas was always trapped in his mind, but that night, it felt like he was fighting to regain who he was.

There were times I could see my brother.

He was fighting to be in control of his own body, but then another person took over.

Judas begged me to kill him so that Fallon would live.

He didn’t want to take someone else away from me.

Fallon hadn’t returned, so I tried to sit up in bed. My wrist was chafed from the cuff, but it was for the best. Goliath was only doing what any sane man would do. He found me on that cliff, crying my eyes out.

I told him that I had killed Judas.

I told him that he was gone.

Those images kept repeating over and over. I held my head with my free hand, trying to push out the memories, but they only grew in intensity until I was thrown back to that night.

Boom!

Judas flew back from the gun’s impact. The bullet clipped his side, but now he was about to fall over the edge.

I screamed, running to him.

He had tears running down his cheeks, but he looked at peace.

“No!” I said, trying to reach him.

“I love…you…my brother…. thank you.”

Before my eyes, Judas fell over the cliff’s edge. His smile was the last thing I saw, and that peace gave him an angelic look as he fell backward with his arms outstretched like an angel.

I smashed into the ground on my knees, reaching out for my brother. “No! Judes!”

He was gone.

I screamed and punched my fists into the jagged edges of the rock bed until I bled. My blood joined with my brothers.

Fallon moaned, and I wiped my face and walked back over to her. I didn’t feel the impact as my knees hit the ground beside her. I pulled her into my arms and held onto her knowing my fucking life and sanity depended on it.

“Oh, Little Voyeur. What have I done?”

I dropped my face into her hair, holding her as I cried for my fallen triplet.

“Roe?”

The sound came from behind me. Goliath was walking out of the trees, and his arm was lax against his side. His face was beaten and bloodied. Had Judas attacked them? Was that what he meant when he said he had to silence them?

Thank God you’re alive.

“Roe…what happened?” Goliath was assessing the scene in front of him, the pools of blood all around. Some were mine, some Fallon’s, others were Ferdinand’s and...Judas’s.

“I…” I said shakily.

The image of my brother falling over that cliff repeated in front of my eyes like a ghostly shadow that wouldn’t allow me to escape. Randall was right. I would never be able to see my hands clean again. They would always be stained with blood.

The blood of my brother.

“I…” I repeated, unable to even form words.

“Roe, where is Judas? He ran off this way after fucking attacking us. He’s not okay. This was a bad idea, waking him from the sedation. I never should have—”

“He’s dead…I…killed him.”

Goliath stood frozen, blinking rapidly and trying to process my words.

I felt so dizzy.

I wanted to vomit.

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to die.

Fallon moaned in her pain, and I looked at my brother. My vision was spotty, and I knew I was going to pass out. I had to be sure Fallon was safe. I had nothing left to live for.

“Lith…please…don’t let Fallon wake up in…. another hospital…please…keep her safe.”

Later on, I woke up on this bed with Fallon beside me…and my wrist in the handcuff.

Goliath didn’t understand. I couldn’t explain anything to him. He tried for a week to talk to me, to get me to tell him about the events of that night, but I couldn’t. I was haunted. I couldn’t find the words.

Nothing made sense.

Everything hurt.

Judas…killed Xenia.

My brother took away the only light in my life. He’d extinguished her life. I tried not to think about how she must have felt. How scared she would feel for her uncle to hurt her…

Quinn had told me that the killer had been the one to put Xenia in bed.

Nothing made sense for how she was laid to rest. Almost like she was preserved and honored, Micah and anyone I hired privately for her case couldn’t match the two different treatments…

but now it made sense. Judas fought his mind.

He tried to make it right.

That note.

Those words were Judas’s, but that had to be the person he fought with. Why couldn’t I have just gotten Judas to safety? We could have figured out how to help him. He didn’t have to be gone.

You wanted him to die for what he did to her. You’re the devil.

I ignored Joe’s jeers. I couldn’t believe he was right. I covered my ear and shoved my head in the pillow. The image of Judas appeared silent, with that relaxed smile on his face. He pulled a pistol out of his pants, pointed it at the ghostly figure of Joe, and pulled the trigger.

Joe blew up into scattered pieces of dust that slowly evaporated into a mist around me.

I blinked, trying to follow what happened. Judas’s translucent form smiled and fell backward, mirroring that pose from the cliff, disappearing with the sound of waves like that night.

I swallowed. I was losing my fucking mind. No wonder my brother wanted to have me committed.

Xenia’s beautiful form appeared, and she sat on the bed with me.

I cleared my throat and tried to smile at her.

“You finally found me, Daddy,” she whispered, a vibrant smile on her face.

She didn’t look pale. The color on her cheeks was that rosy pink. Her eyes were big, innocent pools, and her hair was like her mother’s beautiful springy black curls.

“I…” she wasn’t talking about a game of hide and seek. Maybe she never was. She was leading me to see what happened to her.

“I did find you, Little Flower. I found you.”

Xenia smiled, her skin glowed, and she faded into a light I had never seen before.

She reached her hand forward toward me, and she looked older than she usually did. I felt a warmth when she touched me—a whisper of wind and warmth.

“I can go home to Mommy now, Daddy. They need you here. But we can play again someday.”

I never got to say goodbye to my beautiful daughter…but now she was telling me she was leaving. She wouldn’t be back. This was it. I could feel it in my heart as I looked into her beautiful eyes.

The sunflower in her hair began to bloom, the petals falling free and floating to the bed where our hands touched.

“I love you, Xenia. I…don’t know how I will do any of this without you. I love you so much.”

Xenia stood, tears streaming down her smiling face. “They need you, Daddy. Just like Mama needs me. You are so strong. I will always be with you, even if you can’t see me. You will feel me.”

I let my tears fall, staring at my daughter for the final time.

“I love you, Little Flower. Sleep tight.”

“Will you sing to me one more time, Daddy?”

I smiled through my tears and started a slow sound of her favorite song, “Tennessee Whiskey.”

Xenia disappeared into a ball of light, a golden orb. I could see Ariah reaching out to Xenia with her hands. She was safe, back with her mother, where she always belonged.

I stared at the wall again. For the first time in a long time, my thoughts were…my own. Joe no longer haunted me, and Xenia’s spirit was free to return to Ariah with the mystery of her death having been resolved.

I wiped my face from my tears and looked at the wall again.

Would my brother haunt me?

Nothing is keeping him here.

I knew he wouldn’t be in my mind except for my thoughts, but my hope was overwhelming. Fallon came back into the room and ran to me as best she could when she saw the tears streaming down my face.

“Pharaoh! Are you hurt? What’s wrong?”

I held onto her cheek and kissed her with every ounce of love I had inside my soul.

“She’s gone, Little Voyeur.”

Fallon searched my face. “Who’s gone? Pharaoh, what’s wrong?”

I traced the lines of her cheek and lips with my one free hand. “Xenia. My Little Flower went back to be with her mother.”

Fallon’s beautiful green eyes showed understanding, and she pulled me into an embrace. I didn’t know what truly breaking felt like until this woman made me feel safe enough to shatter completely.

She held me as I sobbed and snotted all over her. I couldn’t stop. I just kept crying. Crying for my brother. My daughter. My fucking soul. At one point I felt someone come in and free my other hand from the cuffs.

“I love you, Fallon Summers. I am sorry. I never should have left you. I was scared to lose you, and being a coward is why I almost did.”

Fallon wiped my cheeks with her thumb and kissed the remaining tears.

“I love you too, stupid. Don’t ever run from me. You belong to me just as much as I belong to you.”

I laughed and felt a sting of sadness resurface.

“But…I am a killer. I am the fucking devil, Little Voyeur.”

Fallon forced me to meet her gaze and kissed me to the point I lost my breath.

“You are my devil.”