Page 5 of Twisted Truths (The Sunburnt Hearts #4)

He grabs my arm again, tugging. “You don’t need to see this,” he pleads with me. “Come on, man. Let’s get out of here.”

“No!” I shout, wrenching my arm from his grip and shoving him away again. Staring down at the matching stains, I shake my head. “I’m not … I can’t … I won’t fucking leave them.”

My breathing comes in short, shallow gasps. I stare down at the spot where my mother tried to save my little brother. My entire world has been upended, shattered, and I have nothing left but questions and unbearable pain.

“Nash—”

“Ziggy didn’t do this,” I choke out. “She wouldn’t do this.”

She escaped. She ran from them. She got away.

“I know,” Levi says, trying for a third time to pull me to my feet. This time, I let him.

“We need to find the bastards who did this,” I say, my body trembling as he pulls me back through the kitchen and out of the house of horrors. “They’re going to pay for taking my family away from me.”

“We’ll talk to Shane and see what information he can give us,” Levi says, his eyes hardening. “We can go from there.”

Swallowing down my pain, guilt, and anger, I nod and follow him back down the drive.

“They won’t give us anything. You know as well as I do, they’re corrupt.

Why do you think they haven’t shut down Sunfire Circle and run Ignatius Solomon and his band of fucked up crazies out of town already?

Because he’s lining their pockets to make them look the other way. ”

“Not everyone’s on the take.” We get in the car and Levi does a U-turn to head back towards town. “We can trust Shane.”

I’m not sure I believe him, but I don’t voice my concerns. I’ve been gone for six years, so Levi knows how this town runs better than I do. If he says we can trust Shane, I have to take his word for it.

Confusion washes over me as Levi pulls up in front of Whitmore House Café instead of the police station, and I’m ready to argue with him as he drags me inside, but then I spot Shane Elliot sitting at a square table in the back corner.

He must have just come off the nightshift.

With his back to the wall, his tired eyes dart around the café as if he’s expecting trouble.

I stride over and pull out the chair opposite him. “Shane.”

“Nash,” he greets me grimly. “Sorry to see you back here under these circumstances.”

Not knowing what to say in response, I simply nod.

Levi takes the seat in between us, and Shane eyes him warily. “You’re causing me a lot of headaches, you know that?”

He shrugs. “Your head would be fine if you did your job and shut down the Circle.”

Shane sighs. “If only that were true.”

“Zara didn’t do it,” I say, interrupting them and getting straight to the point.

“The evidence says otherwise.”

“The evidence is bullshit. She would never hurt them. Or herself. Who else are you looking at?”

He narrows his eyes. “Even if I wanted to, I can’t share details of an ongoing investigation.”

“So, it is ongoing then? ”

“Look, I know you’re upset?—”

“Upset doesn’t even begin to cover how I’m feeling, Shane,” I say, my voice low and cold. “You know Zara. Do you really believe she’s capable of killing our mum? Or Rylan? Christ, he was only twelve. And how was she supposed to get the best of Paul? He’s twice her size on a good day.”

Shane’s eyes flick to Levi, then back to me, but he doesn’t say anything. The silence stretches between us, thick with unspoken tension.

“You’re asking me to go against the evidence,” he finally says, his voice strained. “I’m not some idealistic cop who believes in blind loyalty. I do know Zara, but do you? You’ve been gone for six years, Nash. She wasn’t the same seventeen-year-old girl you left behind.”

My jaw tightens. “I know her well enough to know she’d never hurt our family.”

“My job is to follow the facts. She left a note?—”

I lean forward, my hands clenched into fists on the table, fighting the rage bubbling up in my chest. “I’m telling you the facts are wrong.If there was a note, she didn’t write it. You’re just holding onto the easiest explanation. Zara didn’t do it. She couldn’t have.”

He looks at me, his eyes flickering with something I can’t quite place. Regret, maybe. But he doesn’t let it show for long. Instead, he leans back in his chair, arms crossed, his expression hardening again. “You’re too close to this, Nash. Let us do our job. You’re letting your emotions blind you.”

“Are you going to do your job?” I snap. “It seems to me you’ve already made up your mind about what happened.”

Levi shifts uncomfortably. “Nash?—”

“No,” I cut him off, my voice sharp. “This isn’t about me getting emotional, Shane. This is about the truth. You think you’ve got it all figured out, but you’re refusing to look at any other options.”

Shane leans forward, his hands flat on the table now, the weight of his gaze heavy on me. “We’re working with the facts. You’re here trying to rewrite them.”

“I’m asking you to look beyond the obvious,” I growl. “Look beyond the easy answer. She’d been out of the Circle for less than ten hours. You think they let her go willingly? How many people have you met who have left that compound of their own free will? How many?”

Levi winces. He knows exactly who I’m referring to.

“This isn’t some damn revenge mission. Zara made the decision to join them, just as she made the decision to leave.”

“About that…” Levi shifts again, and Shane shoots him a sharp look, holding his hands up to stop him.

“I don’t want to hear it.” He sighs again. He’s been in the game long enough to know that sometimes things aren’t as clear-cut as they seem. “What do you want me to do?”

“Your job,” I say simply. “Investigate the Sunfire Circle. Look into Ignatius and Gabriel. I’m telling you they have something to do with this.”

“This isn’t just a case of doing my job, Nash,” Shane replies, his tone low. “This is about getting it right. No matter how much you want to believe Zara’s innocent, the evidence says otherwise.”

“And if the evidence was forced or faked?”

He doesn’t answer right away. Instead, he stares at me like he’s considering it, before letting out a long breath and pushing himself up from his seat.

“We’ll see, won’t we? Stay out of the investigation. I’ll update you when I can, but for god’s sake, don’t go getting yourself into trouble. Let us handle it. ”

Levi and I watch him walk out of the café, neither of us saying a word until the door closes behind him.

“Are we going to do what he says?” My brother’s tone is resigned, telling me he already knows the answer.

“Hell, no. We’re going to nail that fucker Ignatius, and his son, too.”

He sighs. “I thought as much.”