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TWENTY-EIGHT
ROWAN
Twenty-five years earlier
Mascara-colored tears streamed down my cheeks as I pressed the blade to my wrist. You’ll have to press hard, I reminded myself, trying to control the tremor in my hand. I’d practiced on oranges—six of them, actually. I knew that lots of pressure and a swift back-and-forth sawing motion was the only way to break through the skin. I knew it would hurt, but I also knew that once it was over, I’d never have to hurt again.
It was time. I’d never been surer of anything in my life. I was ready to leave the earth, plain and simple. I didn’t want this life, one filled with children’s shelters and foster homes, and I didn’t see a light at the end of the tunnel. Hell, I couldn’t even see the end of the tunnel, and maybe that was the worst.
My reason for no longer wanting to be here had nothing to do with addiction, betrayal, grief, debt, or anything like that. It was because I had simply given up. I had no hope. And a world without hope is a very, very dark place.
I was in my bathroom at the shelter, sitting cross-legged in the bathtub. I’d chosen that spot because I didn’t want to make a big, bloody mess for the staff to clean up. Weeks earlier, I’d stolen scissors from the rec room, although I’d been contemplating ending my life for months before that.
I looked at the roadmap of veins on my inner wrist. I reminded myself to cut along the vein, not across it, so that I’d die quicker. I’d read that somewhere.
I’d already vomited twice in the toilet, and now, my heart was pounding so hard I could actually see it pumping through my veins.
I focused on a plume of mold in the corner of the bathtub. I stared at that nasty black spot for what seemed like eternity. Slowly, my pulse slowed and a wave of calm came over. A feeling of peace, almost like happiness, because I realized that I would never, ever, have to feel this way again.
The initial puncture felt like a bee sting, a zip of pain from the top of my head to the tip of my toes. But the sawing—the severing of the skin—was almost unbearable. Like someone had lit fire to my entire body.
That was when Shepherd came in. The boy I’d spent almost every day with since meeting years earlier. The boy I’d lost my virginity to. The boy who the others warned me to stay away from, the boy rumored to have “serious issues.” Which, let’s be honest, only made me want him more. Because I, too, had serious issues.
That was the day Shepherd saved my life.
The day he took my heart for his own.
TWENTY-NINE
ROWAN
“Her name is Macy Swift, do you know her?” Sergeant Chris Hoffman asks Kellan and me as we stare down at the body. Hoffman was the first to arrive on scene, Kellan shortly after, followed by Darcy, the medical examiner.
Kellan and I shake our heads in unison.
“She’s married to a local real estate developer; Jerry Swift is his name. They own an excavation company. Lots of money.”
Kellan nods. “I’m vaguely familiar with the name.”
“How do you know them?” I ask Chris.
“She goes to my gym. She does a lot of philanthropy stuff. Runs a few charities.”
“Are you two friendly?”
“No, I just recognize her.”
“So we’ve got another rich stay-at-home wife whose body is carved with the letter X,” Darcy mutters, hovering over the body with a magnifying glass. The scene is illuminated with flashlights that both Kellan and Hoffman carried down from their vehicles. Soon, the scene will be lit up with Klieg lights and crawling with crime scene techs.
Two deaths in only a few days just kicked things up a notch.
“How long do you think she’s been dead?” Hoffman asks.
“Less than twenty-four hours,” Darcy responds. “Right around there, probably. My guess is that she was killed about this time last night. I can tell most of the contusions are postmortem, so I’m assuming she was dumped here after she was killed. And, based on the marks around her neck, I’m also guessing she was strangled, just like Alyssa Kaing.”
“If someone dumped her, then there has to be tracks from whoever did it.” Hoffman looks at me. “Did you check for boot prints?”
“Yes. There were none.”
