AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CAROLINE MARIE ELLIOTT
MOTHER. DAUGHTER. SISTER.
LOYAL PROTECTOR.
Her words thunder through me:
“I’ll always protect you.”
Something inside me breaks like a dam. My hands ball into fists and my throat tightens. My heart hurts.
It hurts.
I pull at my hair, spin in a circle, and stare up at the starry sky. “Where are you?” I shout, sounding like a madman, like an unhinged beast. “Where are you, huh? You said you’d always protect me. Where. Are. You?”
Silence answers me, as it always does, so I kick at the grass, at the mud, and I fall to my knees, growling my desperate pleas into my hands. “You lied.” My voice cracks, quavers. “I trusted you and you lied…”
“Brant.” I’m falling apart, right along with the bodies and bones, when June wraps her arms around me, crouched beside me in the grass. “She kept her promise.”
I shake my head, tears spilling from my eyes. I’m crying. I’m fucking crying, and I can’t remember the last time I cried. “She didn’t.”
“Shh…she did. She did.” June strokes my hair, kisses my forehead, whispers her soft coos of solace into my ear. “She gave you to us, Brant.” Her own tears get the better of her, and she chokes out, “She gave you to me.”
My heart stutters.
My breath hitches, realization dawning on me.
Oh my God.
All this time…
All this time I’d been angry and bitter, thinking my mother had broken her promise. She’d whispered hopeful words into a little boy’s ear that she couldn’t possibly keep.
But June is right.
My God, June is right.
My mother never broke her promise.
She said she’d always protect me and she did.
Even in death.
She’d written me into her will. She’d written the Baileys into her will. Mom made sure I had a safe, loving home to go to if anything were to ever happen to her—and I think maybe deep down she knew. She knew what my father was capable of, so she took the proper precautions to protect me long after she’d left.
By sending me to live with Samantha and Andrew Bailey, my mother protected me from the legal system, foster homes, temporary families, and so many terrifying unknowns I can’t even begin to imagine. How different my life would be right now if she hadn’t done what she did. How frightening.
How lonely.
My mother’s last wishes were all about protecting me, and I can’t believe I never saw it.
Fresh tears flood me, and I collapse against June, her arms enveloping me as I bury my face into her neck. She holds me. She holds me so tight, keeping all my broken pieces from scattering.
“Thank you,” I croak out, my throat raspy and raw, my voice tired but strong. My heart bruised but free of the heavy weights. “Thank you for bringing me here.”
June pulls back, her hands clasped around my neck. Her own tears shine back at me. She feels my pain in the same way I feel it, and I’m not sure what that means. “You might not notice, but I always spritz myself with vanilla-scented body mist on my birthday,” she tells me.
I notice.
