Her words I overheard that day ring in my head.“I can’t. They’re my family.”But it doesn’t excuse what she did, or the fact I can’t ever tell her how much it hurt to find out the way I did. It’s a twist in my gut that will never ease. She was lying to us all.
“You said he wasn’t responsible for the fire? That means you don’t think it was an accident.”
Denver’s jaw tightens, and as good as his poker face is, I can still read his silence better than any expression.
“But you already knew that?”
“We don’tknowanything. There’s no evidence to suggest it was arson.”
“But you don’t believe it was an accident.”
“No. I don’t.”
He fixes me with an intent stare that tells me all I need to know. My father’s head of security, a man with years of special operations training, who has a gut instinct for these things, knows something doesn’t add up about that day.
But he’s also not said a word about my mother’s death.
Or my role in it.
I narrow my eyes, my next words on the tip of my tongue.
Tires screech through the night like blood-curdling screams, and another vehicle races toward us.
It skids to a halt behind Denver, illuminating us with its headlights.
“I called them,” Denver says, his eyes trained on me like he’s assessing the risk that I might actually scale the fencing and jump off the bridge.
The doors fly open, and they spill out.
One by one.
My father. My brother. My sister.
The background noises of the city blur into nothingness. I can’t see their faces. They’re shadows, lit from behind by the headlights. The irony makes sourness creep over my tongue.
They approach slowly, staring at me like they’re seeing a ghost.
But I’m not a ghost.
I’m a shadow.
Shine a light on me and I no longer exist.
Their faces are all twisted with a mix of shock and pain.
“Three years has made you all pretty damn convincing,” I murmur.
Sinclair’s the first to break the silence. She makes a run for it, stopping directly in front of me.
Her eyes widen as she takes me in, and she sobs out a gasp through a weak, watery smile.
“Slade?” she whispers.
The pain in her eyes is like a dagger to my heart.
“Hi Sinclair,” I breathe.
She slaps me hard across the face.
