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Lucas and Oliver surround Raymond and Caleb approaches me.
“You’re safe now,” he murmurs.
Raymond turns around and screams, “Don’t touch her!”
The sound of flesh striking flesh echoes in the basement room and I hear a thud as the monster collapses, unconscious.
Caleb picks the lock on the cuffs, and suddenly, he’s replaced by Jace, who drags me into his arms, rocking me back and forth.
I’m still as a doll, my mind numb, and then I feel his body shaking around mine and it brings me out of my shock enough to realize what had just transpired. My hands slowly wrap around his waist and then I’m crying.
And I can’t stop.
He just holds me and doesn’t let go even as I wail like a child who has lost everything. I cry myself hoarse, and when no more tears are left, he pulls away just enough to wipe my face and press a kiss on my forehead. “I thought I lost you,” he whispers, hoarsely.
“Raymond, he—” I try to speak, to tell him of the depravities of the man who had raised me.
Jace shakes his head. “I know what he’s done. There was enough evidence on his phone that you left behind. And I heard most of what he said.” He looks over my shoulder.
I know he’s looking at the bodies of my mother and her lover. I close my eyes, an integral part of me, completely shattered today.
I’d never seen the way Raymond had always been obsessed with my mother. He was so beloved in town, who would have believed her if she had tried to tell them of how he’d been treating her.
My mother had been a beautiful caged bird that had tried to protect me at the cost of her dignity, her self-respect, and her life. And then she had fallen in love with a man who had believed her pleas and then they both paid the ultimate price.
“Jace.” I watch him
He looks at me with eyes full of love.
“Can you help me bury them?” My voice breaks, “I—I want them to have a funeral and a proper grave. But not here.”
“We’ll take them back home,” he says, gently.
Cameron’s voice in the background and then Jace is pushed aside as my friend envelops me in a hug and he’s crying. The only other time I’ve ever heard Cam cry was at his father’s funeral. But this is somehow worse than that. I wrap my hands around his neck and I feel my own tears rise up again.
Leaving this hell hole isn’t easy but I refuse to let Jace carry me out. I watch as Lucas and Oliver carry out the bodies that are now ready to be buried, then Duke drags out the unconscious monster who was behind all of this.
Jace’s arm is around me as I watch the ambulance approach from the distance and hear the sirens…I feel empty inside.
“Halley.”
I look up at him.
He studies me with a blazing intensity. “You will get past this, sweetheart. I swear to you. Even if I have to spend my whole life making sure that you do.”
I see a glimmer of something red behind him, and when I look over his shoulder, for a moment, I think I see my mother standing behind him in the center of the road, wearing her favorite dress. Her long red hair flowing freely like it always did, her eyes are sparkling, and there’s a smile on her lips as she meets my gaze.
Then she turns around.
I blink.
She’s gone.
Am I hallucinating?
I stare at the spot she had been standing in but there’s nothing there.
“What is it?” Jace looks over his shoulder, alert.
