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Prologue
HAZE
THEN
I used to think police stations were cool. At least, in the movies. Fourteen-year-old me thought they represented hope: a place where justice was served. But now that I was sitting in one, with my sister’s blood drying on my shirt, they weren’t cool, or impressive.
They were a fucking nightmare.
“Your parents are on their way, kid,” the fifty-year-old-looking officer had said to me, his eyes filled with… something. Something I couldn’t quite recognize at the time. I remembered seeing it in Vic’s mother eyes when she’d asked me if I saw my father often, and I’d said no. I didn’t know then that I’d be seeing it for the rest of my life.
This pity.
The pity that crawls up your throat when a fourteen-year-old boy just watched his baby sister bleed to death.
Sure, Tanner, my mother, and my bastard of a father were on their way, but for the past twenty minutes, I’d been alone. Alone, scared, terrified, empty.
“We’ll find the monsters who did this,” one of the police officers had said to me once I’d told him everything. They thought I wouldn’t hear them when they’d whispered, “Most likely the same dirtbags who robbed a couple houses on the south side. We don’t think they were trying to kill anyone. Clearly didn’t know the kids were home. These two were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
So, Des was collateral damage? An accident? The unexpected bump in the road of their evil plan?
Fuck them. Fuck all of them.
I stared blankly into empty space, thinking of her fingers wrapped around mine before the end. Before she’d closed her eyes and left me behind. Lost. Without her.
Glancing down at my feet, I shivered in my seat, the ice-cold temperature digging into my bones. It was like every good thing, every light, every trace of hope had disappeared from the planet when she had.
Drained, I ignored the furtive looks the officer kept on giving me. They seemed scared. Of what? That I’d snap, lose it, wreck everything? Or did they feel guilty that it wasn’t them? That they had this somehow “okay” life compared to the fucking mess that was mine?
They could feel bad for me all they wanted. I knew they’d never really care. Why would they? They didn’t know her. They didn’t make her laugh, see her toothless smile. They didn’t read her bedtime stories or teach her to swim. They weren’t the one she came running to when she had nightmares. They hadn’t promised to one day stand up to her potential bullies and kick some guy’s ass for breaking her heart.
But that’s the thing with tragedies. You don’t care about the pain until it’s yours. You can’t cry someone else’s tears or fight someone else’s battles. And there are no apologies in the world, no sympathetic smiles, no pat on the back that can change the truth—your pain belongs to you and you only.
How ironic that the thing that kills you is the one thing you can’t share.
I remember the moment I saw my parents come in. They should’ve made me feel better but only poured salt into my wounds. The expression in my father’s eyes ended me. The hatred. The blame.
I remember Tanner wrapping his arms around me. My mother’s eyes were teary. But I knew she wouldn’t let herself cry in public. She never had before and sure as hell wouldn’t start now. I buried my face into my brother’s neck and surrendered to a panic attack. I bawled my eyes out, crying like a baby. I couldn’t see, but I didn’t want to. I’d never want to. Not if it meant seeing a world without Desiree.
Never, in my entire life, had I cried in front of my father. Showing that kind of weakness had been forbidden to us since we were kids. It was a disgrace in our family. But I didn’t care. Because I finally understood. What people said about grief? They were right.
That kind of pain will change you forever.
Not a word was uttered by my dad. Not even a look. Tanner didn’t move. He held me tighter. Then, my father muttered something about how I should’ve been a man. I cried harder.
“We’ll fix it, brother, I promise,” Tanner whispered as I sobbed. “I’ll train you.”
I had no clue what it meant at the time. But I couldn’t be bothered to think further into it. My glazed eyes swept around the packed and agitated room, and the officer’s words echoed in my mind.
“We’ll find the monsters who did this.”
Marcus. His name is Marcus, I’d said.
And I knew, if they didn’t find him…
I would.
1
Fresh Start
WINTER
NOW
“How much longer?” my crybaby of a boyfriend whines, laying his head on my shoulder and dragging out a long sigh. Watching the clouds ruin my every chance of catching a view through the window, I ignore the tingling of Haze’s breath against my neck and press my cheek to the top of his head. Bouncing his leg like a deprived crack addict, Haze continues to make sleeping impossible for me. He’s been at it since the plane took off.
“The flight’s two hours and forty-five minutes. We left two hours ago. Do I need to teach you basic math, Adams?”
