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To say he’d slept bad was an understatement, but rising to the sound of his mother yelling at Charlie loud enough that it reached him in his bed did nothing to improve Dylan’s mood.
I love you.
He couldn’t believe she’d said those words to him last night. They’d left him reeling. No one had ever told Dylan they loved him... well, not that he remembered anyway. Maybe his dad, possibly his mom, but his memory couldn’t come up with a time.
Coward that he was, he’d just walked away. Turned and left the woman who had said the three words he’d never believed he’d hear.
Everything was now a complicated mess. He didn’t want emotions confusing what he had to do, but they were, and he’d be lying if he believed otherwise. Piper Trainer made him feel, and more than he’d ever felt before.
A loud bang on his door had him rising. It flew open.
“You need to dress and get downstairs to hear what’s been happening.”
“What?” Before he could get an answer Charlie had stormed back downstairs. She was angry, so he was guessing it wasn’t another illness or injury. Chances were it was to do with his mother and her behavior.
Pulling on jeans and a sweater, he ran downstairs barefoot.
“You don’t honestly believe she’s capable of doing that, do you?” Charlie was yelling at his mother from behind one chair. His mother, who was still weak, but better, was seated across the table from her.
“What’s going on?”
“I told you those Trainers were bad,” Mary Howard snapped at him. “I now have proof, and it’s that bitch you’ve been playing with who’s at the root of it.”
“Piper is not a bitch, and you say that again and I’ll be seriously pissed.”
“Don’t talk to me like that.”
“Then don’t talk about Piper like that,” Dylan countered. “Now what’s this about proof?”
“Piper Trainer poisoned me.”
He gripped the back of a chair for support.
“What?”
“The results came back, and the poison was in one of the donuts Mom ate. She thinks Piper did it deliberately,” Charlie said.
“I purchased a dozen donuts, and ate two that morning, and nothing else. After that I got sick I was asked what I ate that day, because my blood results came back showing rat poison.”
“Piper would never poison you. She may not like you, but she’d never hurt you,” Dylan said as he tried to grapple with what his mother was saying.
“I know you’ve been seeing her, Dylan! Know that hussy got her claws into you, but now you have to see her for what she is! The rest of the donuts were tested and showed up as having the rat poison in them.”
He stared at his mother as her words slowly began to sink in.
“Chief Blake’s questioning her now, and he’s going to arrest her, I’m making sure of it!”
“No.” The word was hoarse. “She....” His words fell away as he thought about Piper and what he really knew about her.
“Piper would never do that.” Charlie was looking at him, not their mother. “You have to know that, Dylan.”
“I need to go.” He ran up the stairs and grabbed shoes. Minutes later he was running out the door with Charlie on his heels.
“Dylan, you can’t honestly believe Piper would do this?”
“I don’t know what to believe. She hates Mom, we both know that, and is protective of her cousins—”
“No!” Charlie grabbed his arm, making him face her. “You care about her and know she’s not capable of this, Dylan.”
