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Right now it’s a crime scene, and before that night it was a shrine to my parents and Elle.
But before Elle’s murder, it was home. It was laughter and my mom baking casseroles on the weekends to restock the freezer for the upcoming week because both our parents worked, but we enjoyed family meals together.
It was the place Elle would come back to when her adult life got to be too much and she needed to be reminded that she was loved unconditionally.
We had joy there. It’s always been home for me.
Joey Dixon is dead. Only the memories of him and what he did can hurt me now, and as much pain as that is, he can’t show up on my porch or reach through my hanging clothes and wrap his fist around my throat.
“I don’t even know if I want to stay in town,” I confess.
Silence draws my eyes back up to Sophia. I fully expect her to give me a list of reasons to stick around. She’s made assumptions about my connection to Sawyer, and having her perfect life with Colton made me think she’d push for me to run to Sawyer, as if he’s waiting for me to jump into his open arms. But I don’t have what she and Colton have.
How often does someone who was supposed to be a one-night stand end up turning into more?
How often does a one-night stand end up in the middle of a serial killer’s plan to destroy the sister of a woman he killed fifteen years prior?
I huff at my own contradictory thoughts. I’m all over the damn place and that’s why I can’t make any life-altering decisions right now.
“What do you know about Sawyer?” I ask because I just can’t help myself.
“Not much. I don’t go to the clubhouse very often. My parents don’t live on Cerberus property. I know that my Uncle Diego does his research. I know that only elite men and women are brought into the fold.”
I open my mouth to inform her just how I met Sawyer and what happened less than an hour later, but I snap my own mouth closed. We were consenting adults and having any negative feelings about that night comes from my own prejudices and the voices in my head that sound a lot like my mother’s voice warning me about dangerous men.
Sophia’s son wakes up from his nap, and then she’s in mom-mode.
The afternoon and into the evening is filled with a smiling happy toddler who takes it upon himself to show me every single toy he has.
I eat dinner with them, realizing just how lonely my life has been since I came here. I have literally nowhere else to go but home and I’m not ready for that yet. I wouldn’t even consider Colton a close friend, and before today I only had a cordial connection to Sophia. She was the wife of my mentor, not someone I’d call out of the blue to ask if she wanted to grab lunch.
When I thanked her for the blanket and pillows, that had already begun to change. She had no obligation to keep me company all day while Colton worked. She didn’t have to be nice to me.
Yet, she never batted an eye.
As I lie on my side, I keep my ears open. As a detective, being nosey is both a character flaw and a requirement.
I’ve always looked for the bad in people. I’ve always judged and waited for the other shoe to drop. People aren’t nice. They want something. There’s always something they think they can get from you.
Sophia being so nice today was odd. It went against everything my mom and dad made me believe about people.
I listen, waiting for the complaints, waiting for her to ask him if she’s going to have to babysit me again tomorrow.
Their bedroom door isn’t even closed, and maybe that’s purposeful. Maybe they’ll talk loud enough for me to hear them so they don’t have to ask me to leave to my face.
They don’t complain.
They don’t even mention me, but not in a way that I feel like they don’t want to talk about it because it’s a sore subject.
Their conversation is what I’d consider normal.
Sophia tells him all about her day. They discuss their son and how he’s so energetic. They joke about how much trouble they’re in with a new baby coming soon. Sophia laughs after calling him an old man.
It’s clear they love each other. They’re thriving even after a madman tried to rip all of that away from them.
I try not to be bitter about it. Colton didn’t lose his son that day, like my parents suffered with Elle’s death. I’d never wish that pain on anyone, but our story had a different ending.
I close my eyes, trying to will sleep to take over, but all I see behind my eyelids are flashes of Sawyer, as if he’s the only one capable of seeing me through all of this.
