AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I understand,” Luca concedes. “I don’t want to show them to her either, but we need to have them. Just trust me.” His entire attitude towards Charles has shifted, he’s still his usual, stone-faced self, but he isn’t being antagonistic. It’s a subtle but huge shift.
Charles must choose to relent and bring a few photos with him because Luca nods once more. “Hold tight, someone will be there in a few hours. Sooner if I can make it happen.” He ends the call and hands it back to me.
“We have to tell her.”
I wince. He’s right, but I don’t want to.
“Go wake the rest of them up. We’re going to need to start planning.”
He squeezes my shoulder as he puts his own phone to his ear and walks out of the room, already calling the troops. I turn my focus back to what I’m good at. Gathering intel.
Let the hunt begin.
Chapter Twenty-Eight Scar
My peaceful dreamsare shattered with a few simple words.
“Charles found them.”
I’m instantly awake, sitting up fast enough to make my head spin. I still don’t let it slow me down, jumping out of bed as I stare down Luca, waiting for more of an explanation than that. He can’t just drop a bomb like that on me. He can’t do that.
A million thoughts run through my head, questions, doubts, fears. Memories flash by, broken bits and pieces crashing down on me, making me flinch with the force of them.
I want to ask how, where, when? But only one word slips past my lips, the most important question of all and the answer I fear the most.
“Who?”
Declan wraps his body around me, pulling me against his chest where I can feel his rapid heartbeat. My own pounds so hard it’s almost hard to hear anything over the pounding in my ears. His arms band across my chest like a straight jacket, forcibly holding me together because he knows I’m moments away from completely losing it. Again.
Luca meets my gaze, his dark eyes a steel band of reassurance. It’s true. We’ve really found them. After all this time, I’m finally going to know the names of the men who hurt me. Probably more than their names. I’ll probably know them. Their families, their wives, maybe even their kids. Fear, shame, and something far more primal ricochet through me.
“Who?” I repeat, my voice cracking, and tears fill my eyes. I need to know and I’m fucking terrified at the same time. After so many years, I didn’t expect to feel this way. To feel the familiar sense of dread and terror. How many more pieces of myself are left to break? Will the who behind that night take the last pieces of myself I managed to save? The pieces I’ve managed to rebuild.
Am I about to shatter all over again?
“Jeffrey Schroder and Daniel Bernard.”
Five words. So decisive. So easy to push out.
Each one a whip against my bare skin. A new lash of pain and hate and humiliation.
Mrs. Schroder was my piano teacher. I used to babysit their daughter. Their miracle baby. They tried so hard for so many years to get pregnant and Mrs. Schroder was so happy when she finally got her daughter. A beautiful little girl the same age as the twins. Their friend.
Their family spent the second Sunday of every month at our house for a family dinner. Charles and his father were there often as well. It makes perfect sense for him to be one of the men. Of course, he was there. I almost hate myself for not seeing it earlier. It seems so obvious now.
New flashes of long forgotten memories begin to drown me.
A class ring against the dark walnut desk in my father’s office.
Familiar loafers in front of my face as my head bounces against the floor.
A dark chuckle that sounds familiar but distorted.
The weighted gaze in the crowded hallway that sent fear pulsing through me.
The heavy hand that landed on my shoulder, pushing against my wounds as Dean Bernard steered me into his office.
The guilt and shame that coursed through me.
