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ALLIE
Arm sprawled across my abdomen, Jace tugged me closer to him and mumbled something incoherent in my ear. Moonlight flooded into the room through the blinds, and I blinked my eyes open. After reaching for my glasses on the nightstand, I put them on my face and squinted at the clock on my phone.
Three-forty-five a.m.
“Jace,” I whispered, pushing his arm off me. “I have to pee.”
After pushing him onto his back, I scooted out of bed and glanced over at his bare abdomen, just barely covered by the thin sheets. I grabbed a plush teal robe that Jace had bought me and shrugged it over my shoulders.
Once I did my business in Jace’s bathroom—yes, he had a bathroom in his damn bedroom—I opened his bedroom door and peeked my head out into the dark hallway. My mouth felt beyond dry. I needed something to drink. I hoped whoever was looking down on me that Harlan was asleep and hadn’t gotten up for work yet.
Deciding that he was asleep, I tiptoed out of the room and down the hallway, careful not to make any noise. While the house was huge and had too many rooms to count, I had to be extra careful. If Harlan was still awake, he could be anywhere.
Something told me not to go down to the kitchen. It would be too far to run back to Jace’s room without being trapped by Harlan, if he was down there, waiting for me like some psychopath. I didn’t doubt it either. After last night at the game, he’d seemed on edge more than usual. Everyone was on edge, even the people I thought didn’t have any dark secrets.
So, I decided to turn back around and get some water from the bathroom sink in Jace’s room. I didn’t care how nasty the water might’ve been. It would be better than dying at the hands of a known murderer. I walked quickly by the hallway bathroom and stopped when I saw a dim light flickering out from underneath the door.
The bathroom light wasn’t on, but it looked like there was a flashlight or something.
Swallowing hard, I leaned closer to the door to hear someone gagging on the inside. I grasped the door handle and jingled it slightly.
“Mom?” I whispered through the door, brows furrowed together. “Mom, are you in here?”
Someone shuffled inside the room and opened the door. Creaking slightly, the door swung open a few inches. I walked into the room, turned the light on, unsure why she hadn’t done it herself, and shut the door behind me.
“Mom? What are you doing here with the light off?”
“Shh, sweetheart,I don’t want to wake Harlan,” she said, glancing at the door. She puked in the toilet and looked back up at me. “He has a lot of work to do this week and needs his sleep.”
I furrowed my brows. “He’s your husband. He should be the one holding your hair back as you puke,” I said, trying to get her to see what was wrong about this entire situation. A good husband wouldn’t be angry that his wife was puking up her guts at three in the morning. “Dad would’ve woken up any night, no matter what he had to do in the morning.”
After pulling her gaze away from me, she stuck her head back into the toilet and puked some more. “We don’t talk about your father around here, especially not when he’s in the house.”
She went to push some graying-blonde hair behind her ear, but I held it back instead. She doubled over the toilet again and grasped her stomach, puking up some more.
“Why are you puking?” I asked, frowning. “Did you eat something bad?”
She tensed underneath me and nodded a bit too quickly. “It must’ve been the fish we ate last night …” She grasped the toilet and squeezed her eyes shut. “Yes, that’s what it has to be. It can’t be anything else.”
My brows furrowed, chest tightening. “Did Harlan—”
“No, he didn’t.” She stood on shaky legs and shuffled to the sink, washing her mouth. “This is my fault.” Tears welled up in her eyes as she stared at herself in the mirror. “This is my fault, my fault …” she whispered the last few words.
Though I didn’t know what exactly she was talking about, I didn’t need time to figure out that Harlan blamed her or would blame her for something.
She wiped the tears from her eyes and plastered a fake smile on her face. “Everything is fine, sweetie. You can go back to bed.”
“Can we talk about Harlan?” I asked in a whisper before she opened the door.
Freezing in place, she glanced back at me. “About what? We don’t have much time.”
“Mom …” I started.
Though she gave me an opportunity to ask questions and tell her everything, I didn’t know what to say. I hadn’t thought I’d get this far. She had been shut out for so many days, and I couldn’t tell her about what Harlan had done. If she tried to leave, she might get killed.
“Mom, are you okay?” I asked, knowing that this was probably as far as I could take it. “Has he tried to hurt you? You don’t seem the same, and I … I never see your real smile anymore. So much has changed since Dad passed.”
Mom swallowed hard, tears welling up in her eyes. Suddenly, she dropped her head and wept, placing a hand over her mouth so she wouldn’t make much noise. Body trembling back and forth, she pulled me into a hug and rested her head against my shoulder.
“Sweetheart, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry that I got you into this mess. I know …” She swallowed hard against me, body still shaking uncontrollably. “I know what happened. I know what he does to Jace. I know that we can’t get out. There’s no getting out now. It’s too late.”
Lips trembling, I held myself together as best as I could and clutched her tightly to me, stroking her hair. I pressed my lips together, so I wouldn’t make a sound and tensed to keep myself from bawling my eyes out.
“I miss Dad so much,” I whispered.
It didn’t have shit to do with the situation Harlan had trapped us in now, but I had wanted to say it out loud to her for so long. I wanted to scream at her for not letting herself take time to heal after his death. I wanted to fucking hate her for moving on with another man so quickly. But Dad wouldn’t want that.
After a few more moments, Mom straightened out and wiped the remaining tears from her face. “I have to get back to our room before Harlan figures out that I’m gone.” She shoved something into my hand and closed my fingers over top of it. “I love you with everything, baby. I will always love you.”
And then she walked out of the bathroom and down the dark hallway until she disappeared into the maze Harlan called a house. When she was gone, I gently unraveled my fingers and stared down at Dad’s chain that Harlan had stolen from me.
