AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The choice is entirely mine.
My muscles are already pulled tight, every fiber in my body knowing what I should do. Familiarity washes over me because it’s the same thing I’ve always done when I’m uncertain.
I turn back and I don’t walk, I run.
I can’t do this.
forty-two
Rory
Somehow,I’dmanagedtoconvince myself leaving the hospital a second time was for the best, even as my gut continues to tell me that I’m a liar.
I shove those doubts away. Distracting myself with other things instead.
My phone started blowing up not long after I got back to the Caspers’. I texted everyone, letting them know I was okay and that I wanted to be alone.
Stringing my hair up into a high pony, I put my phone on silent and go to work.
The conservatory has many faces. A place of growth, an escape, and now a place of study. Buckling down all my energy I become devoted to trying to figure this out.
Focusing on this is easier than going back to the hospital.
I rub at my tired eyes, checking the time on my phone. I didn’t have a clue what hour it was but when I arrived, I know it had been daylight. Now only darkness settles through the cracks of clear glass.
Papers litter the room. I’d gone through every single piece of information Sgt. Daniels had collected on Lorna. Weeks’ worth of work lay before me. Her entire life’s history present in these thin sheets of knowledge.
This woman’s history is a lot more complex than I’d originally known. She’d jumped from foster family to foster family until she was an adult. Hopping from jobs in a similar fashion the few years after.
The bit that truly caught me off guard was seeing that she’d worked at Hardin. She’d been a secretary. Did Finn even know that?
That wasn’t the only surprising thing I’d learned though, scouring her files.
Hardin was not only her longest job but also her last. Adding up the time line of her work history with their marriage certificate and Finn’s birthday, I easily deduced why she’d quit.
Lorna is a true rag-to-riches success story on paper. A nothing turned into a something, overnight.
She’s someone who had more to lose than anyone. Which makes it all the more confusing on why she’d outed herself the other night.
Paraphrasing, Hailey recounted what Finn had told her happened that night.
For so long, we hadn’t been able to locate her. Like a phantom, she’d disappeared without a trace after her confession at Hardin. Why unveil her carefully guarded cloak now?
She’s insane—smart—but senile.
What’s even more pressing is that Cole admitted he'd noticed the car had been following them for a while. And by that, I mean as soon as they pulled out of the Caspers’ driveway.
At first, I assumed that meant she’d been watching us, and maybe she had, but I wasn’t convinced that was all. A nagging feeling has settled in my bones that won’t rest telling me there’s more.
It was right after Madison had gotten us all into the bank and we came back here. Lorna also would’ve needed access to a car that we wouldn’t recognize. Also, it wasn’t a rental because there hasn’t been a credit card purchase since Abram froze all her cards.
So, she’s either getting money from somewhere else or has had help. If she had help, it wouldn’t be too far off to suspect she was staying with whoever they were as well.
Untraceable, she’s somewhere none of us thought to look.
But where?
Blinking, I pull my head away when the black text on white paper starts to swim, turning into a gray blur. I’ve been staring too long, and my vision is long past strained.
