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3
Keira
The security card worked on the gate and again on the panel to unlock the front door, allowing us access to the house I once knew as a family vacation home.
It was never a holiday for my parents, though.
As I reached my teens, I realized our trips here were out of necessity, not relaxation. We only visited this house because our lives were threatened. Not due to my dad’s desire to bond.
“Once you’re settled, I’m going to take a walk outside to check the yard.” Decker hovers over my shoulder as I disarm the alarm in the foyer with my fingerprint.
“Okay.” I flick on the lights and lead the way down the hall, the familiar space filled with tarnished memories that threaten to overwhelm me.
Despite the reasons for our visits, my mom used to love it here. She would bake all day and watch movies with us all night. We’d chat and read for hours. And now she’s gone, taken by a bullet through the chest, her life stripped by the insanity that still surrounds us.
I shake away the grief and focus on the change in decor as I walk down the hall, determined to pull myself together despite the nightmares nipping at my heels. The paintings are different, the floorboards replaced with elegant tile, and the color scheme lighter than the peach walls I remember.
As I lead the way into the open kitchen and living area, I’m not surprised the main room has also been updated. It’s fresh and new. It’s better this way. But even with the vast changes, my limbs prickle as if ghosts stroke my skin. It’s unsettling. Almost panic-inducing with the way my stomach hollows.
“Are you sure nobody else knows about this place?” Decker swipes his finger over the kitchen counter, the trail leaving no mark due to the lack of dust. “I could eat my di
“Cole would use an agency to arrange cleaning and gardening staff. Nobody should know who’s doing the hiring and firing.”
“Good.” He nods. “Are you all right if I go outside to check the perimeter?”
“Yes. Please go.” My response is quick. Enthusiastic. I’m desperate for space to pull myself together.
He raises a brow, seeming to take offense.
“I’m sorry.” I shake my head. “I just need time alone.”
His lips kick in a sad smile, the gentle affection reaching his dark eyes. “I get it. You’ve been through hell tonight.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“There you go again with that word.” He chuckles. “I don’t think it means what you think it means.”
He winks and walks for the front door, disappearing from view while I wonder if he deliberately dropped a line from a cult classic romance.
He’s such an anomaly to me. A contradiction.
There’s darkness and light. Aggression and charm. I’ve always struggled to determine the real from the fake, but tonight it’s worse with my head a tangled mess of madness.
I’ve never been close to death. Not like this. I haven’t had the misfortune of seeing my past transgressions flash before my eyes. And that wasn’t the worst of it. The thought of my niece, Stella, being at the party hours before still leaves me in a cold sweat. That little girl means the world to me. There’s nothing more important than her safety.
Not one damn thing.
Yet I’m responsible for putting her in harm’s way.
I created the danger.
Nausea inches up my throat, my self-revulsion warring with remorse.
I stagger forward and press my hands to the polished marble counter, sucking in breath after breath. I need to find calm. This isn’t the time for strategy to take a back seat. But I’m struggling to regain control.
Screams echo in my ears. The sight of petrified faces haunt me. I can still feel the shattered glass pinching into my palms and the weight of Decker’s body on mine.
He’d been selfless in his efforts to protect me. Entirely without fear. Wholeheartedly negligent toward his own life.
Maybe joking about him having a death wish isn’t such a joke after all.
I release the air in my lungs then fill them to capacity, repeating the ritual over and over.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Focus.
I drag my gaze around the room, trying to distract myself, but the only replacement to the recollection of gunfire are the childhood memories making my throat tighten.
Sparks of nostalgia flicker to life like a movie, the images from my younger years becoming clear and crisp. I used to sit here for breakfast. For lunch, too. My mom would braid my hair, and I’d complain about how long it would take. I can vaguely remember the subtle tug, tug, tug as she tried to tame my unruly lengths.
An uncomfortable ache nips at my ribs.
She died too young. Too beautiful.
One day she was reading bedtime stories and apologizing for the way my dad avoided his daughters. The next we were dressed in black and crushed under suffocating grief.
That same grief assails me now, stealing the oxygen from the air.
She wasn’t made for this world. Our world. The one with deception, betrayal, and murder.
She’d never been flawed like my father. Her love had outshone his neglect. She was the mesmerizing smile through a crowd of scowls. The virtue surrounded by sin.
For that reason, I’m certain she would hate who I’ve become.
I’m guilty of horrible things. The skeletons in my closet are so tightly compacted I swear one more deceitful action will bring them toppling out.
“Stop it,” I demand aloud.
The panic is increasing, my pounding heart struggling with the building mania.
I shove from the counter and kick off my heels to pad toward the tinted windows. The black of night stretches before me, lonely and cold.
I greet my reflection with a wince—the disheveled hair, the haunted eyes. I can barely stand to look at myself, not because my lavish makeup is betraying me, but because I’m disgusted by my actions.
My nose burns, the overwhelming tingle a
I pivot on my toes, poised to run from my reflection, only to pause at the glimpse of an abnormality on my cheek. I tilt my chin and narrow my gaze on the darkened mirror. Spots cover the right side of my face, all shapes and sizes freckled along my jaw and down my neck.
I swipe them, the rough, dry patches scraping my fingertips.
My heart stops.
My throat clogs.
“Oh, God.” It’s blood.
I touch everywhere—my face, my shoulders, my neck. There’s no tender areas. Not a single cut, or bruise, or scrape.
The spots aren’t from me.
A stranger’s blood marks my skin like a brand.
I wipe them with an open palm, the gentle swipe having no effect. I quicken the pace and severity, scrubbing over and over, my arm trembling with each movement.
I glance further down, glimpsing tiny stains on the strap of my dress and along the bodice. More splotches taunt me. The liquid is engrained.
“It’s everywhere.” My voice cracks as I use my nails, clawing at my cheek, my jaw, my neck.
My pulse grows frantic. I can’t get enough air.
I can’t breathe.
The room darkens, my vision blurring over everything else except those spots that become crystal clear. I tug at the bodice and struggle to reach behind me to release the zipper.
“Keira?”
A door slams. Faint footsteps reach my ears as I scrub, scrub, scrub.
“Keira.” A tight grip grabs my wrist.
“Get it off,” I scream. “I need to get it off.”