I have spent so long now wondering if it was me, if it was something I did that made him do this. All the things he said, the snide comments or judgemental stares, had me believing it was me.
Did me saying yes give him consent to ignore my no?
All this time I questioned myself, but right now, in this moment, it finally sinks in.
I wasn’t to blame.
I said ‘no’.
A two lettered word that holds a far greater meaning.
“Yes, they did. He needed to feel clean. Virgins helped him feel clean.”
“And you didn’t make him feel like that?” Hayden argues.
“He loved me. He loved our children. And he promised; promised he would stop. We had run away as kids and survived years whilst making a life for ourselves. We reinvented ourselves. But he had his demons. I had mine.”
“But why terrorise those women? Why let him hurt another living being when you knew how it felt?” I ask. “Why let him hurt me?”
“Because we were made for each other. We belonged together. I loved him and I couldn’t let him leave me. I wanted him to be happy. We belonged together.”
“Yeah, in a mental institution,” Hayden barks.
“Hayden,” Madison hisses.
She begins to pace, smacking the handle of the knife against her head. “I didn’t mean to kill him. I just got so angry. He was going to leave me. For real this time. Leave our family. He nearly left me for the other one, the other redhead, until I hurt her and told him I’d keep hurting her until he left her alone. And he did after seeing what a weak fool she was.” She laughs, throwing her head back. “So weak it didn’t take much before she ended her own life.”
Hayden gasps, like she knows something I don’t.
“And with me?”
She stops, her nostrils flaring. “He was going to ruin everything. It only took one person to recognise him, to recognise me, and we were screwed. We never answered to killing those people, even if they did deserve it. And my uncle would have killed me after I stole all that money and stuff,” she explains. “He left marks on you, marks we couldn’t risk. We argued and he threatened to leave. He was done with women telling him what to do, with me telling him what to do, and he was going to make it up to you. Or have you make it up to him.”
There was no making it up to me. What he had done—not just the cheating—was unforgiveable.
“So why put his body inside the library? Why not bury him and be done with it?” Madison asks.
“I wanted her to take the fall. You are to blame for his death. If you hadn’t bewitched him, he would have moved on like he did with the rest. But he kept saying you were different, that you obeyed and listened,” she explains, her words filled with venom. “Then I had to watch you strut around here playing the victim and then move on like he never existed. Like his death meant nothing.”
My nails dig into the palms of my hands. “I didn’t know he was dead.”
“Are you listening to yourself?” Harriet bites out. “You have to know how crazy that sounds.”
“Shut the fuck up, you whore. You strip for a living. You have no right to judge me.”
“No, it’s you who has no right to judge me, not after what you’ve put innocent women through.”
Sophia does nothing but sneer at Harriet, and for a moment, I fear she’ll go after her with that knife. Maybe we could stop her. Maybe not. But no one in this room is worth the risk of being injured. Not even Marlene.
I have to pull her attention away from them. “And now? What is your plan now? The police know who you are and other women have come forward.”
The hatred shining back at me threatens to choke me. “I’d have killed them all. Thought I had killed them all—the ones who were a threat to us.”
“You were the woman who hurt Amber, who ran us off the road.” I say it as a fact, not as a question.
“And I would have ran over your body had it not been for the guy in the van,” she sneers.
“And what now?”
I need to know what we’re up against, what she plans to do.
“Now you are going to die. I’m not stupid. I know eventually the police will be knocking on my door. I had planned to draw out my revenge. The notes were just a taste of what was to come. However, my neighbours were starting to ask questions, wondering what the smell was. I had to do something. Do something with him. And I thought… I thought I could pin it on you, but that bitch of a policewoman… You pulled the wool over her eyes too. She didn’t believe me and I could sense it.”
“She was doing her job,” Hayden sneers.
“Then you can blame her for what I’m about to do,” she tells her, as her thumb rolls over the lighter, the flame bright as it flickers to life.
I can’t look away.
Groaning from the floor pulls my attention away from Sophia, and my breath hitches as I watch Marlene roll to her side, her hand pressed to the back of her head. When her hand comes away, thick clots of blood cover her fingers.
“Marlene,” I cry, taking a step toward her, but movement from Sophia stops me.
“Don’t you dare fucking move.”
Marlene turns to me, boiling with so much fury her teeth clench together. “I fucking quit. I’m done. Fucking done. Do you hear me? I’ve been poisoned, subjected to your family—”
“Hey,” Hayden snarls.
“And now I’ve been hit over the head. I’m fucking done.”
“It’s going to be okay,” I assure her, keeping my voice calm.
“It’s not. I’m fucking insulted,” Hayden argues.
“It’s not going to be okay,” Marlene explodes as sirens echo from outside.
“No,” Olivia cries, and a cloud fogs inside my head as I slowly turn in their direction, my hair swinging over my shoulder.
The screams, the yells, the sirens, it all washes away as I watch her light the rag in her hand.
Setting light to my dream.
To one of the things that kept me up when I was down.
A split second. That’s all it takes. A split second to realise we are most likely going to die.
I can rebuild what I have here. It’s bricks, paper and wood.
But these people… Madison, Hayden, Olivia, Harriet and even Marlene; they aren’t replaceable.
They don’t deserve this.
Olivia barely reaches for Sophia before she swings the knife out, slicing the arm Olivia lifts to shield herself.
I’m not weak.
I’m not controlled.
I am my own person.
Taking a deep breath, the same way Drew taught me, I move, not letting this woman take one more thing away from me or anyone else.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
DREW
Landon barges through the office door, a primal growl tearing from his throat. It wasn’t that long ago that he stormed through the doors in the same manner. It had been because he was frustrated and angry over not being able to find Scott. All his leads had come to a dead end and he had given up hope that he’d ever find him.
This time, we know where Scott is—rotting in some morgue where he deserves to be. Landon, however, isn’t done chasing those leads. He wants every bit of evidence he can get to discredit Scott, to make sure they can’t twist Charlotte’s story any more than they have already tried to. He doesn’t need to worry. You don’t need to know Charlotte personally to know she wouldn’t hurt anyone. Maybe in self-defence, but not life threatening, and most certainly not to end a life when she breathes so much of it into the world.