Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 93929 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93929 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
“We’re on the way! Mom? We’re coming. Mom?!”
There’s a scuffle, a scream, and the line goes dead.
I stare numbly down at my phone then up at Finn.
He’s already dressed.
“Come on,” he says, pulling me behind him. “We have to hurry.” He pauses only to grab a gun from his drawer before we sprint out of the building and down to his car. The BMW roars to life and Finn breaks a few laws as he speeds over to my father’s place. I try calling Mom a few more times, but she doesn’t pick up. Mal, Dermot, and Dad all ignore me too.
I don’t know why I’m panicking. This is what we wanted, right? But the terror in my mother’s voice makes me think that everything was so much worse than I could’ve pictured, and I didn’t want her to get dragged into it.
Finn parks out front. He hesitates just a moment before getting out. “We should call for backup. Cormac and Seamus—”
I jump out before he can try to stop me. I hear him curse as I rush inside. I don’t know what I’ll find, but the door is unlocked and the place blasts me straight in the skull with how deathly, eerily quiet it is.
My heart’s an explosion in my chest. My throat’s closed up and I’ve never been so scared in my life. I drift a few steps toward my father’s study, but Finn comes pounding up behind me. He grabs my arm and stops me. “We should wait,” he snarls, his gun out. His eyes scan the room constantly, intensely alert for danger.
But I can only point toward the hallway. “Blood,” I whisper. I think I might throw up. I swallow bile.
He spots it then. A splash of blood on the wall. He moves toward it and I stay close. Ahead, there’s more blood smeared on the carpet like someone was dragged. There was a struggle: paintings knocked askew, a shattered vase with flowers scattered all over, a cracked hole in the drywall. And more blood. So much blood. Whoever did this, they can’t possibly still be alive.
Finn continues forward. I want him to stop. Whatever’s ahead, I don’t want to see it. The trail leads directly toward my father’s office, and it’s the last place I want to go. That room is my hell. It’s my nightmare. The thought of following a trail of blood to that slaughterhouse is utterly against everything I am.
“Please, wait,” I croak, but Finn keeps going. He’s a force of nature now. He sweeps ahead, straight for the door. I stop a few feet back, tears streaming down my face. There’s so much blood here it’s unbelievable. It sops into my shoes. It sticks to my soles with every step. Finn makes a soft, mushy, sloppy noise as he stomps through the muck of it.
The door’s open. He shoulders it aside, moving in with the gun outstretched. He surveys the room, and my god, I wish he’d stop. I want to go home. I’ll make pizza, we can sauna, go for a swim, pretend this sickness hasn’t spread—
But he spots something. His lips tug into an angry snarl and his gun lowers. “Caroline, hurry.” He turns and looks at me. “It’s your mother.”
That finally breaks the spell. I rush forward and lunge through the door.
The office is an abomination. Books are tossed all over. There’s more blood splashed across the floor. There was clearly some kind of fight here. Dad’s priceless little artifacts are snapped. Millions of dollars in statues, fine art, and rare collectibles are ruined.
And there’s my mother, sitting at the base of his desk, her head propped back, her hands demurely in her lap. Her eyes are barely open and her breathing is shallow.
I run to her. I kneel down at her side. “Oh, God, Mom, hold on. We’ll call an ambulance.”
She turns her chin toward me. Her smile is weak, and she’s drenched in blood. There are multiple stab wounds all over her chest. Dozens of them. One nasty gash is sliced from her neck like someone went for her throat but missed. Her skin’s pale and waxy. Her lips are ashen.
“Don’t bother,” she wheezes. Red spittle flecks her teeth. “I never thought… they’d actually do it…”
“Mom.” I take her hand tightly in mine. Tears roll down my cheeks. “Please, hold on.” I look back at Finn. He’s watching the doorway like a guard. “Call the police.”
“Already told Seamus to bring our doctor. He’s on the way.” But Finn doesn’t sound like he thinks that’ll happen in time.
“It’s fine,” Mom says, voice like dried-out paper. “I thought… they’d never go this far. But I should have… realized sooner.” She grimaces in pain as she touches my cheek. “They’re monsters… my boys were… monsters.”
“Who did this to you?”
“Dermot… Malachy… your father… God, I’m so sorry. I couldn’t stop them.”