Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 128307 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128307 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Remorse filters through Macy’s eyes before she murmurs, “I don’t believe she knew the exact date her abduction”—there she goes with the fucking air quotes again—“would occur, but she knew an abduction was their plan of attack.”
I shake my head in disagreement, but she acts as if she doesn’t understand.
She can when she’s holding all the cards.
“Cameron confirmed my theory, Grayson. She confessed that they had staged her kidnapping.”
Her words hit me like a punch to the gut.
This can’t be right. Macy must be lying.
But why would she? What benefit would she get from that?
Nothing.
She would get nothing.
And the remembrance frees me to say, “Tell me everything.”
The world tilts when she confirms my greatest fear.
My father isn’t the man I thought he was.
He isn’t even a man.
“He threatened her?”
Macy’s hand shoots out to grip mine, which is balled on my knee, answering me without words or a gesture. Fury and grief rage inside me as I struggle to stay upright. I recall all the years I’ve spent searching, and all the nights I lay awake, replaying her kidnapping. I think about the shame I felt when I failed to protect her, and how the ache of her departure was endless. And all this time, it was him who had caused my grief. My own father. The man I trusted more than anyone.
“I need to talk to him.” My voice is unlike anything I’ve ever heard. It is low and full of death. “I need to hear it from his own mouth.”
Macy grabs my arm as her eyes silently plead for me to listen. “Don’t do anything rash.”
I can’t stop, breathe, or think. I need answers. Justice. But more than anything, I need to know who my father really is.
After shrugging out of Macy’s hold, I race for the exit.
I reach the underground parking lot before Macy catches up with me. She grabs the sleeve of my shirt as her eyes beg me to listen. “Stop, Grayson, please. You’re not thinking straight.”
After yanking out of her hold, I bark at her, my anger spilling over on the wrong person. “How am I supposed to think straight? My father destroyed my life! He lied to me for fucking years! I can’t let this slide.”
Pissed, I throw open the van’s door so fast the hinges creak before slotting behind the steering wheel. I turn over the ignition, but before I can reverse out, Macy reminds me that this isn’t solely about me. It isn’t even about her.
“You promised.” Her tears spill, and every one of them breaks my heart. “You promised you wouldn’t leave until we found Kendall too. This—” she thrust her hand to the left like my childhood home is only feet from us—“will break that promise.” She wipes her tears with the back of her hand as her eyes continue to silently plead. “You don’t talk with words, Grayson. You’ve never used words. So we both know how this will end. It won’t be anywhere near Kendall.” She steps so close that her warm, panicked breath fans my lips. “You are a man of many talents, but I would have never pictured you as a liar. Please don’t give me a reason to change my belief.”
“Mace…”
The wish to continue arguing surges through my veins, and I can’t think of a better way to disperse it than to pummel it out on my father’s face.
The thought makes me laugh. Macy is right. I don’t talk with words. I use my heart… and my fists. It is the former that sees me switching off the ignition.
I don’t leave the van. I can’t. All the lies I’ve been told are out in the open, and I don’t know how to climb out from beneath their crushing weight.
The thoughts swirling in my head get a surge of reprieve when Macy murmurs several long minutes later, “Scoot.”
I peer at her, lost, before doing as asked. Her advice has never steered me wrong, so I don’t see it being any different today. And I am too fucking snowed under to put up a decent fight.
Not speaking, she climbs into the driver’s seat, fastens her belt, and then reverses out of our designated parking spot.
When she signals to turn left at the T-intersection instead of right, I stray my eyes from the road to her. She smiles. Even though it isn’t her true smile, I’ll take it.
“It’s not time for that yet.” She turns left before merging onto the freeway. “But when it is, if you want me there, I will be at your side, cheering you on.”
In the cracked side mirror, Cameron’s building disappears on the horizon. Macy guides the van out of town. She keeps it five below the speed limit, not wanting to get pulled over, and every two miles, her eyes flick to me as if she’s checking that I haven’t shattered.