“We all grapple with ugly things. It’s how we respond that’s our true defining moment.”
Slowly, I close my eyes.
Last thing I remember…
Dad.
He said he was arrested for killing Caleb’s dad. Took a plea deal… but he said he was innocent. There’s truth buried in there. I was desperate to find it.
You still are.
Outside, into Robert’s waiting arms.
It was snowing.
His car. Driving, talking, and then—
I flinch, squeezing the doctor’s hand. “Car accident,” I whisper, blinking. “But… why does that warrant a detective?”
“Keep going,” he urges.
“First—is Robert okay?”
He doesn’t hesitate to say, “He’s in the Intensive Care Unit. His lung collapsed. Few broken ribs. It was touch and go for a while, but he’ll probably be moved to a regular room tomorrow morning.”
I bite my lip. The metallic taste of blood blooms across my tongue.
“Keep going,” the doctor urges. “Don’t focus on that.”
I shut my eyes and relive the car being hit. Going into a ditch and flipping over. Robert’s arm banded across my chest, trying to keep me safe.
And when the dust settled…
Someone pulled me out. Away. But instead of helping me, they were taking me away.
They knocked me out, and when I woke up…
I was in a barn. It was drafty, ice-cold. Two people argued. My head hurt spectacularly. My whole body did. And then…
Shit.
I sit up straighter. “Where’s Caleb?”
A man walks into the room as I’m asking, and he raises an eyebrow. “He really fooled you, huh?”
I flinch.
The doctor stands, shaking his head. “Really, Masters? You’re supposed to wait for Angela—”
“I’m here,” she says, slipping in behind the detective. “Traffic. I was across town. Margo, how are you feeling?”
“I’m alive, so…”
“Detective Masters wants to chat with you about what happened,” she explains. “I’m here to be your advocate.”
I nod, and the doctor leaves. I’m sad to see him go—even if I didn’t catch his name, he was nice. The detective takes his place at the side of my bed. He drags a chair over and makes himself comfortable, adjusting for a moment.
He has dark eyes and a smooth head. His leather jacket doesn’t scream detective, but it definitely fits his personality. There’s a badge at his hip and a holstered gun on the other side of his body.
“As Angela so kindly explained, I’m Detective Jim Masters. I’m just going to ask you some questions about yesterday.”
I shoot up. “Yesterday? It’s been—”
“About twenty-seven hours since the accident,” he says. “Your abductor brought you in around five o’clock yesterday evening. You were unconscious.”
I frown. “Why would they do that?”
He leans forward. “They? Did you see anything that could help me?”
I shudder. I’d forgotten that part.
He held the cloth over my face.
I tried to resist it, I really did. But then, I made the mistake of opening my eyes.
I take a deep breath and meet the detective’s gaze.
It’s time to name my kidnapper.
“It was Matt Bonner.”
Past
The room was cold. The surface of the table in front of me was sticky. Spilled milk, maybe, or coffee that hadn’t been wiped away.
I avoided putting my arms on the table, keeping them crossed over my chest instead. The entire house smelled like spoiled food. Like death.
“Some lady is here for you.” The foster mom sweeps into the kitchen like she was the queen of the castle, and she didn’t notice it was rotting. “Not sure why anyone would want to visit with you. Did you even brush your hair this morning?”
I was fourteen, not four, but I didn’t bother pointing that out. I left my cereal—maybe that was the spoiled smell—untouched and went to the front door.
I yanked it open, more shocked than not to see my mom standing on the porch.
Houses like this always had porches. Big wraparound ones that made everyone else in the neighborhood jealous, but it was the inside that was bleak. Pretty outside, sick inside.
She fidgeted. There were spots on her neck, bruises. A scrape across her cheek.
I always took inventory when she showed up.
She hated me, but she checked up on me.
It was our little secret.
Her attention went from my face to the thrift store clothes, then down to my boots. They were falling apart. The laces broke the other day, and I had to duct tape them back together so I could keep wearing them.
Boots were more practical in everyday life than soft-topped sneakers. You could run in boots. Kick shit in them. Stomp on your enemies in them.
I cleared my throat.
Her gaze snapped up. “I heard you moved. How…”
“Shithole house,” I said, moving past her. Down the stairs, all the way to the sidewalk. It wasn’t often I got to take a deep breath of clean air. “The foster mom’s a bitch. Her husband is even worse.”
He leered.
They had sex in the middle of the night, the box spring squealing. She never made a noise, but he did. Grunts that filled our ears. The smallest girl would climb into bed with me, burying her head in my chest under the covers.
At my age, I knew about sex—but I didn’t want to think about it. And I definitely didn’t want to hear it almost every night.
Mom followed. “Karma’s a bitch, too.”
I snorted. “Gee, thanks.”
“They giving you an allowance?”
Part of me still wanted to be loved by my mother, and I would do anything to get her to stay. If I gave her money—like I had in the past—she would come back.
It wasn’t guesswork.
She would run out of money again, and then she’d show up wherever I was. Even if it was only for a few minutes.
But right now, I had nothing.
“Can you tell me about your adventures?” I stall. “Where you’ve been, or…”
“I’ve been dealing with a loss,” she told me. She kept tapping her finger against her arm. Crossed and uncrossed them. Shifted her weight. “And coping the only way I know how.”
I sighed. “What is it now?”
I knew it was drugs. Angela and Lydia had both told me, around the same time, that my mother was giving up her parental rights. She’d been checked into a rehabilitation center only a few months after Dad was locked up.
I blamed him for her addiction.
As much as I hated him, I couldn’t give her the same level of loathing. It wasn’t her fault.
I wondered who she lost. Dad, maybe?
“You could go see Dad,” I said. “If you’re feeling like he’s gone.”
She scowled. “No.”
It’d been four years. Maybe she saw him and didn’t want to tell me. She tended to be petty like that. She blamed me. Everything was my fault.
Sometimes I wondered how we got here.
“Margo, I need to go,” she said. “You were right. I’ve been traveling a lot. I’ve been working in the city. But I was late because my car broke down, and they fired me…”