“There’s something I have to do in the morning.”
“What?”
She gave me her real smile, and I soaked it up. “Club business.” She winked before starting up her bike and roaring off. Leaving me standing on the sidewalk, watching her go.
Chapter Twenty-One
Kytten
TRIGGER WARNING:This chapter contains a graphic representation of self-harm and cutting. If you suffer from any triggers, PLEASE, PLEASE, take extreme caution before reading this chapter. Your mental health is more important to me than my fictional story.
By the time I returned to the motel, the monsters had woken. I didn’t understand it. Everything I felt during dinner. Everything that stirred up the emotion in my chest and they had stayed asleep.
I had to keep rushing to the bathroom to check on them. I needed the quiet to hear them. But even then, they didn’t make a sound.
But now, in this room, as I replayed the evening in my head, analyzing every word, every look, between Cash and Ryder and Ryder and Ellie, I could feel them.
I should have known they wouldn’t let me rest. Should have known they would demand to have their say. I guess I should be grateful they waited.
I undressed quickly and grabbed my knife.
I turned it over in my hand. Studying the intricate scrollwork in the wooden handle, I thought about my brother.
Where are you, Thorne?
Why did you leave?
I looked at the vines that wound around my legs. The small thorns surrounding the rosebuds. Protecting them from thosewho might want to pluck them. Inadvertently kill them by cutting them from the vine that gave them life.
If only life worked that way. If only Thorne had been older, stronger. Able to protect the vine. The roses were safe as long as they were connected to the vine. It was the vine that suffered. It was the vine the thorns really needed to protect.
But someone cut it away. Ripped it out of the ground and took her away from us.
I watched Ellie tonight. How she took care of Chrissy and Tabby. Cash told me she wasn’t their real mom. Their mom had left after abusing Tabby.
He was wrong, though. Moms didn’t abuse their children. Not real moms. Ellie was a real mom. Val was a real mom.
My mom was a real mom.
Thorne was mad when she left. But he didn’t know the truth. He didn’t understand what happened that day.
I shook my head. I didn’t want to remember. I didn’t want to think about the man that cut away the vine. I didn’t tell Thorne I saw him.
He thought Mom just left us. He never understood that she didn’t want to go. That she tried to fight. That the man hurt her.
I knew who he was.
His day was coming.
Once I found my brother, I would tell him everything. I would tell him what she did for us. How she protected us.
How she lied to save us.
I pushed the sharp edge against my leg. The tip sliced the skin without hesitation. Dipping beneath the surface, first one, then two, until all three layers of skin had separated and the monsters could climb their way out and scream.
Only this time, I screamed with them.
Despite spending so much time with Cash, I had been watching the women.
