John tells me pleasantly that I should contact the security company, see why the camera didn’t work. And that he’ll send someone to collect the evidence, hoping for evidence of some kind.
But that he isn’t hopeful, and that I should stay out of this. That I’ll make his job more difficult if I attack the suspect, as we got nothing so far on this guy. On Ross.
Fuck him. Fuck them both.
Got to be Ross, no matter how he protested even as I punched him in the face. Motherfucker. I punch the wall by the door, once, twice.
Draw a shaky breath that tastes of rage. It’s bitter and makes my chest hurt.
Goddammit, I don’t like it. I don’t like how this is getting progressively worse. If the culprit is Ross, then he’s gone fucking nuts. A psycho. An organized, methodical one.
Psychos are dangerous. He won’t stop at killing a cat, and John has to know that.
Why my family? Why did this freak pick me? Fucking cunt. And what’s with the insinuations about my past—about leaving someone behind? What the hell does he want from me?
Shit, I don’t want my kids, or Octavia, to see the bloody mess outside the door. So I go in, opening the door while doing my best not to get blood on my hands. I lift them up to check once I’m inside, and I find them shaking with adrenaline like a junkie’s.
The living room is empty, but I hear their voices from upstairs. I take the steps two at a time, needing to make sure they’re okay.
I’m home late. It was the earliest I could escape from work, with Jasper breathing down my neck. He seems to be over his misgivings about his son and decided it’s back to pushing Matt’s buttons.
And I have to physically restrain myself from going out of my way to look for Ross and lay in on him until he confesses. The only thing stopping me is John telling me to butt out, but I’m vibrating with rage.
The kids are sitting in their beds, propped on stacks of pillows, coloring books open in front of them.
And Octavia. She’s sitting on Cole’s bed, reading to them from a story book, though she stops when I appear at the door.
Her eyes brighten. She gets up and comes to me, giving me a smile that’s a fucking shot to my brain, bypassing my anger and fear, spreading roots into my chest.
“The kids are much better,” she says. “I think they’ll sleep through the night.”
Her mouth is rosy, a lock of dark hair curls at her pale cheek, and damn, I want to kiss her so badly. I itch to stroke that curl out of her face, tuck it behind her delicate ear with the small golden stud.
“Daddy,” Mary says, breaking my trance, showing me her coloring book. “Look!”
“And me!” Cole lifts his book, dropping a bunch of coloring pencils to the floor. “Look me first.”
Despite the gruesome message on my door, the worry and the splitting headache, I grin at them. “Awesome job, guys.”
They grin back at me.
“I love it,” Octavia whispers.
“What?” I turn back toward her.
“How you respond to them, so much more than before. You know… they love it, too.”
They do? I look properly at my kids and find twin gap-toothed smiles directed at me. Warmth rushes through my chest.
“Thank you, Tay.” The words spill out of me without thought. “This is all you.”
A slender arm slips around my hips and she leans against me briefly. Too briefly. “You’re welcome. But it’s mostly you.”
The kids fall asleep soon after, and I gather the coloring books and pencils from all over the covers, doing my best not to wake them up. As I turn off the lights, my phone buzzes, and I frown as reality slams back in.
It always does, dammit.
The cops are here to see the cat and knife, and yeah, it’s time I told Octavia