“He tried to kill Delaney!”
I grip the handle of the club, and his eyes widen as I swing it full force at his computer.
“He almost killed Knox!”
This time I swing at everything else on the desk, sending it all flying.
“His fucking intention was to kill us all!”
Bookshelf.
I take my dad’s most prized possession—an autographed, gold-plated football that Ainsley bought him for Christmas one year—and hold it up in my hand.
“And then you had the audacity to play the part of a victim.”
A humorless laugh echoes out of me as I toss the stupid thing into the air and whack it across the room, loving the sound it makes and the look on his face.
“Tessa, stop!” he yells, as if he has any say at this point.
The light coming in through the window glints off a piece of metal on the ground and catches my attention. A key. After picking it up and reading the label on it, I clutch it tightly in my palm and level my father with a look.
“Fuck you,” I spit. “You don’t get to tell me what to do. Not now. Not ever.” I take a couple more steps until I’m right in his face. “You’re a piece of shit, and I hope you rot in hell, right alongside your brother.”
As I hand him the golf club, he watches in silence as I leave the freshly destroyed space and the house entirely.
I PULL DOWN THE long driveway to the secluded property. The familiar, oversized house sits at the end, taunting me. I grab the gas can from the passenger seat and climb out of the car. As I get closer, there’s nothing flowing through my veins but the hatred I have for the man who lived here.
Slipping the key into the lock, the door swings open and I step inside. Everything looks exactly how I remember it: the furniture, the décor, the colors. Memories of Delaney and I running around this place as kids threaten to surface, but they’re not memories I welcome anymore.
I walk around the downstairs, pouring gasoline throughout each room. Then, when everything is doused, I pull the matches from my pocket.
“No one gets to have something to remember you by,” I say out loud. “You don’t deserve it. Your memory gets to fucking die like you did.”
Sparking a match against the pack, I let it fall to the ground and back away as the flames shoot across the trail of gasoline, imagining my memories burning along with this house.
19
ASHER
I pace across my living room, not even finding solace in the glass of whiskey gripped in my hand. My eyes glance at the clock for the hundredth time since I got home. An hour late.
Seeing Tessa this morning with two guys I didn’t recognize spurred an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of my stomach. It was clear by the way the one looked at her and touched her that they share a history that she and I don’t. Colby would tell me I’m jealous—that I’m afraid to lose her to someone her own age or some shit—but personally, I’m enjoying what we have going on. Sue me for not wanting it to come to an end.
I was just finishing up a short conversation with Trent when I got her text telling me that Easton wanted to talk and she’d be a half-hour late. I didn’t necessarily like it, but I’m not her keeper. If she wants to hear him out, that’s her choice. However, it’s an hour after the time she said she’d be here, and Tessa is nothing if not straightforward. If she decided not to come, she would have told me.
The glass slams down onto the counter with a force I didn’t intend. Something isn’t right. I take out my phone and pull up her location. Okay, so maybe I turned that on without her knowing, but it was after the party debacle and I was worried she’d end up in another potentially dangerous situation—like right now.
Her blue dot sits at a house that isn’t her own, and my paranoia grows tenfold. It doesn’t take more than a couple seconds before I’m grabbing my keys and heading for the elevator.
THE SMOKE FILLING THE sky becomes thicker the closer that I get to her location. Dread flows through me the second I turn down a long driveway and see her Lamborghini parked at an odd angle in the drive. It’s empty, but her phone isn’t pinging from the car.
As the house comes into view, my whole body goes cold and my every fear magnifies. Not only is Tessa’s phone signaling inside the place, but the whole thing is up in flames.
No.
No, no, no.
I jump out of my car and look around, hoping to see her anywhere except for in there.