Please… you can’t have him!
“Yeah?” Roman says tightly, spinning back around, arms crossed over his chest to hide his clenched fists from the officer's eyes.
“I know why you did it, son. And he fucking deserved it. They all did.”
“Yeah. They fucking did,” I say before Roman gets the chance, running my fingers down his rippling muscles as he leans against the roof of the car. His shoulders are tense beneath my touch, the hoarse, throaty crackles of his breathing ripping holes in my heart.
As much as Roman agrees that killing them was a necessary crime, I know a part of him misses his brother… it’s the same part of me that misses my father.
And those pieces of us will never go away.
Roman closes me in the car, jogging around the side to get in after me and strap himself in swiftly. We’re ready to peel out of the property when Colton comes around the side.
“No one will ever know you were here. I promise.”
“No offense, Colton, but I really don’t trust you. Haven't had the best relationship with Augustus PD,” Roman says contemptuously, bouncing his leg up and down while kneading the life out of my hand.
Colton nods his shorn head, agreeing with Roman’s statement with a rueful smirk. “Yeah, I understand that… but, I-I didn’t protect you before… either of you, and I will protect you now.”
I lean forward in my seat, locking eyes with Officer Colton before he steps away and heads to his patrol car.
“What is he talking about?”
“No fucking clue,” Roman says, eyeing Colton’s back warily as he shuffles through the trunk of his car.
He comes back moments later, a scrap of paper in one hand, envelope in the other.
“This is for you. When you call him, tell him it’s from Danny. I’m sorry I couldn’t do more for you, Roman. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quick enough to get your name out of the system before your DNA was found at those scenes, but this… this will help,” he declares, passing the folded note to Roman. He stares at it for a couple of seconds before shoving it in his pocket without bothering to let me see.
“And this is yours. I don’t know if you want it, but I figured you might,” Colton tells me next, holding out the envelope.
Timidly, I take the package from in between his fingers and place it on my lap. There’s something hard inside, and when I lift it, I can hear a slight rattle.
Opening the flap, I pour it out and sigh. “Where did you find this?” I ask, holding up my mom’s wedding ring, letting the diamond glitter under the gloomy sky.
“In the box I found in the shed. One, I’m assuming is your dad's, was right next to it, but I didn’t think you’d want that.”
He’s right.
I wouldn’t have.
“Thank you,” I whisper, sliding the ring back inside the envelope before hiding it at the bottom of my purse.
Bobbing his head, Colton begins to back away from our car, giving us enough room to drive past him and head out.
Before we get far, Roman stops the car and sticks his head out of the window.
“How’s my dad?”
“Still drunk… still angry,” Colton replies, shrugging his shoulders as if to say,what else is new?
Roman’s eyes drop to the steering wheel, inhaling a heavy breath. “Does he ever talk about me?”
There’s hope in his tone, a hope that is rapidly snuffed out when Colton shakes his head. “No, son. He doesn’t.”
“Yeah… I didn’t think so,” Roman mumbles before letting go of the brake and driving off. I don’t take my eyes off his diminishing form as we cut through the trees, and only when he isn’t anything but a speck in the forest do I move my gaze to the home I survived.
The ruins vanish from my vision the farther we drive, and a part of me disappears along with it. I can feel fragments of my soul finding their way, attempting to piece me back together with a single thought drifting through my mind.
