CHAPTER 5
Lo
Ibypass Main completely.
No festival chaos today, thanks. No bunting, no overpriced eggnog, no forced smiles.
My skull’s still throbbing from yesterday’s crash, my grand entrance back into Honeysuckle Grove in a tragic, dramatic show. And my ribs still ache where the seatbelt tried to cut me in half.
Beck got my car towed by Rafe Cadler this morning. Honestly, much as it’s been kind of a nightmare to see him, I don’t know what I would have done without Beck in this mess.
But first… this.
The townhouse stands tall, looking exactly like it always did. As if nothing happened. It might as well have been holding its breath for the past seven years, just waiting for me to come back and ruin everything again.
I stand on the porch for a minute, keys clutched so hard the metal bites into my palm. My stomach’s churning as if I drank bleach for breakfast.
Then I unlock the door.
The smell hits instantly.
Dust. Lemon polish. Old wood. The ghost of dinner rolls and cinnamon sugar toast and my mother’s vanilla bean lotion. Underneath it all, that faint sour note of rotting wood from the upstairs bathroom leak nobody ever bothered to fix.
I’m stepping straight into a memory. One I don’t want.
I walk inside. Slow. Careful. My boots creak against the floorboards. Every step feels like it echoes off the walls, as if the house is announcing, “She’s back! Look who crawled home! A failure.”
The living room is dim, curtains drawn tight against the sun. There’s still a half-burned candle on the mantle, wax dusted with lint. The couch cushions are slumped, and the mail basket is overflowing with unopened envelopes.
Probably final notices and tax threats. Nothing new there.
I keep moving.
Past the dining room table where we had dinner every Sunday like clockwork. Roast chicken, burnt dinner rolls, green beans with too much garlic, my dad reading case notes between bites.
Mom was never good at anything other than spending money.
Past the built-in bookshelf lined with thick law journals and glossy business magazines featuring my father’s smug face on the cover. A smile that held more sour than sweet.
My throat burns. I swallow it down.
The kitchen’s the worst.
I stand there for a second, just staring. The cracked tile. The empty fruit bowl on the counter. The faint scent of lemon cleaner clinging to the cabinets.
I used to sit in the kitchen nook after school, scribbling homework answers while my mom lectured me about posture and my dad argued with creditors on the phone about livingpaycheck to paycheck… until he took matters into his own hands.
God. I hate this place.
I yank open the pantry out of reflex. Empty shelves. Mothballs. My stomach growls, but the nausea curls up tight around it, choking it out. I shut the door and lean my forehead against it for a second, breathing through the wave of guilt and fury and grief.
They ruined everything.
My parents. Their little “investment genius” scam. Selling people dreams of lakeside retirement houses and private pensions and then laundering it all through shell companies and loopholes until the economy tanked and everything fell apart.
People lost everything. Houses. Savings. Futures.
And me?
