The breeze from the opened windows hits me in the face. I hear birds singing from the trees, and the atmosphere is aromatic with the rich smells of soil and pine. Normally, that is all I need to be fixed.
But I just found out that I’m pregnant, and now I’m pretty sure I’m on my way to my death. The only thing that can fix me is getting out of here. But without my phone, I can now only dream about an escape.
My heart is racing in my chest faster than this car. What if I never get to tell Caleb that Sonny is his? What if this morning out on the porch was my last chance?
This is bigger than me, and it’s much bigger than the complications that come with Caleb and me being bonded as parents. This is about Sonny. He has a right to know who his father is.
My overthinking brain is finally giving it a rest, allowing me to think clearly for the first time. It’s rare I can think at all with Caleb around, confusing everything.
But that’s the beauty of being kidnapped by a stalker. Everything becomes simple when you realize that this day could be your last. What I really want is all of us living together as a family—Caleb, Sonny, Ellie, and the newborn. That’s the life I want for myself.
I don’t want to escape with Sonny and see things other than Maple Crossing’s main street. I want to walk through the town I know better than the back of my hand, with the people I love most in this world. I want to give Caleb another chance and trustthat he won’t leave me this time. I’ve been so focused on the what-if, that I never stopped to consider what could happen if everything worked out.
We arrive at the motel, and as the stalker drags me out of the car, I’m hit by two things: the horrible smell of decay, and regret. The latter is more horrible. I’ve had multiple chances now to tell Caleb the truth, and I haven’t taken them.
Chances are numbered, just like days. I pray to God that I’ve not used all mine up.
“Which room?” snaps the stalker.
Some personal space would be nice, and a nose peg. The smell of the place is even more dreadful than it was the first time around.
I shuffle through the hallway, the stalker right next to me, his hand still clamped around my wrist. I hold my breath for various reasons as we draw nearer to my father’s room. Floorboards creak underfoot. It’s the only noise in here, besides the howling wind that drifts in through ceiling cracks. It seems to have picked up out of nowhere.
I arrive outside of my father’s room and bring up a shaky hand, preparing to knock. But the stalker shoves past me and barges in, two angry fists at his side as my father carefully rises from the bed.
I peer over the stalker’s shoulder and lose my hold on reality.
“You’re too much to handle sometimes, Piper. All that trouble, and what’s it worth?”
My father thinks I opened my mouth. I was always too much trouble for him, and now he thinks I’ve put him in it.
I shake my head and flare my eyes, telling him that I didn’t do this. But my father only believes what he wants to, and I’ve always been a weight on him that he wanted to get rid of as soon as possible.
“I didn’t tell him,” I mouth.
But all he’s seeing is red.
Caleb was right. Why the fuck was I risking the kids’ lives to keep my father’s location a secret? I still see him as a father, but he hasneverseen me as a daughter. All he sees is a burden.
My father looks at the stalker, and his eyes go back to their original shade—monotone gray. I’d be shitting myself too if a hitman with one eye had a gun pointed at me.
A gun.
Holy fucking shit.
I back into the door with a thump, which turns the stalker around for a moment. I hold my breath. One lifted finger is all it takes for my life to be over.
Thank God my father is present.
“We’ll skip to the chase, since I highly doubt you have two hundred thousand dollars on hand.” The stalker turns his nose up at the place, noting all of the rot.
My father goes white, until he extends his vision back to me and develops some color again. “I have a proposition to make,” he says.
“I don’t have time for any of that.”
I keep a close eye on the gun, watch as the stalker plays around with the mechanisms, chambering a round of bullets. I just wasted a few minutes of time freaking out.
But now is really the time to freak the fuck out.
