Rustling sounded on the other end of the line. “Sweetheart? My God, is that really you? Where are you? We can come and get you. You never showed up to work and—”
I gritted my teeth together. “I don’t have a lot of time, so listen. I’m safe. I’m fine. But I can’t come home. Not yet, anyway.”
“Why?” Dad asked. “Where are you? What’s going on?”
“Twelve seconds,” Dante murmured.
“Who’s that counting? Who’s with my baby!?” Mom practically shrieked.
Her voice brought tears to my eyes. “Did you guys know that I had a twin sister?”
The phone went deadly silent before Dante’s voice whispered along the shell of my ear.
“Ten seconds.”
I swallowed hard. “My twin sister has done some really bad things, you guys, and there are people out there that think I’m her. I’m safe, but you guys have to call off the police if you’ve called them.”
Mom’s voice grew angry. “Why?”
“Five seconds,” Dante murmured as his hand hovered over the phone against my ear.
I closed my eyes. “Because after not telling me that I had a twin sister, you owe this to me. Don’t you think?”
“Three,” Dante said.
“Sweetheart,” Dad said as his voice cooed into the phone, “just tell us where you are, and we can—”
I sighed heavily. “I love you guys. I’m safe, I promise, but I’ll be safer when she’s caught. And if you love me at all—if you feel guilty about this, at all—you’ll stop your search.”
“And we’re done,” Dante said, plucking the phone from my hand.
“I love you guys so much!” I called out quickly.
Before he hung up the phone and started dismantling it like the other one.
“Oh, God,” I whispered as tears lined my eyes.
“Axton?” Mav asked.
Slowly, something crept into my view. The movement out of my right peripheral made me jerk, but as I whipped my head toward the foreign object, I found yet another phone lingering around for me. The fingers that grasped it were thick. Red. White around the knuckles from clasping the phone so hard. And as I traced the bulging muscles and veins attached to the arm outstretching the cell toward me, I found my abuser attached to it.
Axton handed me another phone.
“That’s not smart,” Dante warned.
Axton didn’t respond, though. Hell, he didn’t even flinch. “Thirty seconds. Call them back.”
I swallowed hard. “Why?”
He picked up my hand and placed the phone against my palm. “Because family is everything.”
I had to admit his words shocked me. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” he said, pulling up the dialing application on the phone. “Just call.”
And I did exactly as he asked.
“Brielle!?” Dad practically shouted into the phone.
