I freeze, my blood running cold while my heart flies up my throat. For several moments, I stare at them hard to ensure it’s not a hallucination. Because they definitely were not there when I left for work earlier.
Panic immediately floods my bloodstream, nearly drowning me in it.
Fuck.
Someone was in my room.
It has to be Dread. The fucker’s broken into my room more times than I care to know.
It’s probably a prelude to whatever bullshit he’s planned.
Except, my instincts are screeching a different tune—one I don’t know how to make sense of yet. My muscles are solid stone as I slowly peer over my shoulder, studying every inch of my room to ensure he's no longer here. Logically, I know there’s nowhere to hide, yet it still feels like eyes are watching my every move.
My pulse thunders in my ears as I face my bed again and cautiously approach the note and hair clip as if they're squirming bugs. With trembling fingers, I pick up the barrette first, twisting the pink metal in my fingers with a frown. It's unfamiliar, and I have no fucking idea what it's supposed to mean. Swallowing thickly, I set it down and pick up the note next before unfolding it.
The blocky handwriting is unfamiliar, and there’s no signature, but there doesn’t need to be. Only one person has ever called me Angel.
The last time I heard it was when I was thirteen, standing across the table from him in the prison’s visitation room.
My mom and I saw him every week, but the older I got, the more I understood Lionel for who he was, and the less I wanted to be there. I wasn’t very good at hiding it, though.
Mom spent half the time crying, as she always did, while I silently stared at my fidgeting hands in my lap, only speaking when spoken to.
Our time was up, and I was anxious to go home. But when I turned to leave, he called out for me. I met eyes with the monster in our shed.
“Do you remember your promise?”
I nod.
“You know what happens if you break it?”
I nod again.
“Prison changes nothing. You know Daddy has friends.”
This time, I can only swallow.
He grins, but it doesn’t make me feel comforted. “Bring a smile next time, Angel. I miss you, but I won’t have to miss you forever.”
That was the last time I saw him, but I can hear his voice as clearly as if it were yesterday. It terrified me then, just as it does now. Even at thirteen, I knew he kept a monster hidden beneath the thin veil covering his saccharine words.
The next week, I refused to go. It led to a massive fight with my mom, but I was too old to physically force into the car, and no amount of threats convinced me. So, she went without me from thereon, visiting every single week like clockwork until she took her own life.
“I miss you, but I won’t have to miss you forever.”
And he was right, because it would appear today is the day he no longer has to.
My vision blurs, and my pumping chest caves in, burying my lungs beneath the rubble and rendering it impossible to breathe.
I could vomit. I could cry. I could die right here on the spot, and my soul would rejoice.
Oddly, there’s a part of me still in disbelief, unable to conceptualize a reality where my father is out of prison.Free.
Yet, I’m holding definitive proof he is. Yesterday was his release, and no one else knows about that goddamn nickname except my mother.
But…howis he here already? Did he seriously get approval from his parole officer to leave the state the same day and then drove straight here?
It’s about a twelve-hour drive from Silent Mist to HCU, so it’s feasible, but…
