Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 154379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 772(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 772(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
Piper didn’t realize she had a duffel hung on her shoulder until she tossed it onto Piper’s lap. “Take this. Use it for good instead of whatever terrible things he has planned for it.”
Shock held Piper, and she stared blankly at the duffel on her lap.
It was the same one that Justin had come out of that house with.
“I…” Confusion clogged Piper’s throat.
“I was so stupid to trust him. To think he actually wanted me,” the girl wheezed, pain lancing through her features. “But I won’t do this. I don’t want this life. He was right. He was right.”
Pain bled into the last, the words meant only for herself.
A battle of fear and determination roiled through Piper. She needed to go to the police.
“I know you want to do what’s right. But he’s watching you. I’ve witnessed the things he does. If you report him, he’ll kill everyone you love. You have to get out of here. Right now. Go and don’t ever turn back.”
She gripped Piper’s arm. “Go. Try to save your life. Just like I’m going to try to save mine.”
Then the girl turned and ran back for her car. She jumped inside and the tires squealed as she peeled out, swerving left then right before she flew down the road.
Mania pumped through Piper’s veins, her brow pinched as she jerked the duffel’s zipper open to find what was inside.
It was stuffed with cash.
Uncertainty whipped through her, and her conscience screamed.
She had to report this. Do what was right.
He’ll kill everyone you love.
Alarm blared inside her. A feeling that she might already be too late.
No.
She shoved the car back into drive and rammed on the gas.
She had to get help. Warn her family. Tell them what happened.
Her dad would know what to do. He always knew what to do.
The deepest, most gut-wrenching type of regret burned through her insides as she raced back toward her childhood home.
Afflicted by what she’d been a part of.
Infected by the memory of ever allowing Justin to touch her.
Sickened that she hadn’t listened when her Nelly had been trying to warn her that she was being taken down a path that she didn’t want to travel.
She had been so blind.
So foolish.
So stupid.
And now, that poor, kind man was dead because of it.
Tears blurred her eyes, and she frantically wiped them away so she could see.
She just had to get home.
Her father’s car skidded as she took a sharp left as she flew into their neighborhood.
She whipped around another turn then came to a screeching stop in front of the house.
Her heart ravaged her chest as she jumped out and ran for the front door.
She threw it open, her father’s name a shout at the tip of her tongue, though it shriveled into a whimper when she stumbled through the door.
Blood.
It was everywhere.
Her mother was face down in a pool of it in the sitting room to her left.
Piper’s knees buckled, and her hand shot for the wall to keep herself from falling.
No.
“No, no, no, no.”
Bile rushed her throat, and she stumbled deeper into the house.
Grief a knot that closed off her throat, her hands clinging to the walls as she went to keep her standing.
Her father was in the living room.
And her brother…
Piper bent in two and vomited on the floor.
Oh, God. Please, no.
It was her fault. It was her fault.
Agony shredded her apart, and she slipped through a puddle of blood in the kitchen as she went for the phone on the counter.
She froze when the voice hit her from behind.
“Told you that we would have been just fine if you kept your fucking mouth shut, but you couldn’t do that, could you?” Justin tsked from across the room. “You made me have to go and do this.”
Ice slicked down her spine.
A slow melting of fear and misery and disbelief that crawled beneath the surface of her skin.
She was facing away, and the partition counter that sectioned off the kitchen from the family room separated them.
She could do this. She could do this.
Her fingers crawled for the telephone.
“Wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
She stilled like she was giving, then her hand shot for it. She managed to get it around the handset and yanked it from the cradle.
Justin blew through the opening and into the kitchen in the same second. The phone tumbled from her hand as she whirled toward him.
A bloodied knife dangled from his hand.
She attempted to slowly back away.
“We could have been so good.” His voice teemed with feigned regret. “And here you told me you were game for a good time.”
“You killed them.” She croaked it, her hands fumbling behind her as he edged around the small island in her direction.
“Warned you, just like I warned her. Now I have to take care of you both.”
He lunged at her, and Piper yelped. Her hands flew out to grab onto the closest thing she could find.