Chapter twenty-seven
My heart thundered in my chest, pounding the blood through my veins so fast that my stomach lurched and my bedroom walls seemed to spin crazily. I remembered everything.
I’d gone there because Cassie had wanted me there. She wanted me to see, and I saw. I understood. Why her mother had wanted her to stay away from me. Why Cassie went after Del and constantly pushed me—constantly took from me—why our friendship was a bitter, vengeful, sad little monster underneath its complex, shattering layers.
Most of all, as I struggled to my feet, sorrow coursed through me, tightening my throat, squeezing my heart until it splintered into a million messy pieces.
I could barely breathe, think around the raw hurt.
Cassie ... poor Cassie...
I knew who killed her.
Stumbling over to my desk, shards of glass crunched under my flip-flops as I grabbed my cell phone and pressed down on the contact. The phone rang. Once. Twice. Five times. Tears blurred my vision. He wasn’t going to answer. Of course not. I’d accused him of terrible things, and now that I remembered what a wretched beast I’d been to him, he shouldn’t have been the one I called, but I had to tell someone. I had to get the words out of my mouth because they made it real. They changed everything.
Carson’s voice mail picked up.
I squeezed my eyes shut. “It’s me. I remember everything. I know—I know who killed Cassie. I don’t know what to do. Please—”
My bedroom door groaned as it swung open, and I lifted my gaze. My heart leaped into my throat as my fingers dug into the slim phone. The figure filled the door—the same figure I’d seen in all those memories, looking down on me as I lay on the cliff, touching and checking for a pulse. The shadow man who haunted my steps was real. Maybe not in the backseat of the car, but I knew without a doubt that he’d been in the woods, watching me, grabbing my purse and the note from the car after I’d wrecked. Had he left me for dead twice?
My heart ached at the betrayal.
“Dad?” I croaked, dizzy.
“Hang up the phone, Samantha.”
Hanging up the phone would be bad. Standing there was stupid, but I was shell-shocked. I shook as Dad stalked toward me, sparing a brief glance at the broken mirror and music box. He pried the phone from my tight grasp and disconnected the call.
“Who did you call, Samantha?” he asked, placing the phone in his back pocket.
I backed up. “No one.”
He grimaced. “Don’t lie to me. I know you were on the phone with someone. Who was it?”
There was no way I’d tell him. I clamped my mouth shut, praying that Carson decided to listen to my message and knew to call the police. Long shot, considering he’d probably delete my message without listening to it, and even if he did, he’d call back and Dad had my phone.
“It was Carson, wasn’t it? Why, princess, why did you have to involve him?” He rubbed his brow, sounding disappointed, as if I’d stayed out too late and broken curfew. “This ... we will have to work through this. I can deal with him.”
Fear spiked through me. “Deal with him?”
Dad shot me a dark look, and I shrank back. “I did not pull myself out of the gutters and become who I am today to lose it all. Sacrifices... they have to be made along the way.”
Crazy—he sounded crazy. “Sacrifices? Was Cassie a sacrifice? Was I?”
“Samantha—”
“Why did you kill her? She was...”
“Kill her?” He shook his head. “You don’t understand.”
“I remember!” The pain and panic in my own voice shocked me. “I saw you. You pushed her away and—”
“And she slipped and fell! She hit her head on the damn rocks! It was an accident, Samantha. I never meant for her to get hurt. She just wouldn’t listen to me!” He stepped back, moving his hands over his head, tugging on the ends of his hair. “From the day you brought her home from school, I knew she was going to be a problem. And I did everything to keep you two apart.”
Besides the few moments he’d mentioned not liking my friendship, I remembered now. How turned off he’d been by my new friend. Not allowing her to sleep over, arguing with Mom— poor, naive Mom—when she went behind him and let Cassie stay. How standoffish he’d been to Cassie over the years, outright avoiding her whenever she was in the house or any talk of her.
I was going to hurl.
“Sit down.”
My body locked up, and my eyes darted around the room frantically.
“Sit down, Samantha.” His voice brooked no room for argument, and I sat on the edge of my bed, trembling. “You need to listen to me. What happened to Cassie was an accident. You have to believe me, princess. I never wanted anyone to get hurt.”
Tears spilled over my cheeks. Thoughts raced together dizzily, and terror shuttled through my body. I needed to find a way out of this, and even though he was my dad, Cassie deserved justice. God, she deserved so much more than what her life had become.
He moved toward me but stopped when I recoiled. “I especially never meant for you to get hurt. I didn’t even know you were there until it was too late.”
I lifted my gaze, seeing the face of a true stranger. A man I never really knew, capable of leaving one daughter to die after he’d killed another. “She was my sister.”
“Your half sister,” he corrected vehemently. “One night, Samantha, one night with her mother doesn’t make her your sister.”
“But she was your daughter!”
He crouched in front of me, taking a deep breath. “You are my daughter. Cassie... Cassie was a mistake.”
I shook my head, scooting back from him.
A dark, terrible look flickered in his eyes. “Cate and I had agreed to keep our affair a secret. She understood how much I faced losing if your mother ever found out. She’d divorce me, and I’d lose everything, Samantha—my marriage, my job, everything I’ve worked for!”
One horrifying puzzle piece clicked into another after another. The pre-nup—no doubt they had a clause involving cheating, leaving the one having the affair with nothing. And Dad had nothing without Mom and her money.
“I don’t know how she discovered it,” he continued, standing slowly. My thoughts went to the music box and its hidden slot. “But she did. She wanted me to acknowledge that I was her father, but you know that. You were at the cliff that night. You heard it all.”
Cassie had begged him to love her—to be her father and give her everything that he’d given me while I’d hidden behind the tree, fixated on the drama unfolding. Thinking back, I hadn’t been afraid. Just so damn angry that my dad had cheated— cheated like Del—and Cassie once again had been the center of it all. Part of me had even been relieved when Dad had refused, pleading with her to understand that he would never go public with the fact that he was her father.
She hadn’t backed down, and maybe what happened had been an accident. The rocks had been slippery, and it’d been dark. Either way, I’d seen Dad push her, and she’d slipped. The rocks had run red with her blood, just like the very first memory I’d had. And the horror I’d felt then, seeing my Dad kneel over her prone body, was now rushing through me again.
“She was dead,” Dad said, watching my expression. “I checked. Her skull ... she was dead, and I panicked.”
I’d been rooted to my spot in shock. Not making my presence known until he’d picked up Cassie ... Anger squashed some of the fear. “You threw her off the cliff like garbage and then covered your tracks!”
He flinched. “There was nothing I could do! It would just be better if everyone thought it was an accident. Which it was!” His feet crunched over glass as he moved to the side, blocking the door. “And then you came running out from behind those damn trees. I didn’t know you were there, didn’t expect that Cassie had planned for you to hear everything.” His voice cracked. “And you slipped on the damp rocks and her...”
“Her blood,” I whispered, remembering how I’d screamed her name and then the terror when my feet moved out from underneath me, the sky tumbling over, the ground reaching up to catch me.
“You fell over the edge.” His voice was hoarse.
“And you left me there to die.” The hurt ran so deep I thought I’d drown in it.
“No! No.” He came forward fast, grasping my shoulders and giving me a little shake. “I climbed down the cliff and I checked. I swear, I didn’t think you were breathing. I checked your pulse. I couldn’t feel one, and you didn’t seem like you were breathing, and there was so much blood. Baby, I thought you were dead.”
I shuddered. The night I’d found out that I’d been writing the notes—the nightmare that had woken me up had been a memory of Dad. “You could’ve called the police! You could’ve done something!”
“I panicked!” he roared, his fingers digging into my shoulders. “I thought you were dead, too. And I just panicked!”
I tried to shake off his grasp. His touch made my skin crawl. He was my father—flesh and blood, but he’d left me in a panic. “There wasn’t a single moment afterward that you didn’t consider calling the police? Not once while I was missing?”
He looked me straight in the eye. “I took your phone, and I couldn’t...”
“You...” It hit me then, and I cried out. It wasn’t that he couldn’t call the police after the panic had subsided. It was that he wouldn’t. The deeds had already been done, and the risk had been too great. The truth of his affair would have come out, and he would’ve lost everything—and been charged with Cassie’s accidental death.
Money was more important to him. A relationship with his own daughter hadn’t been enough, and neither had been my life.
“I’m going to be sick,” I whispered.
Dad fingers loosened. “I’m so sorry.”
A tiny part of me believed him, because I could hear it in his voice. “What did you think when they found me?”
Lowering his gaze, he didn’t answer.
My body shook as another sob rolled its way through me. “What would you’ve done if I’d remembered then?” I gasped, trying to shake his hands off. “What are you going to do?”
“I hoped you wouldn’t remember, but then you started poking around, writing those notes, trying to figure out what happened.” He looked so disappointed, as if I’d failed him somehow. “The day you went to the cliff, I followed you.”
Competing levels of horror and fury battled inside me. My hands formed tight fists. “I thought I was crazy! And you just let me believe that.”
“I couldn’t tell you the truth. You have to understand that.” Dad shook his head. “I wasn’t in the car, baby. You had a panic attack or something, but I found the note and I did call the accident in.”
Like that made it better, redeemed him somehow. He’d accidentally killed Cassie and then left me to die ... all so he could keep up his pathetic lifestyle.
He cupped my cheek, and revulsion twisted my insides. “You’re my baby girl, my princess.”
Cassie had been his baby girl, too, and that had meant nothing to him. Movement flickered behind him. Over his shoulder, I caught a glimpse of the door inching open. A long, thin shadow spread across the floor. My breath caught as a denimclad leg appeared, and then long, tanned fingers gripped the door.
Carson. I focused on my father, swallowing hard. “Why did you give her the same music box if you didn’t want her to know?”
Caught off guard by the question, he blinked. “It was so long ago when I gave it to Cate.” A faint smile parted his lips. “I had the boxes made in Philly. They’re unique. It was a stupid, sentimental thing to do.” He laughed then, the sound broken and harsh. “How was I to know that you two would be friends one day? Cate left town. I never thought she’d be back. Those boxes...”
Moving silently behind us, Carson squeezed in between the door and my wall. His eyes were fixed on us, and I had no idea what he was planning. I wanted him to run because I knew my dad owned pistols. He could have one on him now.
If Carson got hurt in all this...
“I’m so sorry.” Dad’s hand moved from my cheek to my neck. “I never meant for any of this to happen.”
Another shudder rocked me. “Please, don’t—”
Carson stepped on a piece of glass. The crunch sounded like a shotgun blast. Dad whipped around, and everything happened so fast. I jumped up as Carson rushed forward, as if he was going to tackle my father, but Dad—he moved so quickly. Like lightning, really. He swiped something off the floor and met Carson.
There was a pain-filled yelp, and Carson staggered back. Blood spurted from his left shoulder as he hit the wall. A scream rose in my throat, spilling over. Dad yanked the piece of glass out of Carson and reared his arm back.
I didn’t even think.
Rushing forward, I grabbed the heavy base of the broken music box, and with another scream that rose from a deep place within me, I brought it down on the back of my father’s head.
The bloodied piece of glass fell from my father’s hand as his legs buckled out from underneath him. He folded like a paper sack.
I stepped back, clutching the music box. “Dad?” I whispered.
He didn’t move.
Had I ... killed him? I edged around his body, reaching Carson. “Are you okay?”
Face pale and contorted, he nodded as he pressed his hand against the wound. “It’s not deep. Thought ... I was going to rescue you.” He gave a dry, shocked laugh. “Holy crap, Sam, holy crap...”
I dropped the box on the floor and placed my hand over his. Blood seeped through his fingers, causing my stomach to roll. “I’m so, so sorry.”
“Stop.” He grasped my other hand as he pushed off the wall, pulling me toward the door. “None of this is your fault. We need to call the police, but let’s ... get out of here first.”
Together, we rushed from the room and down the hall. My eyes were fastened to him the whole way. The wound didn’t seem too bad, but the blood kept making its way down his gray shirt. Dad had been aiming for his throat, but Carson’s reflexes had saved him. And he’d most likely saved me by showing up. I’d gladly spend the rest of my life thanking him.
At some point my brain had clicked off, and instinct had taken over. Get out. Call the police. Get Carson help. It was all I could focus on. He leaned into me, letting go to pull a phone out of his pocket.