Page 21 of Beloved Sacrifice

Rose frowned, as if something had just occurred to her, then said, “Did she know you weren’t dead?”

Weston froze. He hadn’t thought she’d ask that. His silence was answer enough.

Rose squeezed her eyes closed. “You told her, but not me, not Caden.”

“A few years ago, I went to see her. I needed to talk to her and find out what she wanted. It’s her life. I had to make sure she would be okay, be happy, if she had to change facilities.”

Rose turned half away, looking out the window. Weston sat forward, bracing his hands on the arms of the chair.

“She told me you and Caden had a plan. That you were trying to learn our parents’ secret, so you could use it to blackmail them and escape.”

Rose nodded once. “That was…Caden was sure he was close this last time.”

Hearing his brother’s name on her lips made Weston’s chest ache.

“That was my plan, too.” Weston kept his voice low and quiet.

Rose crossed the room, perching on the edge of the couch. “You found something?”

“I did.”

He expected her to ask more questions—what had he learned? What were they going to do about his parents? What were they going to do about the Trinity Masters?

He had answers for those questions. He didn’t have all the pieces he needed, but he was close. Closer than Caden had ever been.

Weston had yet to even begin to truly mourn his brother. He’d spent more than a decade planning and plotting, reassuring himself in the loneliest hours that he, Caden, Rose, and Tabby would have a lifetime together, that what was most important was finding a way to keep them all safe.

But his brother was dead. He would never get a chance to see him, talk to him. To free him from the prison their parents had built.

There was another, lesser reason he’d stayed away, one that did him no credit. A reason that he admitted only in his loneliest, lowest moments—he hadn’t wanted to see them together. In the dark of his own mind, he could admit that it had been easier to stay away, because his heart would break to see the girl, now woman, he’d always loved in the arms of another man.

And now his brother was dead, and Weston was left with his grieving widow.

Rose stood and walked into the study. She came back holding a tall, skinny picture frame. The strip of photo booth photos was one of only two pictures he had on display. For years, he’d made sure to hide all his mementos, but as the years had passed he’d needed a reminder of what he was fighting for—his family.

He’d had the photo strip with him at college. Years after his presumed death, he’d been able to use a proxy to request his boxes of personal possessions, which the university had put in storage. This strip of photos and a picture of Tabby were the only things he kept. The picture of Tabby was taped to the bedroom mirror.

Rose stared at the pictures, then turned the frame to him.

In the first photo, he and Rose, sixteen and twenty respectively, had their faces in profile to the camera, their lips pressed together in a chaste kiss. His hand rested tentatively on her shoulder.

In the second photo, they’d sprung apart, Rose wide-eyed, Weston scowling.

He remembered the moment. They’d snuck into the photo booth to kiss, and then heard Caden calling their names.

In the third picture Caden was there, his big head and cheesy smile taking up most of the frame.

In the final image, they were all smiling. Rose was squished in the middle, grinning. Caden’s eyes were crinkled at the corners, matching his big grin. Weston was smiling, his face pressed against Rose’s.

Of the kids in the picture, only Weston knew the truth about their parents. Caden and Rose hadn’t yet been indoctrinated into their parents’ twisted reality. At nineteen, he’d been arrogant and self-centered enough to assume he was the only one who would be subjected to his parents’ machinations. The boy in the photo didn’t realize that in only a few months, they’d start on Rose, and shortly after that, on Caden.

“You knew.” She set the picture down on the small table, the frame clacking softly against the wood. “You knew what they were like. You let us think you were dead. Instead of just being scared they would hurt Tabby, we had to worry that if one of us stepped out of line, they would murder the other. The same way they killed you.” She took a deep breath.

“I was stupid and arrogant when I was young. I thought I’d found a way to gain the upper hand. Instead, when I confronted them, my own father shot me and burned the building down around me.” His fingers trembled at the memory.

“Pet’s apartment,” she said softly.

“Yes.” That’s where he’d gone to confront Elroy and Barton. He’d wanted to protect Caden, who’d been home at the time.

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