Page 56 of Wicked Oath

“She’s dead,” I snap. “Forty-five minutes. It took forty-five minutes. You could have helped her before.”

“Delaney,” she says softly. “I need to check her.”

Talon and Jude gently take my mom from me before they make me stand up. “Where is he?” I ask.

“The kitchen,” Knox says.

“You can’t go in…” Andrew starts to say.

“Shut the fuck up,” I snap at him before continuing to walk into the kitchen. When I get in, I immediately find that my dad is lying on his back in the middle of the kitchen. He has a small bullet wound to the center of his head and blood is everywhere. “Jesus.”

“Too bad he didn’t suffer,” Talon remarks.

“He should have. I was looking forward to watching him slowly die of cancer,” I add. We walk back through the living room and there is a flood of police officers here. They take me out onto the front porch to sit down and the detectives join us.

“What happened?” Katy asks me.

“Mom called me in a panic. She said that they killed my dad, and they were going to kill me. She was hiding, I guess. She was apologizing for how terrible he was to me growing up. She remarked that they were getting closer to her. A few seconds later, she started screaming and the phone dropped. We had just got into the car when a video request came through.”

“Video?” Andrew asks.

“Yeah. She already had told me it was Logan and Vince. I couldn’t actually see them because they had masks on, but I recognize Vince’s voice when he started raping her and told her to stay still. The phone was propped up on something while they both violently raped her. They got the phone back and I watched as they stabbed her. It was a serrated blade and they twisted it inside of her. I knew the damage was bad but… I didn’t expect there to be so much blood when we got here. I was trying to keep pressure on the wound, but she was fading fast. I knew she wouldn’t make it, so I just held her. One of the guys checked the house to make sure they were gone,” I explain.

“Where were you at when you got the call?” Andrew asks.

“At home. I was asleep,” I say.

“And the others?”

“With me,” I say with a frown.

“Can you account for where they were the entire time?” he continues to question.

“Yes,” I snap. “You are not going to try to fucking pin this on anyone other than who did this. Vince and Logan Reid did this. She said they did it and I heard Vince.”

“We will look into it, but…” Katy starts to say.

“I swear to Christ, if you two idiots don’t do anything other than your goddamn job, I will make you fucking regret it. Vince and Logan did this,” I growl at her. “I don’t give a shit how much they’re paying you or what they have over you. They deserve to be punished for what they’ve done.”

“They have a history of violence,” Katy says. “You don’t think Talon would wipe out everyone you know to make sure you cannot escape him?”

“They didn’t do this,” I say angrily.

“Maybe not, but they have plenty of people working…”

“Stop it!” I scream at her. “I just held my mother while she fucking died. My rapist father is missing half of his goddamn head in my childhood kitchen. I am losing everything that I’ve ever known, and it hurts no matter what I do. You two have the fucking audacity to come here and try to blame them for this?I’m sitting here telling you who fucking did it. I heard his voice. She didn’t hesitate at all when she told me they did it. Either do something about it or I will.”

“Is that a threat?” Katy asks.

“I’ll show you a goddamn threat,” I snap. I go to stand up, but Jude quickly wraps his arms around my waist and sits me back down.

“We are going to take her home. You know where we live, and we aren’t leaving town,” Talon says. “We will get the medical examiner’s office the information on where to send their bodies when they are released for the funeral.”

“We will be in contact to interview everyone separately,” Andrews says.

“Our lawyer will be in touch,” Talon says before standing me up and pulling me off the porch.

“I don’t have a good feeling,” Torch says as we get into the SUV.

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