Page 99 of Stolen for Keeps
“She was lying on her side, her back to me. But her skin…God, she looked off. Not asleep. Just…wrong.”
Maya shifted closer, her eyes steady, soaking in every word. There was no flinch. No pity either.
I continued, “I stayed outside. Never even crossed thethreshold. But I knew. I smelled the drugs. And something else. Like something in the room had gone sour.”
My hands curled into fists. Maya’s fingers moved over my chest, tracing tender circles. Then she rested her cheek against me, right over it. I didn’t think she even realized what that meant.
“I left,” I whispered. “Didn’t tell anyone. Didn’t call for help. I just got back on my bike and rode. Around town. Through the woods.”
Shame punched through me.
“Who the hell does that?” I spat. “Who finds their sister dead and justrides around?”
“You were in shock,” she said gently.
“I shouldn’t be.”
Her head lifted. Her voice sharpened, not cruelly, justtrue. “You werefourteen.”
I shook my head. That line again. Everyone said it like it excused everything. But it didn’t fix what I did…or didn’t do.
Maya reached for my hand and held it firmly. “Actually, I take that back.”
I looked at her. She met my gaze head-on.
“It hasnothingto do with being fourteen. You could’ve been thirty and done the same thing. You saw someone you loved—your sister—dead. That does something to you. There’s no script for that, Noah. No right way to react.”
My throat burned. She didn’t let go.
“You think you should’ve handled it better?” She leaned in. “I think you handled it like someone whose whole world just shattered. You rode around town because death like that…it shouldn’t be real. It shouldn’t be normal. And the second you pretend it is, that’s when something breaks in you for good.”
I didn’t speak. I couldn’t. But something in me let go, just enough to breathe without it catching in my throat.
She didn’t press or try to fill the silence with platitudes. She just stayed right there. Holding me together without trying to fix me.
She understood the shape of the loss. The kind that wasn’t supposed to level a so-called tough-ass kid, but did anyway. She got it, even before I’d said any of this.
“My mom died when I was little,” I said eventually. “I was eight, maybe. I can still kind of hear her voice, but I can’t picture her face.” I glanced down, my thumb brushing the curve of the rusted knife. “But Tessa?” My voice dropped. “Growing up, she was the closest thing I had to a mother.”
Maya rubbed my arm. It wasn’t power in the physical sense. It was deeper than that. The kind of strength that held you still inside.
When I started this conversation, I didn’t think I’d make it through. I thought I’d choke on it and fold in on myself. And yeah, I was a mess, but not in the way I feared. In a way that made space instead of crushing me.
I held onto that feeling and used it as momentum, because if talking about Tessa had nearly undone me, the part that came next was worse. Not because it was old. But because it still bled.
“I kept riding and hiding until I found Elia,” I said, the words rough now. “At first, he just swatted my head like I was being a dumbass.” I huffed out a broken chuckle. “He thought I was messing with him. But when I dragged him to The Willow…” The words caught. “His face. God, I’ll never forget it.” I paused, my chest tight. “He told me to go home. He said it over and over.Go home, Noah. Go home.Like if I disappeared fast enough, it wouldn’t be real.”
Maya shifted, her palm cupping my cheek, anchoring me there. Her fingers were warm, her touch sure.
“I went home,” I said. “And I cried. Like a damn kid.” Idragged a hand through my hair. The guilt always settled in the same place, right at the base of my skull. “What if she were still alive when I found her?” The words stuttered, dragging along the inside of my throat.
Maya didn’t flinch. “Why now, Noah? Why that question?”
“Because I never asked it before,” I admitted. “Not once. I never talked to anyone. Never said it out loud.”
“Then it’s time. You need to ask Elia.”
“What if she were? What if I could’ve saved her?”
