Page 24 of Sinful
Anything with my real name on it—gone. Bailey can stay here in Texas. Helle has to go home.
The highway stretches east, and I follow it like acondemned prisoner heading to execution.
Because that's what this is.
Going home means confessing.
Means telling them I killed Andrés.
Means watching their faces when they realize I'm not the victim—I'm the murderer.
Dad is being tortured because of me, and I'm the only one who can save him, by destroying myself.
The note from Los Coyotes sits in my pocket, and I pull it out at a red light.
Tell your sister hello. They know.
They've always known, and now everyone else will too.
Texas disappears in my mirrors, mile by endless mile.
I should feel something—relief, fear, anything.
Instead, I'm just numb.
The same numbness I felt standing over Andrés's body.
The same numbness I've felt for three years, pretending to be someone else.
Maybe numbness is all I have left.
Maybe that's enough to get me home.
Florida is ten hours away.
Ten hours to figure out what I'm going to say.
Ten hours to prepare for the moment my family learns the truth.
Ten hours until everything I've built—this new life, this new name, this temporary safety—crashes down around me.
The Kawasaki eats up asphalt, and I let it.
Let the speed and wind and engine noise drown out the voice in my head that says I'm making a mistake.
That going home won't save anyone.
That some secrets are better left buried.
But Dad's being hurt and it's my fault, so I ride toward the thing I've been running from.
Toward confession. Toward whatever comes after. Even if what comes after is losing everything—again.
CHAPTER THREE
Bravos
Ten hours on the road turns your ass numb and your mind quiet.
