Page 54 of Damaged & Deadly

“Do you need anything?” Cain asks, breaking the silence. His voice is strained, and when I shift my gaze away from the fire engine to look at him, I find his forehead marred with deep concern lines. “Food? A shower? Sleep? You name it, and I’ll get it for you.”

With a final sniffle, Evie lifts her head, resting her chin on her knees as her red, swollen eyes linger on Cain and me. “Food and a shower sound good. Then maybe some sleep.”

I place my palm on the bed sheet, feeling an urge to touch her yet not wanting to startle her or make her uncomfortable. “I’ll go see what food I can find.” My smile is tight as I get to my feet, and she returns it with a soft one that reminds me of the old Evie.

“Thanks, Ollie.”

She’s the only person to call me that. She loved that both of our names ended inie.She thought it was a sign that we were meant to be best friends. I have no idea what the hell we are now, and hearing her call me that makes my heart soar and my chest clench in pain.

Feeling all sorts of fucked up and emotionally wrecked, I walk out of the room. As I close the door behind me, offering brother and sister some modicum of privacy, I hear her murmur to Cain, “If this is a dream, I don’t ever want to wake up.”

It breaks the last fragment of my heart and I hang my head as I close my eyes, listening to Cain’s response. “This isn’t a dream, Evie. It’s real. I’m real. You’re safe now.”

Not wanting to eavesdrop anymore, I step away from the door and head downstairs. Sawyer is leaning one shoulder against the living room door frame, and she glances up when she hears me.

“I’ve gotta go,” she says into her phone, hanging up as she turns to face me with a somber expression, tiredness tugging at her features.

“How is she?”

“Hard to tell.” I shrug. “But she says she can eat, so that’s gotta be a good sign.”

She nods in agreement.

Throwing a jacket on, I say, “There’s a shop down the road that sells soup she used to love. I’m going to go grab some,” as I stride toward the door.

“Sure. Do you want me to come with?”

I hesitate with my hand on the screen door. “No, it’s okay. I could do with the time to think.”

“Oh, yeah. Of course.”

A fresh wave of guilt hits me and I feel bad for pushing Red away. She’s had a tough night too, but I just can’t right now. My head’s all sorts of fucked up, and I’m not ready to try and talk through it with anyone.

It’s on the tip of my tongue to apologize to her, but I bite it back and without looking at her, I yank open the door and stride out into the early morning air. The sun’s only just rising and it’s way too early for the shop to be open for business yet, so I’m hoping someone will be there to take in the early morning deliveries, and I can pay them off to let me in. Although, I’m not above breaking and entering. Hell, I’d probably sell my soul just to get that soup, because it feels like the only useful thing I can do right now. I don’t know how to ease Evie’s pain or make this transition back into the real world easier for her, but I can get her something she once loved. Even if it is a measly bowl of soup.

I let the cool morning air wrap around me, waking me up and making me feel more alert as I walk the three blocks to the shop. I use the time to try and work through my feelings. My shock at finding Evie alive after all this time; my anger at the state she’s in. I noticed the skin around her wrists is red and rubbed raw; fingerprint bruises mar her pale skin that clearly hasn’t seen a glint of sunlight in the last twelve years.

The most unsettling emotion I’m struggling with is my guilt. Guilt for assuming she was dead all these years. It was easier to believe. Hell, I think Cain and I both wanted to believe it was the truth because the alternative was too horrifying to consider. Of course, now that reality is slapping us in the face. I also feel guilty—and fucking disgusted with myself—because while she was living in hell, I moved on. I let go of the flame I held for her and found love in another woman’s arms. We may have only been kids when Evie was taken, but it didn’t make what I felt for her at the time any less real, and now I feel like I’ve let her down by not staying true to those feelings. Like, somehow, I’ve lessened what we had.

Meanwhile, there’s Red, who is perfect for me in every way, and to who Cain and I owe a massive fucking thank you for saving her. If it hadn’t been for Luc and Red, we would never have even known Evie was alive. And now, with Santos dead, she might have been locked in that room and left to starve. Would anyone have even known that she was there? Would they have cared? A new wave of nausea rolls through me and I shake my head to dispel those thoughts. They don’t do anyone any good. She’s no longer locked in that room, so it’s honestly not worth a second thought.

Rounding the corner onto the street the shop is on, I spot the owner standing out front, accepting a delivery order before he begins lugging it inside. The delivery van drives off as I cross the road, and the owner ducks back out the door to grab another palette of stock.

He tenses when he spots me, his face giving nothing away as he gives me a quick, assessing once over. His eyes linger on my arm, and I glance down, noticing obvious blood spatter from when Cain went apeshit on Santos. In fact, there’s blood all over my top, but the man doesn’t notice the rest of it because it’s black.

Digging a twenty-dollar bill out of my pocket, I hold it up, hoping that will be enough to sway him. “I just need to grab some soup.”

His gaze darts from me to the dollar bill I’m holding before he nods and snatches it from my hands. “In the chiller in the back.”

“Thanks.” Stepping past him, I move into the shop and walk down the aisle to the chillers. Scanning the shelves until I find the container of chicken noodle soup, I lift it and detour past the checkout, dropping another tenner on the counter before heading out the door with a nod at the shopkeeper.

I’m lost in my thoughts the whole way back, and before I know it, I’m standing on the footpath outside Cain’s house. Staring up at the building Cain’s spent a ton of money doing up over the last year, you’d hardly believe it once contained a happy family; happy memories.

And in the space of twenty-four hours, their entire happy family facade came crashing down. Evie was taken, their father disappeared, Cain became a victim of his guilt and anger, and his mother lost herself in the bottom of a bottle until she ultimately found peace in the afterlife.

Flicking my eyes to the house on the left, which used to be mine, I grimace. Where Cain’s house once contained a happy family, mine held no such thing. I spent all my time at Cain’s, even sleeping over some nights as a way of escaping my father’s alcohol-fueled rages. He hadn’t been so bad when I was younger, but my father repeatedly found himself unemployed as gangs lay siege to Black Creek and jobs became harder to come by. Alcohol became his crutch, his way of coping, and unfortunately, he was a mean drunk.

He’d fly off the handle over the most minor thing, sometimes for no reason at all. It only worsened as the disease progressed, until it destroyed his brain and liver. The day I found him dead in his La-Z-Boy in the living room, hugging a bottle of vodka, was a blessing in disguise. The Thomas’ took me in after that. I was practically living in their home by then, anyway. I lived a happy life as part of their family for eighteen months before everything fell apart.

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