Page 69 of His to Keep

“I let him live so I could save you!” He turns to me and grabs my arms. “How else did you think we’d get out? He was the only way.”

“And you’re going to take his word for it?”

He pushes his hands through his hair. “I had no choice.”

“You did have a choice. For all I know, you left her because you hated her!”

“I hated her,” he agrees. “But that doesn’t mean I wanted her dead. I tried to reason with him, but he refused. It was either you or her, and I chose you. Hate me all you want, but I’d always choose you.”

“And now you’re tossing me away.”

“There’s nothing I can give you. I’ll be the omen that will remind you of everything that happened here. The nightmare you can’t shake. And if John does break his promise, if you stay with me, you’ll be dead anyway, and all of this would’ve been for nothing.”

My bottom lip shakes, and I feel like I’m going crazy. A part of me disagrees with him, even hates that he turned his back on Maisie and subjected her to a violent death at the hands of someone he shouldn’t have let live. But then, he never said he was going to save her when we spoke about the plan. That’s the other part, a dark piece of me that doesn’t seem to care about the wrong. My little black heart craving his. Even now, after his confession, I want him to stay with me forever.

How can I move on with my life without him? What life would I even live?

“Where will you go?”

“I haven’t thought that far ahead.” I wipe my dripping nose with the back of my hand, my heart splitting into two. “I’ll just drive away. You won’t see me again, I swear.”

Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out keys to his father’s black Mercedes. “You can drive?”

“He taught me, and I watched him a few times. Can’t be that hard.” My head hurts too much to worry about licenses and the cops pulling him over. And why Father Aaron would teach Callum to drive when he hated him. “And there’s something else.”

Reaching into his back pocket, he pulls out a folded chunk of paper. His ruined sketchbook. The only thing, aside from the clothes on him that he took from the house. Taped back together. “I know what you saw, and I know you probably never want to look in it again. But I want you to see that it’s not what it looks like. To see that it was always you.”

Dropping the journal on my lap, he gets up, expression scrunching with pain as he stands. Whether it’s from his injuries or walking away from me, I can’t be sure. Either way, it looks too easy for him to do it.

Without saying another word, not even a goodbye, he limps over to his father’s car parked nearby. My heart pounds as I flick through the pages, once again laying my eyes on the beautifully sketched imagery of Callum’s world.

The pages that follow have me choking up and sobbing. They’re vivid, detailed, and it’s like looking at an old movie reel. Some drawings are a handsome young boy, often lost and scared as he witnesses things that a child never should. Young Callum, I realize, living a life of absolute torture. Lonely and sad. My heart connects with the lead that’s created him.

Turning to the next page, my stomach twists. A pair of wrists slit open and gushing with blood. Even though it’s just a drawing, it still pains me, knowing that he did this to himself. Knowing it’s from memory. But then it changes. First, there’s Orla, only two, one the picture I saw when Maisie showed me. But then Orla’s face changes to mine, and every page I turn, there’s me.

In the room together. Me asleep, awake, smiling, crying, and angry. As if he watched me when I wasn’t looking, studied me as much as I did him in secret. Compared to the other drawings, these are lighter, happier. Glassy eyed me with flushed cheeks. My face, my hair, and my hands his favorite to sketch. Touching him, holding him. I’m fully naked in one, and I can hardly believe my eyes at the transformation I never noticed in myself. For the first time, I consider myself beautiful and womanly. Page, after page, after page. It’s obsession and darkness. Those times he ignored me. When he was silent. He still drew me, thought of me, wanted me.

I am different to him.

With my heart in my throat, I tear my eyes from his book. He’s nearly at the car, and my head spins. What will my life be like without him? Nothing would be the same becauseI’mnot the same.

Gran’s dead. My parents might as well be. I’ll be on my own, living a lie and holding onto a secret nobody would ever understand. And if I did tell anyone, I’d get unwanted attention for all the wrong reasons. The girl that was kidnapped and raped by the local priest. That’s if I’m even believed.

My body shakes as I stand, knowing I can’t let him drive away from me. Not like this. “Wait!”

He stops, and I start running. He turns around, and I jump into his arms, making him fall back against the car.

“Don’t leave me,” I plead, kissing his face, his parted, shocked lips. He stares at me like he can’t quite believe that I’m here. That I ran after him. Always thinking he doesn’t deserve it. “Don’t leave me, please. Don’t drive away and leave me here.”

“The Brotherhood—”

“Will never find us,” I say with determination. “We can change our identities and move away. I’ll sell my grandparents’ house, and you can get your inheritance. We can run. Go wherever we want. Don’t do this to me—don’t leave me. Not after everything.”

“You’ll be running for the rest of your life.” He grabs the back of my neck and leans his forehead against mine. “I can’t do that to you—I love you too much.”

“I’ll run until I can’t if it means I stay with you.

“Ava…” His lips crush against mine, stealing my breath and giving me my answer. Wrong or right, it doesn’t matter as long as we’re together. In the end, we’re just silhouettes against a house on fire. Inside burns the soul of a girl who lost everything, only to gain so much more from the ashes.

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