Perfect End: A Dark Romance Thriller (Beautiful Ashes Book 2) Page 9

  Even though I know they’re dead and I saw a photo of their corpses, I still called their numbers yesterday.

  I pretended it was all a bad dream, that they were actually alive and well. My hopes were shattered. Both calls still went to mailbox. I tried to draw comfort from hearing their voices, but instead, I broke apart. I spent most of the day crying in my bed, too devastated to even eat.

  When the sun comes up, a nurse enters my room with a smile.

  “Good morning, Amanda,” she says.

  “Bree. My name is Bree,” I correct her. The fake names Hunter had given me have to go. As soon as I’m able, I’ll also change my documents back to my maiden name.

  “I’m sorry. I forgot.” Most of the nurses already know everything that happened. Some of them avoid my eyes, especially the ones who had cared for me when I was first admitted, not too long ago. They’re probably feeling guilty for not believing me when I begged for their help.

  “Should I bring you breakfast?” the nurse asks, opening the blinds.

  “I’m still not hungry.” I gaze through the window at the clear blue sky.

  It’s a lie. I’m desperate to enjoy a proper meal, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep the food down. My stomach is just too upset.

  She wags a finger at me. “That’s not good. You should eat to keep up your strength. It doesn’t have to be something heavy. How about starting with a piece of fruit or some yogurt?”

  I hesitate before answering. “Okay.” I force a smile. She’s right. If I want to restart my life, I need all the energy I can get. Eating sounds like a simple and insignificant task, but I have to remind myself not to take anything for granted.

  “Perfect. I’ll get it for you.” Before she reaches the door, she turns to face me. “By the way, you have a visitor. She wants to know if she has your permission to come in.”

  Aside from the cops, I can’t imagine anyone who would want to visit me. As long as it’s not Hunter, I don’t really care. “Did she happen to tell you her name?”

  The nurse shakes her head. “She only said she’s a friend.”

  Maybe it’s someone who thinks I might not want to see her.

  “Okay, go ahead and send her in.” The words remind me of the past, when I was asked for permission before someone entered my office at Denzel & Co. I want to feel the excitement of returning back to work, to continue climbing the ladder of success, but it eludes me, for now at least.

  That’s exactly what Hunter wanted. He wanted to destroy my career. I need to rekindle my love of being inside the courtroom again, otherwise he has won from beyond the grave.

  The woman who shows up at the door is not recognizable immediately. She’s not wearing her nursing uniform today.

  “Josie,” I say. “How did you...” My words are drowned by the tears clogging my throat.

  “I knew you’re here because you’re all over the papers.” She comes to my bedside and sits down on the chair, taking my hand in hers. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Did you know?” I ask. I have to. “Did you know that my husband was inside your car?”

  “No. I had no idea. I just wanted to help you. I wanted to make up for what I did to you.”

  When I frown in confusion, she drops her head, but continues to hold on to my hand. “You were... You were right. Your husband offered me money. He instructed me to make sure you didn’t leave Cherry Lake, and to keep you from calling anyone. He made it look as though it was for your protection. I was foolish to believe him.”

  “Did he ask you to have the surveillance camera in my room switched off before he visited?”

  “Yes.” Josie nods her head, then she looks up at me, her red eyes meeting mine. “We’re not allowed inside the surveillance room, so I bribed Tom, the IT guy, to do it for me.”

  I want to be angry with her for allowing herself to be manipulated by Hunter, but she was as much his victim as I was. “How did you get the tape?”

  “After your husband left, I went to tell Tom to switch on the camera again, but he told me he had forgotten to switch it off. He showed me the footage. I heard everything your husband said to you. I feel terrible for not believing that he wanted to kill you.” She pauses to wipe her wet cheek. “It’s just that we have so many patients with the craziest stories. But I should have listened to my gut. When I saw you for the first time, there was just something that didn’t seem right. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. You just seemed different somehow. After I saw the footage, I knew I had to do something. If he killed you, I would never have been able to live with myself.” She covers her face with her hands and starts sobbing. “I’m sorry I didn’t do something sooner.”

  “Josie,” I say, squeezing her hand. “You don’t have to apologize.”

  “But I do.” She drops her hands into her lap. “I’m not like that. I’m a good person.” She sniffs. “It’s just that I needed the money for my grandson. He’s disabled and caring for him is expensive. His mother died last year after a long battle with kidney disease. She left lots of debts behind.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” I say, my heart going out to her. “How about your job? Did you get in trouble?”

  “They fired me and I don’t blame them.” She pulls a handkerchief from her purse to dry her eyes, then she gets to her feet and walks to the door. “I just came to say I’m sorry.” With that, she walks out.

  The next person who visits me, after breakfast, takes me completely by surprise.

  “Jacob?” I whisper. I tried calling him several times yesterday as well, but his phone also went to mailbox.

  “Bree,” he says in a hoarse whisper. “Jesus Christ, Bree. What did he do to you?”

  I want to tell him everything, and to ask why he’s in Misty Cove, but I start to weep instead.

  My colleague, my one-night stand, and my friend, crosses the room to come and take me into his arms. He cries with me until all I can do is hiccup. When we pull apart, he answers the questions I didn’t get a chance to ask yet.

  He tells me that Hunter had hired someone to plant child pornography on his computers. He had paid a homeless man to do his dirty work. Unfortunately, the guy discovered Jacob’s wine cellar and ended up drunk on the couch.

  “How did you find out that it was Hunter behind it all?” There’s only one reason why Hunter could have wanted Jacob to be thrown behind bars. It’s the same reason why he killed Vivian and Karen. He knew they would come looking for me.

  “For a fee, Hunter’s helper told me that a man he referred to only as Mister had paid him for more jobs. One of those was to pretend to be the brother of his sick wife, who was in a coma after a car crash. He had to keep an eye on the wife and report back to Mister about her condition. A call to the hospital told me everything I needed to know. You were the wife he was speaking of.”

  Since I was in a coma, I wasn’t aware of anyone coming to see me at the hospital in Houston, but I can understand why Hunter asked someone else to watch over me. He was afraid the cops would get him. After all, I had filed a restraining order against him.

  “How did you find me?” I ask. I also want to ask why he had not come sooner. I stop myself. The fact that he wanted to rescue me from Hunter is enough to comfort me.

  “I asked the cops for help. They helped track him down, but the bastards took too long. That’s why I’m here. I came to find you myself.” He pulls me closer. “But I was too late. When I arrived in town, I didn’t know where to start searching for you. Local gossip helped me find you…after your accident.”

  “You’re not too late,” I say, breaking the embrace. “You came just when I needed you.” The truth is, I’m glad Hunter and Jacob didn’t come face to face. I don’t think Hunter would have hesitated before killing the man he thought was having an affair with his wife.

  Two people I loved already died because of me. I wouldn’t have been able to bear it if Jacob was killed too.

  I tell Jacob the rest of the story, how Hunter killed
my friends and other women.

  I’m surprised that he already knows a lot. In just the last couple of hours, thanks to the information I gave them, the cops were able to dig into Hunter’s past.

  Jacob and I watch the rest of Hunter’s story on the news.

  News travels fast because Hunter is on almost every channel, along with the faces of his many victims, including me and my friends. Apparently, he was born Cory Livingstone, son of the late Audrey Livingstone, former mayor of Newark, New Jersey. Hunter had mentioned that she had cancer. She did, but that’s not what killed her. Both she and her husband, Dan, were killed in a fatal car crash. Their son, Cory, was not with them.

  “Oh, my God.” I flick off the TV and turn to Jacob. “What if Cory had something to do with the crash?” But he seemed to have only hated his mother. Why would he kill his father as well?

  “I wouldn’t be surprised. The guy was twisted in so many ways. But I don’t want to talk about him now. Tell me how you’re feeling.”

  I shrug. “Still in shock. It’s going to be tough learning to lead a normal life again.”

  “You’ll make it. You’re strong. And I’m here to give you whatever you need. Tell me what you need, Bree. Anything.”

  “I just want to go home. I want to find my friends’ corpses and give them a proper burial.” I choke up again. “Hunter showed me a photo of them in some ditch.”

  “Okay,” Jacob says. “We’ll ask the cops to help with the search.”

  “Thank you,” I say. “But before we leave town, there’s someone I need to see.”

  As soon as I’m released from hospital, I go on the search for Josie.

  I find her easily with the help of the locals. To repay her for her courage, I write her a check that will pay off some of the debts left behind by her daughter, and commit to cover most of her grandson’s future medical expenses.

  When my job is done, I return to Houston, to a life I thought I’d lost.

  Epilogue

  Two years later

  “Are you ready to meet her?” Jacob asks, putting an arm around my shoulders.

  “I don’t think I’ll ever be ready. But I do want to see her.”

  Jacob puts a hand on my cheek so I can face him. His thumb traces the lines of my lips before he leans forward to kiss me.

  It’s been two years and a lot has changed. Jacob and I have not only opened up our own law firm, which takes on several pro bono cases a month to defend abused husbands and wives who killed their spouses in self-defense, but we’re also a couple.

  When I returned to Houston, I tried slipping back into my old life, but nothing was the same anymore.

  I still wanted to be inside the courtroom, to defend people I believed were innocent, but I wanted more.

  For most of my adult life, all I wanted was to climb as high up the ladder as I could. I got what I wanted. I made partner in one of the largest firms in the US, but it was no longer enough. The race to the top no longer fulfilled me as much as I thought it would. I wanted to make more of an impact. It was no longer just about money and power.

  When I told the other partners at Denzel & Co. that I was leaving to start my own firm, they thought I was crazy. After all, I worked hard to get to where I was. They were right, but I also paid a high price.

  Even though I still support the idea of women going out into the workplace and building their careers, I finally realized that work-life balance is important. I would never have wanted to stop working completely so I can spend time at home as a housewife, but what happened to me woke me up. I started taking more time off work, and did not work as many overtime hours as I once did.

  At the start, the other partners supported me in every way they could, understanding that I needed time to heal from everything that happened. But after two months, it was business as usual.

  Mason, my boss, called me into his office a week before last Christmas and told me that the other partners were complaining. They were starting to resent me for choosing to have a life while they toiled long into the night.

  In that moment I knew what I had to do. By the end of the day, I was packing my things. The next morning, Jacob showed up at my door and shocked me by telling me he also quit. He said Denzel and Co. wasn’t the same without me there.

  That night, we took our relationship to another level. I wanted more than just comfort from him.

  There were many more nights after that, but we took it slow, and we still are. There’s no point in rushing something if it’s the real thing.

  Now here we are, in front of the Good Seasons Old Age Home in Newark, New Jersey. We are visiting Hunter’s maternal grandmother.

  The old woman had written to me out of the blue a month ago. Before then, I didn’t even know she existed. She said she wanted to apologize to me in person for what her grandson had put me through.

  I didn’t want to come see her. I knew talking to her would open up wounds that have not quite healed yet. But there are still pieces of the puzzle missing about the man Hunter was, and questions I still need answers to in order to find closure.

  Maribel is a small, frail woman in her late eighties.

  We find her sitting by the window, holding a photo in her hands.

  We introduce ourselves, but she barely seems to notice us.

  I wonder whether she changed her mind about speaking to me.

  After ten minutes of waiting for her to acknowledge our presence, I ask if she wants us to leave. That’s when she turns around and her green eyes meet mine.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. Her voice is so low and weak that I have to sit close to her in order to hear what she’s saying. “I’m sorry about everything.”

  “Thank you.” I fold my hands tightly in my lap. Jacob’s gaze caresses my back. Having him inside the room comforts me.

  “He used to be a good boy,” Maribel continues. “My little grandson.” She lowers her gaze to the photo in her hands. It’s that of a little boy. It’s Hunter.

  Even though I know he was born under another name, it’s hard for me to get used to it. I stick to what I know.

  “What happened to him?” I ask. I know how his mother affected him, but maybe Maribel knows another side to the story.

  “He was an unwanted child. When Audrey got pregnant, she wanted to get rid of him, but Dan convinced her to keep the child. He asked her to marry him. He promised that he would do everything for the baby. Audrey didn’t have to change even one diaper.” Maribel pauses to take a breath. “He was a good man. He loved my grandbaby. Audrey never cared. All she was interested in was her career. She said she never wanted to be like me. I was a stay-at-home mother. My husband... He was the breadwinner. It gave him control over me, too much control.”

  “Did he abuse you?”

  “He did, and I took it. Audrey resented me for staying with him till his death. But where could I have gone? I had nothing to my name, and I had a child to look after. I stayed because of her.” She holds Hunter’s photo tighter in her grip. “She swore she would never be like me, that no man would ever control her. She got what she wanted. But I never thought she would become her father.”

  “Hunter–” I shake my head. “Your grandson, he mentioned that his mother was different behind closed doors.”

  “She had a temper. I raised her the best I could, but it was not easy. I’m embarrassed to say that she physically abused her husband. Hunter told me everything the few times he was allowed to visit. After watching her father being controlled and beaten up by her mother, he swore to never let a woman do that to him. Like his mother, he went too far.” She meets my gaze again. “I’m sorry for the things he did to you… and others. I just wanted to tell you that it was not entirely his fault.”

  I disagree. I want to tell her that we all have choices, and that Hunter could have chosen to be a different man, but he didn’t. Of course, I don’t tell her that. The woman is already wrestling with her own pain.

  “Thank you for speaking to me,” I s
ay to her. The things she told me make me very uncomfortable, but at the same time, they’re pieces of the puzzle that had been missing. Maybe now my mind will stop searching for answers and I can finally move on with my life.

  “I need to eat lunch now.” A smile touches her wrinkled face. “We’re having chocolate pudding today.”

  I smile back in spite of myself. “That’s all right, we have to leave anyway.”

  Back inside the car, I turn to Jacob. He’s just as shocked as I am by what Maribel said.

  “It’s amazing how our parents can mess us up,” he says.

  “Yeah.” I fold my arms across my chest, feeling suddenly cold even in summer. “You know what? I think I’ve heard enough. I want to move on from Hunter and everything that reminds me of him.” I touch Jacob’s cheek. “Thank you for coming with me. Thank you for being by my side while I was healing. Thank you for your patience. Thank you for everything.”

  “You never need to thank me.” He gives me one of his crooked smiles. “Having you in my life is thanks enough. I want more, but I understand why you want to take it slow.”

  “Jacob, I don’t know if I can ever promise you or anyone forever. All I know is that I love having you in my life. And I want to wake up to your face every morning.”

  “What are you saying?” He frowns.

  “Remember when you asked me to move in with you last year?”

  “Yes. And I still do want you to move in with me, but only when you’re ready. We don’t have to get married to prove our love for each other.”

  “Well, in that case, I’m ready for the next tiny step. Let’s get a place together. Let’s leave the past behind.”

  And that’s exactly what we do. This time, I don’t regret a thing.

  THE END

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