Page 61 of Vintage

“I had to do it,” Ace whispered, his voice cracking. “I couldn’t let him go. Not after everything he did.”

I took a step toward him, my breath shallow. “Who? Amir?”

“No…” His voice faltered. “Tyson. He never stopped hurting me. He was always there, always in my head, even after he was gone. And when I saw Amir, when I saw his face… it broke me all over again. I had to make him pay.”

His words were twisted, painful. But the worst part? I understood. I understood the desperation, the feeling of wanting revenge, of wanting to make someone else feel the pain that had consumed you. But what Ace had done was monstrous. He had created a nightmare for Amir, for everyone around him.

“And your father?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. “He was in on it, wasn’t he? He never let you go. He helped you keep this… this lie alive.”

Ace’s eyes widened, and for a moment, I saw a flash of something—something darker, something broken.

“My father... after Willow died… he went mad. He couldn’t let her go either. He made me promise to keep her alive in whatever way I could. So, I did. I became her. I became Willow.”

The words hung in the air like a death sentence, a twisted confession of the insanity that had consumed him. He had been living a lie for so long, had built his entire existence around the death of his sister, around revenge, around a madness that had taken him far beyond the point of no return.

“Everything you’ve done… it’s been for nothing,” I said softly, my voice heavy with sorrow. “None of this was real. The curse, the hauntings… it was all you. All of it. You’re the one who’s haunted this place.”

Ace’s face contorted with pain, and for the first time, I saw the full extent of his brokenness. “I couldn’t let her go,” he whispered, his voice filled with desperation. “I couldn’t let anyone forget.”

I took a step back, the weight of his words sinking in. The truth had come too late. It was over. But the damage had already been done.

Amir has suffered for something he never did.

Ace’s father took the fall for him. The culprit was punished.

The silence stretched out between us like a heavy fog, thick with the weight of everything Ace had just revealed. His words hung in the air, a chilling truth that twisted my stomach into knots. I stared at him, not knowing how to respond, not knowing how to process what he had just confessed.

For so long, I had wondered what had been happening in this house, why the ghosts and the hauntings felt so real, why the curse seemed to wraparound us like an invisible chain. But now I understood—it wasn’t ghosts that haunted this mansion or Willow Crest. It was Ace.

He stood there, trembling, his eyes wide and frantic, as though the truth had finally overwhelmed him. There was something tragic in his expression, something fragile. And yet, under all of that, there was a dangerous kind of clarity.

“I didn’t want to hurt anyone,” he whispered, his voice shaking. “I just… I just wanted to make it stop. I wanted to make the pain go away.” His hands clenched into fists at his sides, as if trying to hold back the fury of years of torment. "But I couldn’t. I couldn’t stop it. Not from the moment I saw Amir. He looked just likehim,and it was like everything started again. Tyson. The bullying. The pain. The rage." His voice cracked. "I couldn’t breathe without wanting revenge.”

I felt a pang of sympathy, he looked just like willow despite his brown eyes, but it quickly turned to horror. He was an image of the pain that me, and my husband suffered. He wasn’t just blaming Amir, not just blaming Tyson anymore. He was blaming himself, too.

“You’re lost, Ace,” I said softly, the words catching in my throat. I had no idea how to reach him now. The man who stood before me had fractured so deeply, so completely, that I wasn’t sure there was anyone left to save.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered again, his eyes vacant as if pleading for something, anything, to make sense of the chaos he’d created.

But I didn’t know how to fix him, and I didn’t think he knew how to fix himself either. He had become a puppet of his past, trapped by the shadow of his own grief and rage. His trauma had driven him to destroy everything around him, and now, standing here in the ruins of his own madness, I wasn’t sure there was any way out.

“You don’t have to do this,” I said, trying one last time to reach him for the sake of his dead sister who begged to be forgiven. “You don’t have to hurt Amir. You don’t have to live this lie anymore.”

His eyes snapped to mine, and for a fleeting moment, I saw a glimmer of the Ace I read in the diary, the little boy—the boy who had once been so full of promise, of life. But it was quickly replaced by something darker, something twisted by years of pain and deceit.

“Ihaveto,” he said, his voice low, almost pleading. “You don’t understand. I can’t let it go. I can’t let her go.”

I took a step forward, feeling the conversation and perspective was manifested between us into a physical wall. "Willow’s gone, Ace. You need to let her rest. You need to let yourself rest."

The words felt futile, like I was trying to force water into a cracked vessel. Ace had been drowning for so long that even when he had the chance to surface, he couldn't take the breath he needed.

Then, unexpectedly, he took a step back, his face twisting into something almost unrecognizable. A sudden wild look came into his eyes—something violent, desperate. "No," he said through clenched teeth. "You don’t get it. No oneeverget it."

Both of us froze, hearing crunch of leaf just behind me. I frantically moved to watch the person and then his face emerged. Darius was red in anger, his eye fixed on Ace.

Both the men looked at each other, but then Ace took another step back.

I froze as he turned away, the desperation crackling in the air like static. “Ace… please,” I said, my voice shaky now. The fear I had been suppressing crept up my spine. This wasn’t just about Amir anymore. It was about everything Ace had buried beneath the weight of his trauma, everything he had tried—and failed—to suppress. He was no longer just a victim of his past. He was now a man willing to destroy anything that stood in the way of his twisted version of justice.