Page 80 of Please Save Me

Something that made me seem more scary and less sympathetic. But, deep down, I wasn’t a frightening person, just a broken one.

“Can you keep a secret?” I laughed the second I realized how dumb that sounded. “Of course you can, you’ve had a secret identity almost as long as I’ve been alive.”

He smirked at my joke before leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees. Cameron’s eyes were eerily serious, but his face was judgment-free.

“You ain’t gotta tell me if you don’t want to. I’m just curious.”

Cameron Cole wasn’tcurious; he was nosy. Usually, that was a reason not to talk to someone… but I also didn’t really have anyone else I could talk to about this stuff. Not without going to prison anyway.

“You know I killed Mason’s mom, right?”

He looked away and rubbed the back of his neck. “I uh… yeah, that ain’t something you forget.”

“Would you like to know why I killed her?”

His hesitation was to be expected. But, after a moment, he nodded.

I took a deep breath to harden my nerves as I closed my eyes, preparing to relive some of the most stressful days in my life.

“At the beginning of my Ph.D program, I was a detective…. Well, I’m still a detective, I just… didn’t,you know.”

“Kill people?”

I never thought I’d see the day when Cameron finished my sentences, but I was almostgladhe did.

“That… and I was stationed back in Portland while I worked on breaking down a sex trafficking ring.”

Saving people used to be mypassion. I wanted to work on kidnapping cases and return the victims to their families. And while I wasn’t with that sector of law enforcement for long, liberating sex trafficking victims was easily the most rewarding part of my career. I liked feeling like a hero; like I made a difference, like the work I did mattered.

“And… I had caught wind that one of the ones in the area would target certain people if the money was right.” A chill ran down my spine as I thought about that.

“What’s that got to do with you killing Mason’s mom?” Cameron was beautifully oblivious to the connection, dumb to the fact that a parent could be as cruel as Holly Albright.

“Holly had money and a hatred of her daughter.”

Okay, so maybe hatred was a strong word. It was more envy on Holly’s end. Mason was beautiful, loved, and kind, all the things Holly hadn’t been foryears. Her modeling career ended when Mason was born, and Holly blamed her daughter for that fact.

The disgusting puzzle pieces seemed to click as Cameron’s jaw dropped.

“You ain’t saying what I think you are…right?” he stammered.

But I couldn't lie to him, not right now. “Holly paid close to fifty thousand dollars to have someone abduct Mason. So, I did what anyone in my situation would do–”

“And killed her?” he blurted.

My gaze narrowed. “No?”

God, why was everything murder with this one?

“I went to talk to her, to ask her to rescind her request, but… things went south.”

When I confronted Holly, I didn’t expect things to go well. I expected her to argue with me, and for me to threaten to arrest her. What I didn’t expect was for Holly to threaten my life.

“She pulled out a gun and pointed it at my head.” I shuttered as I closed my eyes. If I thought hard enough, I could still feel the barrel pressed between my eyebrows.

My bottom lip quivered and suddenly, breathing became a foreign concept. I pressed the mouthpiece of my vape between my lips and drew in another breath, using the cannabis to help quell memories that wouldn’t quite leave me alone. Still, even THC wasn’t enough to make me forget.

“I didn’t want to kill her.” My voice cracked, and my cheeks suddenly felt wet. “I was sixteen, and all I knew was I didn’t want to die.”

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