Page 40 of Protect

She pushes at my hand on the back of her head, obviously willing to let me rip her hair out, but shoves and pushes at me until I let go. Rolling over, she crawls back to the skeleton and gently touches the skull.

It looks so white against Hope’s dirt-stained fingers. Her hand shakes and she gasps between her sobs. “Safe now. You’re… safe now.”

“Fuck, this is… it’s too…” Jaxon can’t. He looks from Hope to her mother’s unmarked grave again and again, tears clouding his eyes as his hands tremble at his sides.

He can’t process it and Dimitri remains frozen.

Hope’s dealing with the worst of this, but knowing a murderer, having trusted a murderer, backed a murderer, seeing Hope like this, learning so much about Coach, seeing the evidence ofexactly how terrible he was, isn’t something any of us can shake off.

Jax is furious, that’s obvious. He’s choking on his words, restless, obviously plotting something, Dimitri is in shock. If I take even a second to focus on myself, I’ll implode. And Hope… Hope stroking her mom’s skull like it will help her, like it will comfort a long-dead woman is really fucking close to ruining me.

“Hope, it’s time to walk away. You don’t have to see this—”

“Death is safe,” she whispers.

Fifteen

HOPE

Death is safe.

That’s all I can focus on. I know how hellish it was living with Dad. Before he was hurting me, he was hurting Mom.Their screaming matches weren’t a secret from me. Hearing her go quiet, the nights she’d tell me to put on headphones, the sad smile she’d give me when I’d spend the night at a friend’s house… she never let me know how bad it really was.

She never let me know what a monster he was. She wouldn’t leave me alone with him in the house. She was so protective. She always did what he said if I was in the room.

She constantly lost.

She welcomed his punishments and the pain.

All to protect me.

She died—he killed her, but she is safe now.

I wonder if her last moments were terrible, thinking about the pain, what she’d miss, what she’d never get to experience, worrying about me… or if she felt good. If she knew he’d never hurt her again. If she welcomed the peace of nothingness, knowing she’d never feel his touch or the agony he’d bring her again.

She finally got to rest. She got peace. She was safe and away from him.

Mom was in our favorite place.

“You’re safe,” I whisper. “Death is safe.”

I want her to hear me. I want her to know it’s okay. I want her to know that she fought hard enough. That she did enough. That she wouldn’t have been able to stop what he did. Mostly, I hope that if there was any kind of life after death, that she never looked at me. I need to know that she didn’t see a thing, that she just got to rest.

“Hope, please stop saying that,” Knox whispers.

I look at him, at Dimitri, at Jaxon. They’re all upset. They didn’t know. Now there’s no denying how terrible my dad is. No one will save him. He’s useless. A waste of breath. A problem that can be crushed as easily as a cockroach. No one will miss him.

I turn my mom’s skull and notice a scrape on her lower jaw. I touch it and grit my teeth. He stabbed her. He stabbed her more than once too. I’m sure of it. He wanted to get his hands dirty. He wanted her to know that he was in control of her life and death.

Slowly, I stand.

He’s going to know what it feels like.

“Hope!” Dimitri yells.

It doesn’t matter that everything is blurry. It doesn’t matter that there are plants whipping at my hands and face. I’m done living in fear. I won’t let my mom die for nothing. I’m going to kill the monster that ripped her apart and if that means doing it with my bare hands, I will. No hesitation. No mercy. The same kind of treatment he’s given me my entire life.

I race through the cabin and don’t stop until I’m standing in front of my father. He’s asleep.

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