Page 52 of Behind the Scenes

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“Joseph and Mary Hartford…” I mumbled. The names were familiar. Eerily so. I knew them… But how?

I racked my brain trying to figure out where I had heard of them before, but nothing was coming up.

“The Hartfords… Weren’t those the ones…Oh.”

The memories hit me like a ton of bricks. It had been so long.More than a decade. But I remembered. The whole country knew them.

“The doomsday cult,” I whispered.

“Right,” Penelope confirmed. “The ones who mysteriously killed themselves and left their child behind. They found her covered in her own blood. She was alone in the house for a whole week before anyone knew what happened. It wasHarley, Laura. She was thirteen. She had been chained to the bed after some fucked-up ritual, and her parents drank some weird-ass poison to?—”

“Enough,” I said, far more harshly than I intended.

My gaze shifted back to Harley, who was still peacefully sleeping in the bed.

I had seen the pictures. I had read the news articles. Because she was a minor, they had done pretty well at not disclosing her identity. There was no photo of her in the press. Everyone knew of her, but no one knew who she was.

My stomach dropped when I remembered the details of the case. I remembered my parents talking about it and watching it on TV. I remembered just how dark the lives of her parents had been.

How horrible her life must have been.

As someone without the instinct to kill—well, at least by my own hands—I couldn’t fully understand Harley or why she did what she did. But knowing what happened to her, I was able to see where the need came from.

“Just…” Ana let out a sigh. “There were rumors back in the day, once the investigation ran deeper, that she was the one who killed them. It was obviously never proven, but I just want you to be careful.”

I knew the rumors. I remembered the media going frompoor kidtopossibly murderous kidas if her parents had been saints or something.

And the more I knew Harley, the more I could see what had really happened. The more Ipitiedher.

It just made our whole situation even more unbelievable. Hereshe was, the big bad wolf, falling asleep and totally vulnerable. I could do anything to her. Kill her even. And yet…

That poor child.

My body felt heavy, and all the energy was sucked right out of me.

“I am being careful,” I said quickly. “Don’t speak of this to anyone.”

She paused for a moment before speaking. “Okay.”

I didn’t have the energy for more, so I hung up. I stayed out on the balcony for a couple of minutes, trying to come to terms with all of it, before I slipped back inside the room and all but collapsed on the bed.

Right next to the crazy murderer.

The one I was unfathomably starting to feel a bit for.

And when the sound of the pillows hitting the floor roused me from sleep and I felt her arm come up around me, I simply nestled in.

I reached behind me in bed to confirm it.

Harley’s arms were no longer around me, but the warmth of her embrace still lingered.

I was comfortable. Far too comfortable to care about anything else. My head felt heavy, and so did my body. I couldn’t move even if I wanted to.

My mind was telling me to wake up. To remember the conversation I had last night. I knew I needed to say something. Or do something. But I couldn’t tell what that was.

All the stress and tiredness from the last few days had decided to hit me all at once.

I had work to do. I had emails to read. There was a trial coming up as soon as I came back from the island. I had so many things to do, and all of them were currently swimming around in my head, desperately trying to get me up.