Total pages in book: 185
Estimated words: 180510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 903(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 602(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 180510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 903(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 602(@300wpm)
That’s all I remember because I’m so very tired. Everything goes dark behind my eyelids. Quiet. Peaceful. And then …
I hear a voice.
“Little girls. Little girls everywhere. Oh … what’s that? You lost your hair? Well, that’s what you get for being better than your brother. That’s what you get for making him look bad. Just ask sweet little Beth with her strawberry locks … oh … that’s right. She’s dead.”
“NOOOOO! I KILLED HER. I KILLEDHER. IKILLEDHER!” I jackknife to sitting.
“Daddy …” Reagan’s voice. She’s crying. “W-what’s wrong with J-josie?”
“Shh … I’ve got you,” his voice fades, and the door shuts.
Her cries muffle. His footsteps fade. The door to her room clicks shut. And I’m alone with a cold sweat along my brow, a pounding heart, and the realization that I, Winston Jeffries, killed my sister Bethany. I poisoned her. I shaved her head. And I buried her body in a cemetery. Then I cried. I grieved. I did all the things my parents expected me to do while everyone searched for her. They searched for her until my mom took her own life with the same straight blade she used to shave my head. Then my dad drank himself into a coma every evening, waking up in the middle of the night to puke and do things to me that no dad should do to his son. I can smell the mix of putrid stomach contents laced with alcohol.
I can smell it from over a century ago. And that is why … Josephine Watts has never consumed a drop of alcohol.
Puzzles start out slow, but as more pieces are found, it comes together faster and faster. This puzzle is coming together in bigger chunks. Not a piece at a time anymore. Ten pieces. Twenty pieces. And the picture it’s creating just keeps getting more unbearable.
Throwing off the covers, I find my feet under shaky legs. When my heart starts to slow, I can hear Reagan’s soft sobs. How does a five-year-old, who was once afraid of the boogieman, process someone leaping out of their sleep and screaming, “I KILLED HER!”
Dizzy with the faint residual echo of his voice in my head, I ease open the bedroom door and navigate the stairs by gripping the railing to steady my swaying gait.
I shove my feet into my sneakers at the entry and stumble into the cold December air, light flurries peppering the night skies, blurring my vision, and making me even more dizzy while my faltering steps take me toward the street.
“Josie!”
I walk down the middle of the street.
“JOSIE!”
I mentally go through my own autopsy. Blunt force trauma.
When people get hit by cars, it shatters their skeletons and their organs rupture. It can be unsightly. And it’s usually not autopsied. But sometimes bodies are found after a hit and run, and we have to determine if a vehicle ran over a dead body or if it was the cause of death.
“STOP!” Colten wraps his arms around my whole body, like he could tackle me to the ground, only we don’t fall. He drags me to the sidewalk as a horn screeches in our ears and taillights beam bright red in the distance a few seconds later.
He scoops me up in his arms like a child and carries me to the house.
“You have to stop saving me,” I whisper.
When he gets me back into bed, Reagan comes into the room and crawls in next to me under the covers. “I have bad dreams too,” she whispers. “Daddy will keep you safe. He keeps me safe.”
Colten shuts off the light and slides in next to me so that I’m sandwiched between them. His arms snake around my waist, and his lips press to my ear while he whispers, “I’ll stop saving you when you stop trying to die. But I’ll never stop loving you, needing you, so tough luck, Mr. Duck.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“This isn’t your regular time,” Dr. Byrd says, when I have a seat by the window, this time opting for the rocking chair. He has a solid mix of seating choices.
“I lost my job, so my schedule suddenly opened up. And since I’ve been entertaining the idea of suicide, I thought a quick check-in might be a good idea. You know … before I check out.”
He eyes me without sharing my jovial sense of humor, probably because it’s hard to figure out where the humor lies in my current situation.
“How often are you having these thoughts?”
“Daily.”
“These thoughts … how intense are they … on a scale of one to ten?”
“Eight. Nine must be actively acquiring a weapon, drugs, rope, or unfastening my seat belt while approaching a tree at ninety miles per hour. Correct? And ten means dead or a failed attempt? Eight. I’m going with eight.”
“How serious are you about following through?”