“No. It wasn’t a dream.” He studies me for a minute.

“Okay, listen, I’ll call Ryan and have him be on standby.” There is a knock at the door, and I can hear Grace outside. “I’ll explain to Mason what is going on.”

The entire time he is gone I’m uneasy. Was it really all a dream? It felt so real. It seems like forever until Jake comes back from answering the door. “Okay, listen, Mason and Grace are gone. Ryan is on his way; he is going to park down the block and then wait in here with us. If what you said really happens we are going to get him, okay?” I feel like he is a little reluctant to believe me, like he may just be pacifying me.

I wrap my arms around him still in shock that I didn’t lose him. When the EMTs said he was gone it felt like my heart had been ripped in a million pieces. I couldn’t breathe. I kiss him again needing to convince myself that he is real.

His eyes lock with mine. “Hey, I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

“I need to know what happened to my sister, Jake.” If what I heard from Camden in the dream was true, then there is so much more to the story. I need to know what happened to her. Maybe it's why I’ve never been at peace. Maybe it’s subconsciously why I couldn’t move on. “I’m scared that something will go wrong.”

“I promise you that if that fucker comes in this house he will not touch a hair on your head. I will break his fucking hand if he tries to.” He pulls me closer to him so that I’m flush against his chest.

The front door opens, and Ryan walks in. Even with the skeptical look on his face, Ryan begins to speak. “Okay, Jake, you and I are going to wait on the steps. If he is coming, he will more than likely at least look in a window and make sure she’s alone. Nina put the TV on and do whatever you were doing in your dream.” I nod. I hope he believes me and he doesn’t think I’m psycho. I didn’t hear what Jake told him on the phone. They could both think I’ve had a mental breakdown. They wait on the steps, and I move into the kitchen as I would have. “Nina. You cannot leave this room.”

I look back at Ryan. “Okay, before I was in the kitchen.”

I mess around with things pretending as if I’m organizing papers, and that’s when I hear it. A door. I look up to see Camden about to hit me over the head when I scream and am pulled backward.

Jake is holding me behind him. I’m clinging to the back of his shirt. My heart is beating so loudly I wouldn’t be surprised if he could hear it. “Don’t you fucking touch her.”

“Put the gun down!” Ryan is screaming at him, as he reaches for his walkie with one hand while still keeping the gun trained on Camden. He calls for back-up. We did it. We stopped him, Car.

“Carly! Come with me!” Camden screams at me. “Where is my daughter, Carly?”

“What did you do to her?” I scream. I need to know what happened.

He looks at me and laughs. “Nothing that wasn’t deserved.” His voice comes out in almost a growl.

“You bastard! How could you hurt her?” Tears start to fall and his face twists in anger as he looks at me.

“God, all you did was fucking cry. It’s not my fault you weren’t in the mood. But I could see it in your eyes. Your good girl act wasn’t fooling anyone. You wanted it, and you wanted it hard, so I gave it to you. Then all of a sudden you wanted to tell someone, but I knew if you did, our love would be over, and I couldn’t have that. You knew what was good for you and didn’t say a fucking word. Those were the best four months of my life until you started getting sick all the damn time. You took her away from me. Our blessing, my baby! You killed her, you fucking whore!” No. That’s the doctor she was seeing? An abortion doctor? “You deserved to die that night, you bitch, and I thought I did it. Then I see you walking around town with my kid and this asshole!”

Oh my God. He did kill her. I start to cry for my sister. For all that she went through. Why didn’t you come to me? I could have helped you.

Suddenly everything goes to shit quickly. Camden lunges for us and I hear two shots ring out. He and Ryan both fall to the floor.

“No!” Jake kicks the gun away from Camden’s reach and then rushes to Ryan’s side. I can hear sirens approaching.

Please don’t let this be like my dream. I’m frozen in place. That’s when I see him getting up.

Camden. The bastard that killed my sister.

I don’t even think, I just move I grab Ryan’s gun by my feet, aim, and fire it right at the asshole. Jake jumps at the sound and Camden falls to the floor. Jake looks over at me, before returning his focus to Ryan.

The EMTs come rushing into the house and head straight for Ryan. Jake stands up and walks over to me taking the gun from my hand and placing it on the table beside me. “Hey, are you okay?”

I nod unable to take my eyes off of Ryan. They lift him onto the gurney as another group of medics come in and attend to Camden. “Is he going to be okay?” They don’t answer me, they simply rush him out the door.

Jake takes out his phone and calls Brian telling him to call everyone else and meet him at the hospital. I hear Camden coughing and am disappointed that the fucker is still alive. They take him out and leave Jake and me by ourselves. “Do you want to come to the hospital?”

I nod. Ryan got hurt because of me. Two detectives walk through the door. “I need to get your statements. What happened here?”

“Listen, Ryan’s our friend and was just shot. I need to go to the hospital to make sure he’s okay. Can this be done there?” Jake’s tone is rushed as if he already has one foot out the door.

“That’s fine. We’ll follow you.”

Jake grabs my hand, and we head to the car. On the way to the hospital, we don’t speak much. I don’t know what to say. I feel horrible that Ryan is hurt because of me. I’m reeling from Camden’s confession about Carly. And I just want him to say something. To give me some sort of assurance. I guess that’s selfish of me, though. I’m asking him to comfort me when his friend is in the hospital, and we don’t know what is going on.

When we get there, everyone else has already beaten us. They are all in the waiting room, along with a half dozen of officers. I guess word got out about Ryan.

I say a silent prayer to Carly to keep him safe like she did for me.

Chapter Twenty Eight

Nina

One week later

As I stand at my stepbrother’s grave, I don’t know what to feel. I hate him for what he did, for my sister’s pain. He was coherent enough when the cops questioned him to tell them everything. He had been raping Carly for months. Hitting her and threatening to do worse if she talked to anyone. That was why she was so depressed. He found out she was pregnant when he came upon the test in the trash. When he followed her that day and found out what she had done, he snapped. He put her entire bottle of pills in the food processor and forced them down her throat. A couple days after his confession, he began hemorrhaging in the middle of the night and passed away before the doctors could save him.

Hearing the details from the detective made me physically sick. My sister was an amazing person and he stole her innocence and then her life. I will never forgive him for what he did to her. I’ve started to work on forgiving myself with Jake’s help. I will never get over the fact that I might have been able to do more, but I am learning that even if I did force her to tell me, I might not have been able to stop Camden. Not only that, but he might have taken my life so I couldn’t tell the story. I hope that she is at peace now, and he is rotting in hell like he deserves.

“I will not visit you again. You are the devil. We trusted you. We welcomed you into our house. You deserve no better than to be here. My sister could have been something amazing, she would have been, but you took that chance from her.” I have so much more I want to say to him, but all it would be are ugly hateful words. While he deserves every one of them, I refuse to let him impact my life, or feelings any more than he already has. I feel a hand on my back and turn to face Jake. “Let’s get away from here.”