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I gently sat on the bed and flipped to the back of the brochure, glancing through pages of flowers.
Roses might be nice, I thought to myself. They were my favorite.
Remi remembered that.
Black ink sat between pretty petals on the page.
I’m guessing you remember the notes I used to leave for you. Maybe the flowers, too. The only flowers this time are the ones printed on the pages, but I wanted you to know how much I miss you.
- Remi.
Chapter 76
Catharina
“Hey, look who’s out of the bedroom!” Woodrow was the first to greet me with his signature smile, all perfect teeth and twinkling eyes. “Sick of sharing your bed with the cats?”
He sat on the sofa, Jolie and Dec on each side of him. Ollie had left my room not long ago, making sure the cats left before he stripped my bed for the fourth time this week. He sat on the giant chair. I sat on the sofa, pulling down a cotton nightdress I hated and struggling to make myself comfortable. Dragging himself up from the chair, Ollie helped me to prop cushions before sitting on the floor at my feet.
“No. They’ve vacated. They’re actually on your bed now,” I answered with a forced smile.
I didn’t feel like smiling. I’d lost everything, and it was so much easier to deal with when I didn’t remember any of it.
Knowing I’d never see Rhylie again was hard, but this family had become my own, each acting as part of my support system. Ollie did most of the heavy lifting. He was the strongest, emotionally and physically.
In the last month, so much had come out in the open. Ollie and Remi’s roles within trafficking, as well as Dec’s, too. I knew it all. No secrets, no lies. I hated all three of them for it for the first three weeks.
Oops, there was a lie. Because I never hated Remi.
I’d tried to hate him like many times before. And, like many times before, I failed, seeing his smile in my head, or I’d dream of how he’d held me each night when we first reunited after my current bucket-load of pills knocked me out for the night.
But each day, I’d learn a little more about why they did what they did. I learned about Remi having to choose between inking someone for sale and being brutally murdered, unable to find me, and about Ollie, sneakily working his way to the top because others in his position wouldn’t hunt down and find so many of the girls they brought in. His role was awful. The nightmares and the grief he spoke of were awful, and it became unbearable to hear the pain in his voice when he told me the whole story. Of his girl and how she went missing, of all the women they’d managed to track down, the men, too, most of whom went on to be thriving survivors following their time at Beyond Heaven.
Dec hardly worked with them these days—not wanting to pursue a career in bending the law to get off bad guys. He’d failed the last two cases, Remi aside, intentionally, and put bad guys behind bars. He hadn’t been asked for much legal advice since. He was happy with that outcome. He preferred computers and was currently managing a fan page for Remi, which Remi probably knew nothing about. However, his love for technology benefited Ollie for whenever he needed him to hack someone’s computer. Which only seemed to happen when Remi had been on a rampage.
Avenging me. Retaliating for Rhylie. For a young boy too weak to fight for himself.
It all made me love him more.
And if I could love him, it was stupid to hate Dec and Ollie when they were only in their roles to bring the entire empire down.
“How are you feeling?” Ollie asked, gazing up at me.
“Vicious.”
He laughed. “Not the answer I was expecting. Do you need to talk?”
“Is it about Rhylie?” Jolie questioned her hand on my leg. “Anger in grief is normal.”
Admiring her pretty hair, covering half of her pretty face as she moved closer, I answered, “I’m not angry at her.”
“Then why are you angry?” Dec wondered.
The whole family moved closer. Even Gabriel came pounding down the hall, head bumping Woodrow’s leg so he’d pick him up and smooth his naked skin.
“I’m angry with Remi. Why isn’t he here? I mean, why do I even care that he makes no effort with his recovering wife? He’s proven he doesn’t.” I tucked my legs beneath me and pulled a throw from the back of the sofa to keep warm.
“Cat, he does care,” Woodrow answered, his hand still on Gabriel, who playfully chewed his finger.
