“Come back to me . . .
even as a ghost, even as a shadow,
a raven at my door, a scar upon my body—
for it is in my trembling, shrinking heart, I hold the things we thought we lost.”
—Segovia Amil
Soft music filters through the basement hallway. I pace forward, fists clenching at the old, familiar tune. When I enter Room Three, lights blind my eyes.
“Fucking shit.”
I stop in the threshold, holding my forearm over my brows. My muscles tighten, a low thrum stirring in my ears and blending with a song from my past. Unless the sun is down, I’ve hardly set foot outside over the past decade, never mind a fully lit room.
I can’t stand the way it fucks with my head.
“Come, Lucas. Step into our blast from the past.”
“Turn those fucking lights off,” I growl, a mild sweat working beneath my skin.
A second later, the room dims, and I drop my arm.
What the hell is this?
A body is chained to the column, the head hanging low, but it’s the crates in front of it I can’t figure out. I step closer, squinting at the blond-haired girl I faintly recognize, her cheeks wet, her trembling fingers curled around the crate’s bars. When my gaze flicks to the crate beside hers, my chest hammers so hard it’s about to tear through my fucking skin.
Emmy sits curled in a ball. Her arms are tied behind her back, and her head is bent toward her knees. She rocks back and forth, her soft humming in sync with the song.
A snarl rips through me as I lunge forward and yank on the door, but an all-too-familiar padlock keeps it from budging. My grip tightens around the door, and her faint floral scent hits my nostrils. The smell makes me freeze. I watch her slow movements, forward and back, her long hair blanketing most of her body, and for a second I can’t breathe. Her humming seeps into my ears and sits heavily in my chest. I grit my jaw, try to turn away, but my neck is too stiff.
It can’t be her.
It’s not her.
I killed her.
“Ask her sister.” Raife’s words are low and taunting.
I’m playing right into his slimy hands, but I glance at the crate beside her anyway. The blonde widens her eyes as she stares from me to Raife.
“Go on,” Raife tells her. “Tell him who your sister really is.”
“Raife. Shut your fucking mouth.” The room goes quiet, nothing but Emmy’s humming and the song playing on a loop. “Frankie. Explain.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know—I don’t know everything—”
“Start with what you do know. Don’t cut any corners.”
A lump passes through her throat. She flicks her eyes to Emmy then back to me. Her gaze slides down to my clenched fist around the crate.
“Okay,” she whispers. “Okay.”
I nod, my jaw ticking harder with every second she’s not talking.
“I was ten when Emmy showed up. I don’t know, I didn’t understand it. She didn’t have a name, but the men who brought her to us said she was Mama’s niece.”
“What men?”
Her eyes water. “I told you, I don’t know. I swear. They were dressed nice, real professionals. They helped her get some papers, and the next thing I knew she was a part of our family. Mama wouldn’t talk to me about it, and Emmy wouldn’t talk at all, but my neighbor Betsy told me Mama had a sister once. I never knew about her. She said Mama’s sister was adopted, and that she was something evil. No one spoke of her.”
An irritated grumble rises up my throat. “What happened to Emmy?”
“Well . . .” She swallows, glances down at the floor. “Mama said . . . she said Emmy needed to be cleansed of her past, and of her own Mama. After the priest came, she told Emmy stories all about her life now, telling her this is the only life she’s ever had. She tried to get Emmy to repeat her new name back to her, to tell her she understood that I’m her sister and she’s her mama, but Emmy—she wouldn’t say a word.”
My gaze slides back to the crate in front of me, and my stomach twists. She wouldn’t say a word.
“So”—Frankie closes her eyes and takes a deep breath—“so Mama locked her in the doghouse and repeated over and over again who the Lord is, who Mama is, who I am, who she is—Emmy May Highland from Presley, Mississippi—until Emmy finally echoed it back at her.”
“How long was that?” My voice is low, fury gripping my lungs. When Frankie doesn’t answer, I snap, “HOW LONG?”
“F-forty-two d-days,” she whimpers through sobs. Her body shakes, and she wraps her arms around her chest. “It took forty-two days for her to believe it. I-I snuck out to lie with her every night. I begged her to just say it. Say what Mama wanted. I d-didn’t know what to do. But I swore. I swore from then on I would always be there for her. I would be her sister. I would be the best sister she ever had.”
My eyes shut as the fire in my lungs reaches my throat.
“I love her. I really do love her like my sister,” Frankie whispers. Her words only irritate the flames. “I even tried to love her art. I knew it was important. She had to get it out. But sometimes . . . sometimes I could hardly look at it, and I worried she saw right through me. Eventually the guilt—it just ate at me more and more every day. I had to get away. From Mama, from everything. I always had to get away.” She pauses, thank fuck, then looks around the room and mutters, “A-and now look what I’ve done.”
I slip my fingers through Emmy’s crate, stroking the soft strands of her hair and rubbing them between the rough pads of my fingers. She won’t stop rocking. Singing. Shaking.
Sofia.
Emmy.
Whoever she is.
Somewhere along the way, she weaved herself so deeply into my veins I can’t fucking inhale without her breathing life into me. When she first arrived, I wanted to get under her skin. I wanted to see if I could break her without even touching her.
But, fuck.
I had no idea I’d already broken her.