“I’m Aislin.”

I stand there frozen, in shock, and stare down at the girl in my arms clutching my shirt, desperately wanting to believe the words she just spoke but not daring to. It will destroy me if they aren’t true. It’ll shatter the little bit of sanity I have left and will leave me in pieces. Pieces I know with every part of me will never be put back together. After all these years of searching for her; all the sweat, blood, tears, and broken relationships; the time, effort, frustration, and hopelessness. For her to be standing in front of me right now… It can’t be true. It can’t, but I’ve never wanted anything more in my life.

“No!” I snarl and watch her flinch. I want to feel bad, and a part of me does, but what she’s saying is incomprehensible. How could she be so cruel? What gives her the right to think she can give me the one thing I want most in the world, only to snatch it away when the truth comes out?

“I remember,” she rasps. “I remember you. The treehouse. The drawing you made me for my birthday. You saving me from the bullies.” She looks down at the bracelet then at the one on my wrist, before lifting her eyes back to me. “The bracelet I gave you that last Christmas.” Her eyes turn frightful, and her voice trembles when she continues. “I remember the bus not coming. I remember being taken.” Her eyes fill with tears. “Please, Niko. Please believe me.”

My heart stops as her words hit me. My eyes take her in. Blood drips from the corner of her mouth and purple is starting to form above her eye. It sends my blood boiling. The scars on her forehead and cheeks have my vision going red, knowing the guy on the floor writhing in pain and is currently being handcuffed is the cause behind them. I force myself to look past her injuries.

Green eyes stare up at me. Bright green, the same green I looked at so many times when I was a child. My chest tightens.

High eyebrow arches. Even as a child, my mother used to say she had beautifully arched eyebrows. My breath gets stuck in my throat.

Brown hair. It’s different than it was before, darker, but looking closer, I see the same natural golden highlights. My vision blurs, and my hands grip the girl in my arms tighter.

My eyes move to the hair hanging over her shoulder. I want to push it aside, but I’m scared. I’m terrified it’ll reveal the truth. A truth that will set me free and a truth that will break me.

“Niko,” she whispers, the sound coming out hoarse and broken.

I want to say her name. I want to breathe it and watch her eyes as I do so. I want to shout it to the sky and demand how God could be so cruel.

Can it be true? Can everything I’ve done for the past fifteen years of my life all come down to this? To be centered around this one girl? A girl I’ve known for all of a few weeks? To have her in my clasp and not realize who she is?

Tears gather in my eyes, and I don’t have the willpower to push them away.

“A-Aislin?” I croak out.

“I remember, Niko. I remember,” she says raggedly, her eyes wide as if she’s having a hard time believing it herself.

My knees become too weak to hold me up, and I drag her down with me to the floor. Aislin… I drag Aislin down with me. My ass hits the ground, but I make sure she’s not jarred by the impact. I sit with my legs spread wide, knees bent, with Aislin on her knees between them. She still looks uncertain.

My hand shakes, and she watches me as I reach out slowly. My fingers touch her hair, and it feels so soft. My gaze locks on her left ear, and I swallow thickly when I push her hair back. Without asking, she tilts her head to the side, knowing what I’m looking for. It takes me a minute to gather the courage to lean forward. When I do, every single ounce of air in my lungs whoosh out in a painful rush at the birthmark I see. My finger gently rubs across the raised star.

My eyes fly back to hers. “How is this possible?”

More tears leak from her eyes, and she says. “I don’t know.”

Not able to hold back any longer, and praying so fucking much she doesn’t pull away from me, I yank her into my arms. Her body stiffens slightly but then relaxes. I know she’s been through a lot, and even though she’s Aislin and she knows me better than anyone, her abhorrence to touch hasn’t changed, I’m sure. But I can’t not hold her right now. I need it more than I need my next breath. To have her here, my arms wrapped around her and feel her heart beat against my own, is more than I ever thought was possible. She was dead, gone from this world, my light forever extinguished and leaving me in pitch dark.

I bury my face in her hair and breathe in deeply. Tears fall freely from my eyes and soak her shirt as I cry every bit of tears I’ve forced back over the years. She’s here. She’s really fucking here.

“You never forgot me,” she cries into my shoulder. “You never forgot me, Niko.”

“Never,” I growl roughly.

As lights flash around us and orders are barked from one person to another, we both sit on the floor in each other’s arms and let out all the pain we both felt for so long.

* * *

It’s still hard to believe Aislin is sitting beside me right now. My Aislin. The girl who’s consumed my mind for years. It’s surreal but feels so fucking good. Her chair is as close as it can be to mine, and we clutch our hands together tightly. I have no plans to release it anytime soon. Even if I did, I don’t think she would let me. She’s been glued to my side since we left Mr. Stewart’s house three hours ago.

When we first got to the precinct, Captain wanted to talk with me privately, but the fearful look in Aislin’s—it still feels weird using that name for her—eyes told me that wasn’t happening. I refuse to put her through anything more at the moment. I told him we would talk later. He took one look at Aislin himself and relented. Both Captain and Tavers’ faces still hold disbelief each time they look at Aislin, and I don’t blame them. Part of me is still in denial, but I know deep in my gut it’s true. I just don’t understand why I didn’t realize it before. She looks different than she did at thirteen, but parts of her are the same. I want to slit my own throat for not seeing it before. The many scars marking her face are what hid her from me at first, but now, when I look at her, past the scars, I see her. I see my North.

“I really wish you would go to the hospital,” I murmur.

She faces me, the small cut on her lip now clean. It angers me beyond measure every time I look at it.

“I’m fine, Niko. He never…” She pulls in a breath. “He never touched me except for the one hit.”

I don’t like it. I want her looked over, but I hold my tongue for the time being.

My body tenses when Tavers and Captain walk into the conference room. The look on their faces tells me whatever they have to say won’t be good. Aislin stiffens beside me. She sees it as well. When Tavers eyes move to her, they soften with sympathy.

“There a few questions I want to ask… Aislin.” Captain says her name hesitantly as if it’s hard for him to get out. It’s hard for me to say her name too.

Her hand tightens in mine, and I’m about to tell Captain that it can wait, but her hushed voice stops me.

“What do you want to know?”

Captain’s eyes move to mine, and I look at Aislin. “Are you sure?”

Aislin hasn’t been questioned yet as to what she actually remembers. She’s told me she doesn’t remember everything, but she does remember the kidnapping and bits and pieces of her life before and during. I don’t want to add to her pain, but I need to know. I need to know every single detail she has to give of everything she went through. It’s going to kill me to hear it, but it’s nothing more than I deserve for not saving her in time, for not recognizing her from the moment she came back into my life.

We still don’t know if Clem Stewart had Aislin this whole time, and it’s eating up my nerves not having those answers. Captain and Tavers have been in there the past couple of hours interrogating him. The last I heard, the crime scene investigators are still combing his house.

“Just stay with me. Hold my hand and don’t let go,” she says softly.

“The hounds of hell couldn’t pull me away.”

I look back at Captain and nod. He sets a notepad down on the table and takes a seat. Tavers remains standing at the end of the table. I glance at him and see hard eyes staring back at me. It ratchets up my own anger.

“You need to stay calm, Niko,” Tavers says. “What you’re about to hear is going to be hard.”

I give him a tight nod and strengthen my fingers around Aislin’s.

“Do you know who took you?” Captain asks his first question, and I brace for the answer.

“I-I think I remember.” Her eyes narrow in thought. “It was Mr. C, wasn’t it?”

Captain frowns, looks at me, and then back at Aislin. “Mr. C? Who’s Mr. C, Aislin?”

It only takes a split second to recognize the name. I haven’t heard it in years, but I know Aislin’s file by heart. Mr. C. AKA Clay Campbell, our fucking bus driver. One of the six initial suspects who was cleared when his alibi came through.

“How in the fuck is that possible? That man in there is Clem Stewart.” I point toward the holding cell through the wall. “I ran his license myself,” I growl, my stiff body leaning into the table. It’s only Aislin’s hand that keeps me rooted in my spot and not going after the fucker.

Captain’s eyes flicker to me. “He changed his name six months after he took Aislin. Two months after that, once the school year was over and the name change was complete, he quit his job.”

I swear smoke must be coming from my ears. That’s how much rage I feel at the moment. This whole fucking time, it was our childhood bus driver. I think back to my memories of him. He had blond hair back then and weighed about fifty pounds more than he does now. He looks different, but his eyes… His eyes are the same.

“Do you remember what happened that day, Aislin?” Captain’s question pulls me back to the present.

She shudders beside me. “I w-was walking to school because the bus never came. Mr. C stopped and started talking to me. I remember thinking it was strange to see him in a car instead of the bus. He asked if I wanted a ride to school, and I told him no. He got out of the car, smiling, and said he wanted to show me something. Before I knew what happened, there was a pain in my head, and then everything went black.”

Captain’s lips are in a straight line as he writes down everything Aislin tells him. My own body vibrates with anger. I want nothing more than to storm into his cell and beat the man until he stops breathing. The one punch I got in back at his house wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy me. I want to destroy him, rip him apart piece by piece.

“Do you remember what color the car was?”

“I think it was white.”

“A white Honda Civic was found under a tarp behind his house.” Tavers’ quiet statement has me turning my head his direction. “Brown hair was found in the trunk. The samples have been sent to forensics, but I’m pretty confident they’ll come back as Aislin’s.”

I give a sharp nod in acknowledgment.

“Did he ever say anything to you? Tell you why he took you?”

She frowns again, as if trying to think back to her time with him. I clench my teeth because I know this is hard on her. All her scars… they came from him and her time there. I wish I could wipe those memories away, but we still need them right now.

She shakes her head. “No,” she answers with a tremble. “He never said why.”

Captain nods, scribbles on the pad for a few more seconds, and then places the pen down. He looks at me. “There’s something you need to see, but I’m not sure if Aislin should. It may be too much for her.”

“No,” she states vehemently. “I want to see too. As long as I have Niko with me, I’ll be okay.”

I turn to her and tilt my head down so our faces are only a few inches apart. The old Aislin from my childhood shines through in the stubborn tilt of her chin.

“Aislin,” I call her name gently. “I know this can’t be easy on you. Tavers will stay in here with you while I go.”

She shakes her head before I get the words out. “I need to know. Please. I need to know why this was done to me.”

My eyes flicker back and forth between hers, looking for any signs this isn’t a good idea. I know it isn’t, but I recognize her need to understand why her life was torn away from her. She was tortured for years; she deserves to know the truth.

“Okay, but if for one moment it gets to be too much, tell me and I’ll take you away. Promise me.”

The breath she pulls in is shaky, but she nods, furthering my belief that she’s one of the strongest women I’ve ever met.

Captain leads us out of the conference room with Tavers taking up our rear. Our hands stay locked together as we’re led to another smaller conference room. A small TV sits on a stand by the table with the remote on top. Several books are on the table as well. Captain gestures for us to sit in a position where we can see the TV, and then he grabs the remote.

Captain’s concerned eyes move to Aislin. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, Captain Morgan. Please just play it.”

Giving a firm nod, he presses a button, and the screen turns on. It’s static at first, and then the interrogation room comes across the screen. My anger meter goes from a simmer to boiling when I see Mr. Stewart on the screen with Captain sitting across from him. I note Tavers in the background leaning against the wall.

“Why did you take Aislin, Mr. Stewart?” Captain asks on the screen.

Mr. Stewart lifts his head. “Because she’s mine,” he states, his voice hard.

“Why do you think she’s yours?”

He shifts in his seat. “She just is. I made her, so she’s mine.” He snarls the word mine, and even on the screen I see the spit flying from his mouth.

I frown, not understanding his statement.

“What do you mean, you made her?”

Mr. Stewart leans over the table like he’s telling a secret, his cufflinks clanging against the metal. His voice is low, but what he says echoes across the room and leaves my stomach turning over.

“Me and Momma made her. She’s my baby. Her and Aaliyah are mine, so I took them. Momma made them go away, but I got them back. I got them back and loved them just like Momma always loved me.” He sits back in his chair, a frown pulling down his brows. “Aaliyah died. She got sick and died. My Lelu was the strong one and knew just how I wanted to love her.” His voice turns hard again. “She didn’t like it at first, but she learned real quick what happened if she was bad. Bad girls and boys get punished when they don’t do what their parents say. I taught Lelu just how to please me. I taught her how to—”

“Stop!” Aislin shouts beside me. “Oh God, please stop it.”

The screen goes black, and I turn to face her. She has her eyes slammed shut with tears leaking out the corners. I scoot both of our chairs back and drop to my knees in front of her. Her whole body is shaking like a fucking leaf.

“Aislin—”

“There was another,” she interrupts me, opening her red-rimmed eyes. “T-there was another g-girl. In the room n-next to m-mine. I remember her. S-she would c-cry every d-day, and I could hear it through t-the wall.” She stops and grabs my hand in a painful grip. “I remember the day she stopped crying. I remember him yelling at her and hearing crunching sounds. That was the day I escaped.”

“How?” I ask before Captain has a chance.

“I-I started screaming at him th-through the wall to stop hurting her. I don’t k-know why. I n-never raised my v-voice. I never spoke t-to him unless I had to, b-but that day I did. H-he came into the r-room and s-started hitting me too. It hurt so b-bad. I must have blacked out. W-when I came t-to, he was gone, and th-there was no more s-screaming. I got up to check on h-her, and she was gone. I n-noticed the door to my room was cracked o-open. I guess he left it open, and I-I e-escaped.”

Tears pour from her eyes, and her cries are hiccupping sobs. I pull her into my arms. “Shh… it’s okay, baby. Everything is okay now.”

My eyes meet Tavers’ and Captain’s over Aislin’s shoulder. I let them know silently that she’s had enough. I pick up her trembling form, carry her from the room, and take her into the same room where I slept off my binge several weeks ago.

She doesn’t say anything as I lay us both down on the small mattress. She’s exhausted—we both are—but I know we can’t go home yet. We need to get through more shit, but I refuse to have her go through more right now.

She curls her body against mine, her sobs dying down, but her breath still coming in pants. The sound breaks my fucking heart. My hands rub up and down her back soothingly. When I think she’s asleep, I look down at her still form, only to find her beautiful green eyes staring up at me.

“I tried so hard not to forget you,” she whispers croakily. “But the longer I was there, the more you went away. The things he did… no,” she interrupts my protest. “I need you to know. The things he did to me, they hurt, they hurt so much, but not as much as knowing I was forgetting something so very important.”

“Oh, Aislin. I’m so sorry I didn’t find you.” Her finger touches my lips, silencing me.

“No, Niko.” She shakes her head, more tears sliding down her face. “I knew you were looking for me. I knew you would do anything to find me, but after a while, your memory started to fade. Maybe it was my body’s way of protecting me, taking away the one thing that would have made it more unbearable, knowing you were out there looking. Maybe it was God’s way of making me stronger, making me fight on my own so I wasn’t given false hope if there was a chance it would have ended… differently.”

Her words tear me apart. Ending differently means ending with her dead. For months, that’s what I thought, that she was dead, and before that, I had no clue what had happened to her. There were endless possibilities, and I thought of them all, but it never crossed my mind that the sweet man from our bus was at the root of it all. The man we saw every day for years, the one who gave us candy in the morning, the one who smiled and wished us a good day, and the one who gave us cards on our birthdays. Even when his name showed up on the suspect list, I never, not once, believed it was him. I was a fucking idiot and should have known better. Over three-quarters of kidnappings are by family members or acquaintances of the family or child. I’m a detective; I fucking know the statistics. That’s what bothers me the most. We had the guy in our clutches, and he got away.

“You’re here now, and you’re safe,” I say through a thick throat. “And I swear to you, Aislin, no one will ever touch you again.”

“I believe you.”

Her words mean the world to me. She has no reason to trust me, no reason to believe a word I say, but she does. Her eyes tell me so.

I watch her eyes as I run my hand along her cheek. I see vulnerability and fear from my touch linger in her eyes, but she doesn’t pull away. Instead, she closes her eyes and leans into my hand. I brush the hair away from her face, my gaze taking in her scars. I push away the ever-present anger caused by seeing them. The tips of my fingers meet the raised birthmark below her ear, and I close my eyes. I keep my fingers there, lightly rubbing my thumb over her damp cheek.

“My North,” I whisper.

* * *

I’m not sure how much time passes, but sometime later, I feel another presence in the room. I look down at Aislin and find her asleep. I lift my gaze to the doorway and see Tavers standing there.

I kiss Aislin’s head before carefully lifting it and pulling my arm free. I don’t want to leave her, but I need to talk to Tavers. I take one last look at her before leaving her sleeping on the bed. I stop just outside the door, pulling it closed halfway so Tavers and I don’t wake her.

“We found journals,” he says, his jaw hard. “Years’ worth. There is some fucked-up shit in there, Niko. And it pretty much paints us a picture of everything that happened.”

I shove my clenched fists into my pockets. “Tell me,” I demand.

He takes a minute, his eyes moving to the partially closed door and then looking back at me.

“The journals start twenty-six years ago.” He stops and eyes me closely.

“Just fucking tell me, Tavers,” I growl.

He nods stiffly.

“They start with him telling a story about his mother molesting him. Every day for six months, there’s an entry. They’re graphic, giving minute-by-minute details. There’s a three-month gap between the next entries. When they start again, it’s about his mother being pregnant. He was excited and couldn’t wait to be a father. The abuse continues, but seven months later, on July 22, 1989, the entries stop again for a month.”

Fuck! That’s the day after Aislin’s birthday. A sick feeling churns in my stomach.

He pulls in a breath and looks down at his shoes. When he looks up again, his eyes are colder than I’ve ever seen them.

“When they start back up again, he’s angry. Angry with the mother for taking away his babies. He goes into detail about what he wants to do to them. His sick perversions, the same things his mother did to him.” I push past the bile rising in my throat. From Tavers’ expression, it looks like he’s doing the same thing.

“Wait. You said babies?” The look in his eyes tells me what I need to know. “Son of a bitch,” I mutter. “Fucking twins?”

He nods and continues. “When he was searching for the birth certificate, that’s how he found out she had twins. The mother’s name was on the certificate, but no father was listed. He talks about looking for them. The details of the abuse from the mother are still there, but the focus of each entry is about his obsession in finding his babies.”

“She couldn’t put the father’s name because it would implicate her as raping her child.”

Tavers nods and continues. “He was enraged at his mother for keeping that secret from him, from keeping both of his babies from him. He searched for them for two years when he realized he couldn’t find them on his own. He took to torturing his mom for answers. His mother sold one of the twins for cash, and the sister, Natalie, stole the other and moved away. He talks about finding his sister and how angry he was when she turned him away. Without Natalie’s knowledge, he visited the little girl often. Again, there were details on how he abused her and threatened the girl not to say anything. When she was ten, he took her. He had planned to wait until she was fourteen, the same age he was when his mother had the twins, he mentioned it being poetic, but moved up his plans when he found out his sister was leaving the country with the girl. It was the summer of ‘96 when he found Aislin.”

I yank my hands from my pockets and turn away from Tavers. Propping my hands on the doorframe, I hang my head, my chest heaving up and down. A year after she moved in next door. I think back to that time and remember the following school year was when Mr. C started driving my bus. Fucking shit.

I spin back around to Tavers.

“If he was waiting for a specific age to take the sister, he would wait to take Aislin as well. Why grab her early?”

“This is from his interview that you didn’t see, but it’s as simple as him coming upon her alone. His… sick needs got the better of him, and he acted. He did have an appointment that day that he made it to. He was on his way when he saw her walking to school. He knocked her out, put her in his trunk, and made it to his appointment in time.”

I clench my teeth. “He took a big chance of her not waking up and alerting people.”

“I agree, but I think in his fucked-up mind, he was willing to take that chance or didn’t even think about that possibility. He had her in his sights for years and knew the day was approaching, so I think he just sort of snapped.”

“What’s the sister’s name?”

“Aaliyah.”

“So Aislin was sold and had a twin,” I state.

“Yes. Aislin was sold two days after she was born. Natalie stole Aaliyah two weeks after she came home from the hospital with the mother. She had a birthmark just like Aislin. That’s why we all thought the body from the woods, coupled with the matching DNA from being twins, was Aislin. In the journal, Mr. Stewart talks of him having the same birthmark on his shoulder blade. That’s how he confirmed Aaliyah was his, and once he saw Aislin, he knew she was the twin because they were identical. We’re running a DNA analysis to confirm.”

He pauses for a moment then lowers his voice. “There’s more.”

“What?” I bark.

“Two bodies were found buried behind his house. They’ve been there years, but we’re guessing they are the sister and mother. Once he took both girls, he never mentions them again.”

I take a moment and pull in a deep breath. Barely contained rage runs through my system, and it takes everything in me not to find the twisted fucker and mutilate him. Once I’m reasonably in control, I look back at Tavers.

“How in the fuck is all this possible? How in the hell did we miss so much when he was right under our noses all these years?” I ask heatedly.

“You know the authorities never thought she was kidnapped, Niko. To them, there was no reason to search for her. Aaliyah was never reported missing. The rooms they were kept in weren’t on any blueprints. It took him years to modify the basement and build the rooms they were kept in; my guess is so people wouldn’t become suspicious if he was ever questioned or suspected. He was careful and had spent years planning. Don’t blame yourself for this. There’s no way you could have known. You were a kid when she was taken, and by the time you were able to look for clues yourself, too much time had passed.”

I take in his words, but I don’t believe them. Not when the answers were right in front of our faces. I’ll always blame myself for not finding her. As a kid, there wasn’t much I could do, but once I became an adult and started working for the force, I was trained for cases such as these. It wasn’t enough, I wasn’t enough, and that will stay with me forever.

I turn my back to him and face the doorway. Through the dark room, I see Aislin lying on her side facing me. So much pain, so much lost time and heartache, all from a man with a sick sense of ownership and depraved thoughts of love.

“One of the later journals states he knew who you were the whole time. When we took the case of his missing niece, he knew you were her childhood best friend and found it humorous that you were going to be the one who brought her back to him. He was also the one who shot up your yard that night. He knew Aislin was breaking in next door and went to grab her. She ran, and that’s when he took a shot.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I snarl, my hand itching to hit something solid. “He was fucking playing us the whole damn time.”

Tavers’ jaw clenches as he nods. “We also found a dog kennel in his garage and duct tape and rope in the trunk of his car.”

“Fuck me. He was getting ready to move her.” The color drains from my face, knowing I was so close to losing her forever. Had he moved her, the chances of me finding her again, or finding her alive, were damn near nonexistent.

“That’s what it looks like.” He steps beside me and peers into the room. “There’s something else you should know,” he says quietly. I don’t look at him, but instead keep my eyes on Aislin. How much worse can it get? I tip my head up for him to continue. “He talks about her being pregnant. He only mentions it once, then nothing more, but he mentions being excited about her having his baby.”

My fucking knees become weak, and I grab the doorframe to keep myself from falling. The groan that leaves my lips sounds like a wounded animal. I try so damn hard to pull in a breath, but it hurts too much.

He puts a hand on my shoulder. “Take her home, Niko. There’s nothing more we can do tonight. I’ll let Capt know you’ll be back tomorrow. We’ll work at finding answers then.”

My heart feels heavy, and my stomach is in knots as I walk into the room. I stand over Aislin for several moments, just looking at her, still having a hard time believing she’s lying here before me.

Several minutes pass and she starts whimpering in her sleep. I drop to my knees at the side of the bed and lay my palm on her cheek. Her first reaction is a jerk, and her eyes snap open. Alarm blazes in her eyes before she realizes it’s me, and then they soften. It pleases me so fucking much that I give her comfort. Most women who’ve been through what she has would still be scared shitless of any man even if she had known him since her childhood. But I believe, since that first day in the hospital, she knew deep down she could trust me. That’s why she eventually let me in. That’s also why I’ve felt a connection to her. I know that now.

“Hey,” she says sleepily.

“Do you want to go home?” I ask, stroking my thumb along her cheek.

She yawns, and it’s so damn cute it makes my chest hurt. “Yes.”

I stand and hold out my hand. She grabs it and together, hand in hand, we leave the room. I give a chin lift to Captain and Tavers across the room as we walk toward the exit. We’re just passing through the half door that separates the lobby from behind the counter when there’s a commotion across the room.

“Lelu!”

Aislin stiffens beside me, and I pull her closer to my side. I turn to face the handcuffed man who’s struggling between two officers. My eyes narrow. The fucking bastard has Aislin’s eyes although they look crazed right now. I don’t know why I didn’t see it before.

It takes every ounce of strength in my body to keep from going after him. The look in his eyes as he gazes at Aislin almost has me retching.

“Lelu! Tell them you’re mine! Tell them, Lelu!” he shouts.

My eyes move to Tavers, and he gives a short nod before stalking off across the room. He stands in front of Mr. Stewart, blocking his view of Aislin and me.

With my arm around her shoulders, I turn us around. “Let’s go,” I say, unable to keep the anger out of my voice.

“Lelu,” he screams as I lead her out the door into the darkness of the night.