Chapter Thirty-Six
THE ROCKS FELL away, revealing a piercing light. I took a step into the darkness to avoid rocks tumbling to the ground.
“Where is he?” a voice demanded. It took me a second to place it… Barnes. The detective who was determined to catch Philip. So determined that he had been willing to blackmail a judge.
I didn’t answer—couldn’t. My throat was filled from dust, coating the air I breathed after the rocks came down. I didn’t know where he was by now, but I hoped he was safe.
He stepped inside, a looming shadow. I could only see the tip of his short-cropped white hair. He grasped my arms and shook—not too roughly but enough to jolt me. “Where is he? Where did he go?”
It wasn’t hard to act disoriented since that was how I felt. “I don’t know.”
A harsh curse and then he was brushing past me—a thump and another swear word as he must have stumbled on the uneven ground and hit sharp rock. I put a hand over my mouth to hide a smile even though it was too dark to see.
Philip was always a step ahead.
My smile faded. He was always a step ahead of me too.
“Ma’am? Are you okay?” A medic appeared at the entrance and helped me through the break in the rocks, shielding me from pebbles still falling from overhead.
It was stable enough for now. I supposed I should have been embarrassed to be covered in dust, probably smelling of sex and earth—but I didn’t. This was me right now, as much a mess on the inside as out, as crushed as the tunnel itself, barely supported.
I limped down the aisle of the church with the help of the medic.
The sunlight was blinding when we reached the stone steps. This street had been empty when we got here. Now it was filled with cop cars and ambulances—even a big fire truck. I supposed a shoot-out and cave-in underneath a church was a big deal.
Sitting on the back of an ambulance was Tyler, a blanket around his shoulders. And hovering over him, looking worried, was Adrian. My heart seized to see two people I cared about—battered but safe.
Adrian looked up and saw me. His eyes lightened with relief, and he rushed over to embrace me. I lost any semblance of calm and threw my arms around him, crying.
“Oh, Ella,” was all he said, and in those words was a world of understanding.
We had both loved Philip. We had both lost him—never had a chance, we realized far too late.
“He’s okay,” I said, gasping. Because I knew Adrian would worry. “He’s okay.”
Adrian pulled back and cupped my face. “And you?”
“I’m…” Not okay. Almost shaking with grief over the loss of him. It wasn’t new, though. This was how it felt to be with Philip, always knowing he would leave eventually, living in the future pain. “I’m here,” I said at least. Because that was all I could offer, my presence, a small and strained smile. “I’m safe.”
All my life I had been searching for acceptance, destined to love people who would not love me back. Parents I had never known and parents who had adopted me. Philip. It wouldn’t break me. I had been through enough to know that now, but it was cold comfort.
“My brother?” I asked.
Adrian glanced back, a worried expression on his face. “No serious injuries. At least, no physical ones. He’s not talking much.”
I knew if anyone could give him the support and safety he would need, it would be Adrian. He had done that for me years ago in those weeks I’d lived in Philip’s home. And he was doing it for me now. “Do you think he was…”
The word refused to come out. Raped.
A dark thundercloud crossed Adrian’s face, and I remembered that he had also slept with Marco—a one-night stand that had led to the betrayal. “He said no. They’ll examine him at the hospital to be sure.”
My stomach clenched as I realized what someone would find if they examined me: traced of Philip’s come on my back, bruises covering my body from his hard hands and the sharp rocks in the tunnel. No, I couldn’t bear for anyone to look at me now. “I want to go home. Adrian, I need to go home.”
His expression turned sympathetic. “You should get checked out, just to be sure you’re okay. It won’t get him in trouble, whatever happens.”
I wasn’t certain of that, considering how desperate Barnes was to put Philip behind bars. It wasn’t only worry for Philip though. It was worry for myself. I felt like I was fragile, made of thin glass in dark colors, like the stained-glass windows lining the church. If they touched me, I would break.
“Please,” I whispered. “Help me get out of here.”
I imagined me sneaking away into the back alley while Adrian distracted them, but he winked at me. “Leave it to me.”
I blinked, surprised out of my panic. “What do you mean?”
“Give me a little credit,” he said, mock affronted. “I didn’t work for Philip for years and not pick up any tricks of my own.”
He looked over my shoulder, and his eyes narrowed. I glanced back to see the cop, Barnes, hurrying down the steps—heading straight for us.
I tensed up, but Adrian shook his head with a faint smile. “Don’t worry about him.”
“Easy for you to say,” I muttered.
He just laughed, which seemed to make Barnes’s expression darken as he approached.
“You,” he said, accusing, as if I had Philip stashed away just to spite him. “I have questions for you.”
“And she’ll be happy to cooperate,” Adrian said smoothly, “as soon as her lawyer is present. He’s just over there speaking to your colleagues. Drew Laramie. I understand you’ve met.”
Barnes scoffed. “Philip’s lawyer? He can hardly represent her interests at the same time.”
“He’s not Philip’s lawyer anymore,” I said. “And I would trust Drew with my life.”
He’d already saved me once. And he’d saved Philip countless times. As if conjuring him, he circled a flashing police cruiser and spotted us. And I knew that I would be okay, at least physically.
Emotionally—that was a different story.
I had worked my whole life for acceptance from people who wouldn’t love me back, the princess of lost causes. They would never come true, not in this lifetime—but that pursuit had given me other friends, other family. My brother, Tyler. Adrian. Drew.
A car pulled to a stop outside the police tape, and I saw Shelly and Luke step out. I had acceptance. I was loved, even if it wasn’t by the man who had my heart.
“Why are you so determined to catch Philip?” I asked, unable to hide the censure in my voice. By violating the law, by blackmailing a judge, he had lost any right to the moral high ground.
Barnes narrowed his bloodshot eyes, receiving my message loud and clear—and he didn’t like it. “Philip Murphy is a knife lodged in the heart of this city. I will do anything to pull it out.”
I blinked. “Even if that stops the heart?”
“You believe that because you don’t know what Philip is capable of. You think he, what? Sells candy on the street corner? That the guns get sold to the CPD?”
My eyes narrowed. “I know more about the dark side of Chicago than you think.”
He studied me. “That might be true, but you don’t know the dark side of Philip Murphy. You don’t know what he’s truly capable of.”
“Then tell me,” I challenged.
“Fine.” He studied me. “You want to know what your boyfriend is capable of? A few years back we found a group of men in some abandoned tenements in the meat packing district. Lowlife types, picking up odd jobs from bigger criminals. Criminals like Murphy.”
There was only one phrase that rang in my head: the meat packing district. What were the odds this story about Philip’s evil deeds connected back to that place?
“He killed them. We don’t know what work they did for him—never found that link. But he must have decided he had no more use for them, because he had them killed. That wasn’t the worst part, though. We see death all the fucking time. No, the worst part was the way they were killed—burned to a fucking crisp. They had been chained to the pipes in the bathroom.”
The sunlight seemed too sharp suddenly, the air too thin. They had been chained to the pipes in the bathroom. A group of criminals, chained to the pipes of a bathroom.
Like the ones who had held me captive back then. Philip had avenged me.
Barnes’s eyes narrowed. “But that’s not why I’m really after him, and I’m guessing you figured that out. No my beef with Murphy is personal. He fucked my daughter. He got her pregnant. And then he left her to die.”