“Jesus Motherfucking Christ,” I roar over the loud rumble of my bike. Cut the engine; place my arm across the handlebars to cradle my head.

I can’t get her image out of my mind. It’s plugged so tight in my skull I’m on the verge of destruction.

Zoe is fucking gone. I will never forget the way her dead eyes stared at me. The way her mouth gaped open, her fingers curled tightly around a plastic toy truck.

I may have done some shady-ass fucking shit in my life. Killed some people a time or two because they deserved to die, but I sure as hell have never stumbled across a scene as devastating to my black heart as seeing her innocent, lifeless body on that bloody kitchen floor.

I ran like the son of a bitch I am. I had no choice when I heard the sirens in the distance and the sound of a crowd gathering outside. Someone must have heard what the hell was going on in there and called the cops. If they did, they should be shot for not pounding the door down to save her. I hope they rot on their fucking guilt for this. The good Lord knows I would’ve stampeded that fucking door down and surprised that lowlife with bullets in his skull. That fucker better pray to the devil himself the cops find him before I do.

My background doesn’t have a damn thing to do with me slipping out the back door undetected. Running through the backyards and down the street to where I parked my bike. It’s the fact that once I gathered my shit the best I could, the intensity of rage took over. That slimy motherfucking boyfriend of hers did it. He took the kid and left after he beat her to death. Literally.

I passed the cops and the ambulance on my way. My skin was prickling with anguish for what they were about to walk in on.

By the time I made it back to Zeke and Amelia’s, I was shaking like a dried-up leaf blowing in the wind. This is all kinds of fucked.

It didn’t matter how I told Amelia or when. She was going to freak. Break down and blame herself like I’m blaming myself. The only thing that mattered to me was the safety of her and the baby. Everything else had to be shoved aside.

“Did you find her? Is she alright? Is she coming over?” Hell, no, she isn’t.

“Yeah. I found her.” I ran my hands through my hair. Caught a breath and didn’t come up for air until I told her. It was the hardest thing I’ve done in my pathetic excuse of a life.

Amelia’s screams hit my ears, sounding like a dying animal. It tore through my skin and rattled my bones. She fell into the arms of my brother. Her body shaky, lips trembling, and then she bent over clenching her stomach. Water started dripping down her legs, and I froze. Guilt slinked right up and took hold of blackened-out soul and crushed it.

The guilt is smashing my brain as I climb off my bike and enter the hospital. The noise, chaos all around me driving me further insane.

I glance up at the directory, find the maternity floor, and pray to anyone who dares listen to me to let Amelia and the baby be alright. My brother better be holding on as well. If anything were to happen, I would die a slow, tortured death by my own Goddamn doing. I’d slit my own throat on the spot.

The minute I step off the elevator, my eyes go wide when I see a woman in scrubs sitting on the floor. Her hands are covering her face. She’s crying. Shoulders are shaking, body convulsing. Sobbing.

Ruckus. So much of it is running through my head that I brace my hands on the wall for support.

Is she the doctor? Did something happen to my family? Fuck. I can’t breathe. My lungs start constricting in desperation as they try to inhale air. I picture Zoe’s dead body in her own pool of blood, then Amelia's face fades; the game goes on and on until I shake the vision from my head.

“Eden,” a familiar voice calls out of a room. Zeke. Thank fucking God. His big frame kneels in front of the woman. Hands grabbing hold of hers in a tender grip.

“Zoe Ashton is she the woman who died?” the woman asks, pain etched so deep in those words that my blood freezes from hearing her name.

“Yes.” Zeke drops her hands, sits back on his haunches, and shakes his head. I can’t see his face, but I know my brother well enough to know he’s shocked as fuck at hearing Zoe’s name. So am I.

“Jesus Christ, Eden. How the hell do you know her?” His voice is so quiet I can barely hear him over the thunder rolling in my chest.

“She’s…” Her shoulders start shaking again with violent force. I need to fucking stop the shit running through my brain because it makes my reality slap me with the brutal truth of my life—my sister and the hell she went through blinds my vision.

Loud sobs run up and down the hall, bringing me back to the woman on the floor.

Jesus Motherfucking Christ. I run my hands down my face nearing a point of snapping my head off.

“What? My God. I didn’t know. Come on. We need to get you cleaned up,” Zeke growls. Demandingly. Shocking and scaring the piss out of me along with it. She’s what? What the fuck did I miss her saying? Goddamn it.

“No. I need a minute. Someone from the administration has been paging me for a half hour. The police are downstairs. I have to identify her body. It’s in the morgue at St. Peters. They have my sister locked up in a cold metal box. This is all my fault. I should have stopped it. I was going to; I swear I was,” she rattles on while her words are rattling in my head. I’m not sure if I heard her right, because I swear to God she said ‘sister.’

By some fine intervention, my legs shuffle forward. “Zeke,” I call out. I have no clue what I’m thinking; all I know is, if I were in this woman’s shoes and found out my brother was dead, I wouldn’t want to be alone. And knowing my brother like I do, he wouldn’t want her to be either.

So many other questions drift, fade out, drift back in. The first one being Zoe has a sister. The second one is, who in the fuck was the real Zoe? She led so many different lives, and it seems she was the joker, but again, if it were Zeke in that metal box, I’d be there. No questions asked.

“Saxon.” He stands.

When I see the look of desperation on his face instead of a look a new father should have, I nearly break apart. My heart sinks to the tips of my steel-toed boots.

“The baby. Amelia. Are they alright?” I murmur.

My chest is so tight, filled with emotions I never knew I had.

“Yeah. My daughter is beautiful. Amelia is sleeping. I was…”—he pauses. Stands and sticks his hand out to the woman. She takes it, her hands shaking—“going to go to the nursery to see her. We’re naming her Clara. If I call the nursery to tell them you're coming, would you go sit with her?”

I squeeze my eyes shut. I have a niece. They named her after our sister. Fuck me. A niece named Clara. A miracle is now gracing this earth.

“Hell, no.” I open my eyes. I know exactly what he’s thinking. He’s doing what he does best. Putting someone else before himself. It’s in his nature. Zeke has always been the caregiver even before our sister died. It’s placed so deep in his DNA to be the boss and take charge that the fucker doesn’t even know when to put himself first.

“I’ll go with her; you go be with your daughter. I got this, Zeke. The only hero you need to be right now is your daughter's.”

I have no idea how those words flowed from my lips. I felt each syllable lounging in my throat, but that man deserves nowhere else to be but beside the gift God gave him. I’d be a liar if I didn’t say I want to hold my niece close to my chest and kiss the hell out of her even though these palms have had their fair share of bloodshed etched into them. I’ll get my turn. Right now, she deserves to be held by her father.

“Thanks, brother,” he whispers in a solemn tone.

In slow motion, with each action branded on my memory forever, Zeke drops the woman's hand. I watch as each of their fingers unlace, and then my brother does something I never expected. He places her hand in mine. Her fears and trembles become my rocking core. I see Zoe, yet I don’t. She looks so much like her, making me want to hold her forever, then within the blink of an eye, she looks nothing like her at all. It’s insanely wrong and right in the same flash of a second.

Can’t explain it, but there’s something about this woman threatening to shine light on my darkened soul.