Twelve of Roses

Sheriff Reynolds told me Con had walked out of the hospital, wearing a doctor’s coat, with a fresh bullet wound in his back and a laceration in his shoulder. And even before doing all that, he’d managed to find me and give me a message.

I’m sure the cop that was supposed to be outside of his room was being reamed a new asshole.

I had no idea where he would go, but I hoped it was far away. I hoped he got help like he said he would on the card attached to the flower.

Justin was detained, Lauren was wanted, and Vicky was still missing.

Poor souls.

Sheriff Reynolds guarded me like a junkyard watch dog when the police started asking questions. It was to the point that they eventually gave up, saying they would be in touch once they realized they weren’t going to get anywhere. I almost told them about the finger in my freezer, and then changed my mind—the ring frozen to it was mine.

After, the Sheriff told me all he knew. Everything was out in the open, and it all made a bit more sense—at least in my head.

My father went to school with Con’s. They’d had a falling out of sorts. They were part of some clandestine group. Things got ugly between them over nothing other than a woman.

Fast-forward: my dad’s dead and Con’s commits suicide, after committing multiple homicides. My uncle was privy to all that went on in the town of Ponty-Poole, and with my father gone, he was free to expose the Burrows and help destroy their family name.

That got him a hole in the chest, a dead wife, and left a niece alive that was just another link to a history of secrets and lies I still didn’t fully understand.

I just knew there was more to me than my name suggested. I was the object of someone’s obsession and all their resentment.

It was an ugly domino effect. Two families ruined because of some enmity that should have been buried long ago.

Sheriff Reynolds was adamant that it would start over again with another girl, and another Burrows. He told me that he wanted to stop it. He didn’t want another sweet girl like me to get hurt. I could only smile and bite my tongue to stop from spilling my guts.

No one could ever know my secrets.

I was far from innocent.

I could have ended this before it began if I’d come forward as a witness, admitting I realized Con was the one who killed my uncle. It had been a suspicion in the beginning—like the one I had with Max.

But who could forget something like that? He’d looked me right in the eye and spoke my name the same way he eventually did a hundred times—the voice still the same.

It wouldn’t do me any good to divulge that now. I needed to start planning how to move forward.

With Molly gone, I was on my own.

Con wouldn’t be stupid enough to show his face around here, and I wasn’t going to go looking for him.

If we met again…

I wasn’t sure what would happen. Would it be another fight to the death? I didn’t want to go through that again. I wanted to live so badly just as a normal girl for once.

I could only hope this finally ended here.

EXTENDED EPILOGUE

Chapter Twenty-Three

Six Months Later

I remembered wanting to leave this small town. I hated everything about the place with its one gas station and tractor driving cowboys.

I took all of that back now.

I’d been here nearly seven months and slowly made myself at home. It was my third month here when Reynolds informed me that Grandpa had left me the house and the secret savings account he’d been building over the years just for me.

The tombstone a few feet away marked the passing of the only person other than my parents that had genuinely loved me. My heart ached every time I came to visit, but he made me fell less alone these days. Therefore, I stayed. That, and because it was safe.

Everyone knew everyone, and when what happened to me spread around, the outpouring of support was overwhelming. I wasn’t ridiculed or judged but praised.

It was all bullshit, but I went with it.

Being somewhere where people believed a certain version of events seemed better to me than starting over and reinventing myself yet again. I no longer had to conceal and hide every detail of my past.

I approached Grandpa’s white tombstone with my carnations, not thinking anything of the flowers already there until I was right in front of the grave.

Twelve dozen roses sat between two bouquets sold at the local grocery store. I closed my eyes and pulled in a deep breath, slowly exhaling when I opened them again.

It’s not him, I told myself, clutching the carnations to my chest. I couldn’t freak out every time I saw roses. These ones weren’t even black.