Little Jack (Hell's Handlers MC 6)

How was she supposed to go on without Joy? They’d been so excited to turn thirteen in a few months. Ready to enter their teen years as a unit. They often spoke about going to college together, someday getting an apartment in Tampa, and eventually marrying another set of twins. Together forever.

Now it was all over. Gone in an instant.

Holly felt so lost and alone. Constantly cold as though all the warmth had faded from her life with Joy’s death.

And the added sense of responsibility was overwhelming. How she spent the remainder of her life just became twice as important as it had been only two weeks ago. Now, she was no longer living for herself, but for two. And she refused to let Joy down by living half a life.

“I promise, Joy-Joy,” she whispered to the lifeless body in the shiny black coffin with a silky yellow interior—Joy’s favorite color. Bright and cheery. Just like her twin’s personality. “I promise I will live every day to the max. For you.”

Silence was the only response, of course, because dead bodies didn’t speak, no matter how hard Holly wished otherwise. With a thousand-pound weight resting on her chest, Holly finally stood and walked toward the coffin. She’d been waiting for a private moment away from all the pitying gazes. All four of her limbs seemed to grow heavy as though she was slogging through thick mud.

When she reached the coffin, Holly dug half of the Best Friend’s necklace out of her pocket. It was one of those hearts split down the middle with best on one side and friends on the other. A trinket they’d purchased a few years ago with their allowance money. Though they’d never taken it off in life, Holly’s mother hadn’t wanted Joy to wear it today. She thought it not classy enough.

But there was no way Holly would allow that coffin to be put in the ground without Joy’s half of the necklace. Afraid to disturb the peace Joy’s body seemed to have found, she didn’t clasp it around her sister’s neck but hid it under her palm instead. Then she held onto the charm of her own necklace as she let the tears fall. “Goodbye, J-Joy,” she said, then pressed a kiss to her sister’s forehead. “I’ll wear this for the rest of my life.”

“Holly? Holly, where are you?” Her father’s panicked voice sounded from the hallway outside the visitation room.

She should call out. Alert him to where she was. The poor man had just lost a child in the most traumatic of ways, but all of a sudden, exhaustion hit so hard, she couldn’t summon the energy to shout back.

“Holly?” Pounding footsteps drew closer until they came to a stop somewhere behind her in the visitation room. “Jesus, Holly. What’s wrong with you? Do you have any idea how worried your mother was when we couldn’t find you?”

As she turned away from the coffin, Holly used every last bit of her fledgling strength to bite her tongue. For the past two hours, family, friends, and what seemed like a thousand police officers from around the state had paraded in and out of the memorial service.

For her dead twin sister.

Throughout the entire ritual, Holly sat with her butt rooted to the very seat she now returned to. She didn’t cry, didn’t speak with any of the guests, didn’t move a muscle. Just stared at her sister. Most mourners seemed to understand without words that she needed this time to be with her sister. So where did her parents think she would be?

This should have been the very first place they looked before anyone even edged toward worry. She was trying, really trying to remember their grief was just as consuming as hers, but they’d changed over the past two weeks. They’d changed when Holly needed them most, and it was so hard to deal with the loss of Joy and the change in her parents at the same time.

“Been right here the whole time, Dad,” Holly said as her father approached. He sat, leaving an empty seat between them. No hug, not even so much as a pat on the back for comfort. That wasn’t her father’s style. All he had to offer was a burning desire to punish whoever it was that took Joy from them.

“Well, your mother was scared shitless. You should have let her know you planned to stay in here.” His eyes narrowed, and the expression of near disgust wasn’t lost on her. As though he couldn’t stand to look at her face now that the other half of her was missing.

Welcome to the club.

Holly sunk her teeth into her lower lip so hard she made herself jump. “Just been sittin’ here. Haven’t moved.”

He grunted. It wasn’t often she saw him in his police uniform these days. Not since he’d been promoted to detective and wore civilian clothes ninety-five percent of the time. Today, he looked so official in the crisply pressed navy-blue uniform. With the same blonde hair she and Joy shared along with those blue eyes, she and her twin were clearly their father’s daughters.