Page 117 of Ricochet
No, I didn’t understand. But it didn’t really matter now, because the only thing I wanted was for her to remember who we used to be.
“Do you remember that night Ava died?” Another slice over my heart, because that was one death I would never get over. “Are you finally going to listen to what I have to say? I mean, not that you have much choice, but you know, really listen.”
“I wasn’t in Croyford Bay that night.”
“I know you weren’t.” She started playing with the dagger, the point of it on the floor, while she turned it around with her hands. “Which is why it hurt me so much more when you accused me of something I never did.”
“But they saw you—”
“They saw me trying to save her!” she roared. “Cillian and Tristan saw me trying to stop the bleeding after I removed that knife. My knife, might I add, the one that went missing three weeks prior to that night. They saw me doing CPR on her, because there was still a pulse. She was still alive when they arrived, and if any of you idiots had listened to me,” she looked behind me, right at my brothers, “she might’ve survived. But no, you had to let emotions take control over your body, and instead of helping me, you pushed her deeper into the grave.”
“Phee,” I tried, but she instantly placed the tip of the blade beneath my chin, lifting my head.
“It’s my time to talk, Kieran. You had your chance, and you blew it.”
“Okay.”
“Good.” She removed the dagger from my face, holding it in one hand, with her arms on her knees. “The reason I went to your house that night was because Theo called me. That motherfucker told me that Ava called him and sounded upset.”
“Why would she call him?” I was confused. Ava hated Theo, and if there was one person she tried avoiding as much as possible, it was him.
“Now you’re getting it. He was the one that helped me escape after you left me to die in that basement cell. He was the one who knew who really killed her, and instead of chasing the murderers in your lines, you were so focused on me that you never even realized what was happening right under your nose.”
“But we found your knife. It was the murder weapon.”
“Right, the one I just told you was missing.” She stood up, looking down at me. “When I arrived there, her guard was already dead. When I saw her in the kitchen, she was already almost dead. She was stabbed by somebody else, not me.”
Were we really that blind?
“You were chasing the wrong person, and all this time, you had one traitor in your midst. Did you really think that my father didn’t know Theo was working with you? He just probably didn’t care because that slimy toad never knew even half of what was going on in the Syndicate.”
“But then, who killed her?” If it wasn’t Ophelia, it had to be someone who knew our routine.
“I don’t know, but I am going to find out.”
“That’s bullshit,” Cillian attacked from behind, but was it? Was it really bullshit, because the Ophelia I knew never shied from accepting the things she was guilty of? If she really killed Ava, she would’ve said so. But looking at her, the way she behaved, the way her pain still shone through, I finally understood.
She really didn’t kill my sister, and my pain, my anger, the need to take it out on somebody, anybody, made me betray her in the worst way possible.
What was I thinking accepting the things without relevant proof?
We were wrong. We subjected the wrong person to the suffering she didn’t deserve.
“Ophelia, I am sorry.”
“Your sorry means nothing to me.” She pulled my hair, exposing my neck. “Your sorry can go to fucking hell. You’re only sorry because you ended up here. The excuses, apologies, none of those will cut it this time.”
“Please, listen to me.”
“I am done listening to you.” She leaned in. “I am tired of men telling me what to do. I am tired of men taking whatever they want without any consequences.”
Did she... Did she know?
“You take our innocence, our sweetness, and until you turn it into something ugly, you never give up. But when that happens, you throw us aside, like yesterday’s trash, looking for a new toy to play with. Isn’t that what you did, Kieran? You took everything I was, and when what I became wasn’t good enough, you decided to dip your dick into somebody else. Somebody I hated. But you did something else as well, didn’t you?”
No, she couldn’t know. Nervousness I had never felt before, rushed through my whole body. My hands started shaking, and the night I wanted to forget, the one I wanted to erase from my memory, started repeating in my mind.
Glass.
