Page 2 of Dark Side of the Cloth (The Righteous 1)
* * *
AWeek Later
Yasmine woke with a start because of a loud noise. She had taken to sleeping in the pantry where she could lock the door, and no one would think to look for her. She pushed herself out from under the back corner shelf she’d curled up in to sleep. The small space was dark, but the soft glow of the kitchen light filtered under the door, making her feel safer. Ever since Raquel’s death, she hadn’t slept through a night. Something or someone always woke her.
Yasmine bit her lip, her hands shaking as she reached for the knob to see what the strange noise had been. The house was large, but she heard every creak, groan, thud, and bang in the quiet that accompanied the night. The knob screeched a little in protest as she turned it.
Yasmine poked her head out, but nothing moved, and no other sound could be heard. She tiptoed out of the kitchen and began a search of the house. She had designated herself as the house guard, slinking through the rooms at all hours to make sure the doors and windows had been properly locked. She completed her inspection of the main floor and made her way up the wooden stairs, careful to avoid the steps that made noise. Nothing seemed out of place, but when she poked her head into her parent’s room, her mother was not in bed.
A shiver raced down her spine as she renewed her search, this time for her mother. They hadn’t spoken since the night her mother told her that she was the one that should be dead, but she couldn’t think about that now—she was on duty.
Yasmine looked everywhere that she could think, even in the backyard and the garage, but found nothing. Giving up, she made her way back to her little sleeping spot when she spotted the door to the basement, where Daddy got the bodies ready for a funeral, open. The light was off, but he never left the door open. Yasmine swallowed hard, her body shaking as she stepped toward the dark descent. She flicked on the light switch and jumped back, expecting something to attack her. Her heart beat so loud in her ears that it was all she could hear. But, her fear was for nothing because there was no monster or man waiting to pounce.
Yasmine tiptoed down the stairs to the first landing, looked into her Daddy’s workroom, and saw her mother. “Mommy?”
She stared at the chair on the floor and then back up at her mother’s purple-colored face and the blank stare on it. Yasmine stepped forward one step and froze as her mother’s body twitched and jerked harder, strange noises coming from her mouth as her body swung from a rope wrapped around her neck. She tried to scream, but it felt trapped in her throat as she gaped at her mother.
Finally, Yasmine’s mind registered the situation, and she ran forward as she began to scream for her Dad. She grabbed her mother’s leg and lifted as hard as she could as panicked tears burst forth.
“Mommy, don’t leave me. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry I killed Raquel. Please don’t leave me!”
