Page 99 of Regret

“Yes.” He dropped his gaze to the floor, unable to look at her any longer.

“How did Blue die, Ace?”

“Oh God. You know how she died, Scarlet,” he muttered.

“Answer me!” she shouted, her face as white as a ghost.

Hunter jumped up from the couch, a toxic mix of anger and confusion poisoning him from the inside. “A car accident, Scarlet. Blue died in a car accident.”

Scarlet remained unmoved. “What was her name?”

“Blue,” he answered almost inaudibly. “Her name was Blue.”

“Her real name, Hunter.”

She knew, goddammit. He could see it on her face. But she was going to make him say it. She was going to make him spell it all out for her even if it meant tearing him the fuck apart.

He stared at her, hating the fact that she was forcing him to say it, but he did anyway. “Willow.” He let out a heavy sigh. “Her name was Willow.”

The chain dropped from Scarlet’s hand like white hot coals, the sound of the metal hitting the floor echoing around them as if it was a ten-ton anchor that slammed in the ground. She gasped, holding her chest like all the wind had been knocked right out of her.

“Willow, was she your sister, Scar?” he asked softly, a part of him hoping like hell he was wrong about it all.

All she did was nod, more tears moving down her cheeks, and Hunter’s entire world got pulled from under him.

“Oh my God.” He pulled at his hair, staring up, thinking this was just another one of the universe’s sick, twisted games. But when he looked down, staring at Scarlet, he saw it. He saw all the similarities between Scar and Blue, the things he was too blind to see before. Now he knew why he had felt so drawn to Scarlet all this time—why he felt that familiar pull toward her. It was because ofher. It was his connection to Blue that had been pulling him to Scarlet all this time.

What if these feelings he had toward Scarlet weren’t real at all? Was it because deep down inside he had known this all along? Was that why he had this unexplainable urge to protect Scarlet from the start?

And then his entire world came crashing down around him for a second time in his life.

It was all a lie. Everything he had shared with the woman in front of him was never fucking real.

He walked over to where she stood, crouched down, and picked up his chain laying on the floor. Somehow the silver trinket felt like it burned the skin of his hand, like he didn’t have the right to hold it anymore. It no longer represented his love for Blue, but rather had become the symbol of his fate…a cruel, hard, punishing fate of living a life alone. Of never being able to love again.

Scarlet’s soft whimpers filled his ears, and it sent a grueling ache smashing right in the center of his chest.

“Scar—”

The front door burst open at the same time the alarm started to go ape-shit.

Hunter didn’t think. He just reacted.

He grabbed Scarlet and pushed her to the side as two men came rushing through the door. Scarlet fell to the floor, and Hunter rushed over to the drawer where he stashed his gun. The second he turned around and aimed, he stared straight down the barrel of a gun pointed at his forehead. The guy in front of him staring down the barrel of Hunter’s gun.

The man cocked his head to the side. “There’s no need for that, son.”

“I think there kinda is when someone bursts through my door and aims a gun at my head,” Hunter replied dryly, his finger firmly on the trigger.

“There’s no time. We need to get her out of here.” He glanced at Scarlet, who slowly got up from the floor.

“Like hell we do.”

“They are on their way here right now looking for her. We don’t have time.”

Hunter glared at the guy with the shaven head and goatee, probably in his mid-forties. “Who the hell are you?”

The man looked from Hunter to Scarlet, who stood silently watching them.

“I’m her father.”

THE END (To be continued)