16. I Want To Show You Something

EVERLEIGH

Five days…

It’s been five days since my world changed.

My mother is alive.

My mother is alive and is married to Antonio Silvestro.

My mother is alive and is married to the monster that kidnapped me and was going to sell me.

I haven’t spoken to Ronan since that night.

I haven’t spoken to anyone actually. When it gets bad like this, and unfortunately this isn’t the first time I’ve shut myself away and gone non verbal, Gran usually calls in the cavalry.

That would be why I’m sitting in the middle of Woodland Park, Samson at my feet, drinking coffee with my cousin. Adrianna and I grew up thinking that we were sisters. We were inseparable. She’s a month older than me and has always been my protector. When we turned sixteen, she protected me from her alcoholic father.

Her father used to beat the shit out of her on a near daily basis. He blamed her for her mother dying in childbirth. I’m not sure but I think he was sexually abusing her too. Until one he set his sights on me. He co