in her right mind. I moved slowly, carefully, and Jaz’s shoulders slumped.
There. That was it. She was still in there.
“Give it to me,” I said, taking another step closer to her, my hand nearly on hers, on the knife.
A fresh tear fell down her face, creating a pathway through the wet blood on her cheek. When her grip loosened on the knife, I was able to take it from her, holding it off to the side. “She killed my mom,” Jaz whispered, her voice breaking, and my heart breaking as well.
I didn’t care that she was covered in blood; I used my free hand to pull her close, to hold her against me as she started to break down.
“She killed my mom,” she muttered it again, caving into my chest and losing it.
Archer went to look around the kitchen with Vaughn, but it wasn’t a second later that he saw something bad—my guess, Piper’s body. Or maybe Bobbi’s. Either way, Archer paled and turned his back to it, moving to stand beside Jaz and me. He set a hand on her back, and I let him take her.
As Jaz buried herself against Archer’s chest, I glanced down at my clothes. Covered in blood, thanks to her, but whatever. I didn’t care. I took the knife to the island, setting it down before going to Vaughn. From where he stood, I could see both Piper’s body and Bobbi’s.
God, what a fucking mess.
Piper’s neck was cut; if I had to guess, I’d say Bobbi caught her off-guard, maybe when she was cooking or something, while Jaz was still upstairs. No way Jaz would’ve watched and let Bobbi hurt her. Jaz loved her mom; she might complain about her and her parenting skills any chance she got, but that didn’t change the fact that she loved her.
Bobbi, on the other hand, was a mess. There was no single wound on her body. Her entire top half was littered in wounds; a quick count put the wounds at at least fifteen, but I’d bet any money there was more. Jaz really lost it.
Fuck. I had to call Oliver.
I pulled out my phone, and I saw Vaughn do the same thing as well. Vaughn wandered to the living room to talk, but I stood there, keeping an eye on both bodies and Archer and Jaz as Oliver answered: “Jacob, what is it?”
“You need to come home,” I said. “Something happened.”
“I’ll be right there.” No hesitation whatsoever on his end, and I hung up.
How could I tell him over the phone what happened? He and Piper had looked to be pretty close. No, that wasn’t a conversation you had with someone over the phone, but when he got here, I had to keep him out of the kitchen until I told him.
Vaughn returned a few moments later, saying, “My brother is on his way.”
I held back a bitter chuckle, because now was not the time to laugh. It was kind of priceless, though. The fucking Scotts were literally in everyone’s business. “I take it that means you don’t want me to call the police?” My fingers tightened around my phone, and I couldn’t help but glare at the tattooed kid.
“No,” Vaughn said. “I should call Dante, though.” His dark eyes roamed to Jaz, who still stood buried in Archer’s arms. “He’d want to be here for her.” So he made another call.
While he did that, I took to pacing. Eventually I wandered outside, hoping to catch Oliver right as he got out of his car. I didn’t care about the blood on my shirt, didn’t care what I looked like. Oliver would know the very moment he saw me what had happened, though he wouldn’t know who was dead until I told him or he pushed past me to get into the house.
Oliver’s car pulled into the long driveway after a while, and I couldn’t help but hold my breath as he drove up. The minute he got out and saw me covered in blood, the man looked like he wanted to be sick.
“No,” he said, hurrying over to me, leaving his car running. “Please tell me—”
“It’s Piper,” I said. “Bobbi killed her.” So much for me laying it on easy, but I supposed I’d never been one to sugarcoat things.
If my heart wasn’t already broken for Jaz, it would’ve been the moment Oliver listened to what I said. His mouth thinned into a line, his expression falling. I’d hated this man for so long for