Sins of Mine - Mary E. Twomey Page 0,50
in the grass. I can’t hear much, and am grateful that the world is mildly muted. I don’t want to hear the absence of birds in the woods I used to love. I don’t want to hear Paxton’s condemnation for murdering his father right in front of him.
But that’s the one thing I should be listening to. This was my dark deed, and I should endure the fallout without shirking from the responsibility. I ready for him to cuss me out. I brace myself for Paxton leaving. I deserve every bit of it.
I also don’t regret what I’ve done. Maybe I should. Maybe that’s my second grave sin. King Regis is—was—a monster, set on doing whatever he could to line the treasury at the sacrifice of his own people.
Still, I don’t consider my actions heroic. I know full well that I finally deserve the cell from which I’ve escaped.
I’m the villain, though it took the world telling me that’s what I was before I fully assumed the role.
Regis labeled me a criminal, and finally, now I am.
Paxton kneels beside his father with Gray at his side. My prince’s eyes are wide and rimmed in red as he combs over the lifeless man who made his existence pure agony.
He leans over and kisses his dad’s forehead. “Rest well, Father. Do not cause as much torment in the afterlife as you did here. I hope you finally find your peace.”
Then he rests Regis’ arm across his unmoving chest. Paxton stands against the backdrop of the forest, confusing me when he picks up his father by the ankles.
“What are you doing?”
Paxton glances over at me as if I’ve missed some obvious step. “I’m moving his body into the cottage. If we leave him out here like this, they’ll come looking for the person who shot him. If he burns in a building filled with other criminals, the story is complete, and they won’t go digging for more.”
My mouth falls open when Paxton doesn’t throw an ounce of condemnation my way. In fact, he’s going so far as to cover over my sin.
It makes no sense.
“Are you sure?”
Paxton wears a wry look, as if to ask what I expected. “Positive. Can you get the door, darlyss?”
My limbs find the wherewithal to scamper to the cabin, tugging the edge of my shirt over my hand before I touch the knob. Even through the fabric, it’s hot.
When the door opens, I scoot to the side, letting Paxton move his father’s body, which really, should be my job. The heat licks at us, and though it makes me sad to watch our little cottage in the woods burn, I know this is the way it must be.
My father must be burning with his men inside near the front door. I wonder if he’s already dead.
I wonder if part of me is also hopelessly lifeless.
I’m not sad. Or, if I am sad, it’s hitting me at the wrong angle.
Paxton drops his father’s ankles once his head is all the way inside the doorway and then nods to me, moving past my stunned form out into the fresh air. “Come on, darlyss. We don’t want to be anywhere near this mess.” Then he kneels beside Rafe, who is whimpering and having trouble standing on three legs. Paxton coughs out a fair amount of smoke as he does what he can to help Rafe.
Rafe howls through his pain, and part of me panics that his injury might be too much for his body to handle.
I take a step toward my true family, but pause when I hear the sound of my father shouting my name. “Arlanna! Help me!”
“Daddy?”
I shouldn’t call him that. I shouldn’t feel five years old, hoping for his attention and time. He kidnapped me and locked me in a closet, swearing he wasn’t going to let me out until my hair grew back.
I turn toward the anguished sound, horrified to find him barreling toward me, red-faced and singed from too much fire. His hands are burned and blistered, but that doesn’t stop them from reaching out to wrap around my throat, searing my skin.
“All I wanted was for you to help me! Was that too much to ask? I needed your hair! I needed it, but that didn’t matter to you!”
He’s a professional, so his thumb closes over my windpipe, pressing too hard for me to suck in one last breath.
Then again, I was raised by a professional, so instead of fighting with his fingers, I claw