what it was. “You… you got to know her while she was working with Tony… didn’t you?” I ask.
She nods as she angrily wipes at her eyes. “I did. When she started working for us, I didn’t know who she was. I thought she was just another person off the streets like the others. She seemed sad but when she talked to me, she lit up. I spent so much time with her because I felt like I could avoid the shit my father was doing, because I felt like I finally had someone there for me. I… I loved her. I know she didn’t feel about me that same way, but she was kind to me and caring and then one day she just disappeared. It felt like my heart was destroyed and I knew I had to find her. My father said he had no idea who she was or where she went, but I knew something had to have happened to her. No, she didn’t love me the way I loved her, but she still cared enough about me that I knew she wouldn’t leave me. I spent a year looking for her, Killian. A year. So please, Killian, please tell me. Where is she? What happened to her? Did she really leave me?”
I stare at her for a long moment as I realize that every step of this, every moment of this was for Rose to get into my life to figure out what happened to Brandy. And for some reason, I find that I can’t even hate her for it. Because it seems like for the first time, someone besides me even cares about what happened to her. My father wrote her off and my mother cares more about drugs than any of her children.
Rose desperately grabs for me. “Killian, please… please tell me what happened to her. Did she leave? Did she run away? Where is she?”
“I… she started working for Tony and my father. I know she did it because she was obsessed with making my father see her as if she were his child. She thought that if she did this for him, he’d appreciate her. And he finally did. He was finally happy with her, but she was losing herself to the darkness of this world my father has created. This twisty dark hell that once you’re in, you just can’t break free. So I went to her and I begged her to see what she was doing and for her to understand it was wrong. That she was helping to put toxic weapons out into the world. That she should run away and stop doing these awful things. She was such a kind and caring person that I think me saying it finally helped it sink in. And… so she listened.”
Rose looks hopeful for the first time since I stepped into this room. “She got away?”
And I realize that in this moment I have to crush her. I have to ruin everything she’s searched for, everything she’s done for the person she loves… loved.
Could I ever do that? Could I ever love anyone that much again? I cared deeply for my sister, but when she left me, I felt like she ripped a crucial part out of me. And as I saw her laughing and smiling with Tony’s men, I realized she left me behind to deal with Father alone and I began to resent her. Then when Rose came into my life, I thought that I finally had another who cared for me, and while she might, it was all for Brandy.
Slowly, I shake my head, unsure if it’s better for her to live her life searching or to finally know. “No… I made her see the guilt of her ways. I showed her what she was doing, and she couldn’t handle it so she killed herself,” I say, my voice catching.
The color drains from her face as she watches me, her eyes searching me closely. “No… no, no, no. Please. Please tell me you’re lying. You’re lying! She wouldn’t do that! She wouldn’t leave everything behind!”
“Yeah? You think she wouldn’t leave you behind?” I yell. “What about me? She left me in this hell! She left me behind with the realization that I killed her! If I hadn’t talked her out of this, she would have been alive. I made her feel enough guilt that she died.”
I turn and rush through the door but when I see who’s