Buried (Heavy Hearts Book 3), page 38
At the last moment, my dad releases his hold on me, and Ayden yells, “Duck, Lexi!”
I do as he says, ducking and falling to the ground as Ayden leaps and sails over me, his eyes trained on my dad, his fist raised in a tight ball. The crunch is loud and is followed by a thump and a thud as I scramble on the ground to get away. When I turn back, I see Ayden and my dad in an intense fight. Punches are thrown by each of them. Growls and hisses drift up into the night sky as they tumble over the concrete driveway, like a pair of lions in a melee.
“Lexi!” Marcus skids to a stop by my side and quickly pulls me up off the ground to his side.
“We have to help Ayden.” I cry, even though it’s clear that he’s holding his own. I’ve seen hints of his dark side, and he’s told me a little about his past, but this guy, no, this man in front of me now, fighting with the ferocity to kill, is a side of him I haven’t witnessed.
“HELP!” Marcus screams at the top of his lungs. Over and over, he screams as Ayden’s fists connect with my dad’s face, while my dad starts to weaken, only able to get the odd one in.
Light suddenly fills the driveway as Barb and Tony come out of the house. Unfortunately, the sudden illumination distracts Ayden momentarily, which is long enough for my dad to land a blow that topples Ayden off him, falling still on the ground.
“Ayden!” I scream and try to run for him, but Marcus holds me back as my dad staggers to a stand, takes one last look at me with blood smearing his cheek and jaw, and darts into the darkened front garden just as the police round the fence line to enter the driveway.
“He went that way!” Tony yells, taking chase with the police.
I wrestle Marcus off me and dart towards Ayden, tears burning tracks down my cheeks. I land to a knee scraping stop at Ayden’s side, taking his head in my hands.
“Ayden! Ayden!” It’s all I can manage, and Marcus joins me on Ayden’s other side, nudging him repeatedly until a low groan greets us.
“Stop fucking nudging me.” Ayden’s words are a low rumble before his lids flutter open, and those ocean eyes peer up at me past dark lashes.
“Ayden,” I whisper, tears dripping off my lips and chin.
“I’ve died and gone to heaven.” His lips head north in a lazy grin, and I fall apart in a messy, smiling, crying heap as I cradle his head to me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
He got away! My dad fucking got away! The Fox Pines Police Department is useless! Well, all except Jason and maybe Burt. For fuck’s sake, he was right there. Ayden had weakened him, and still, the police couldn’t catch him.
To say I’m pissed is a fucking understatement! Unfortunately for the patrol that didn’t do their job properly, and the other two officers who arrived afterwards to take our statements, they heard all about it from my lips. I’ve had enough. It’s fucking laughable how ridiculous it is that my dad was able to sneak past the patrol in the first place and come right into the backyard of the Grady property. Then they lost him when they took chase on foot.
Andrea had rushed home from work after Barb called her, and she went into nurse mode, checking over her son and making him stay seated on the couch. Ayden kept relatively quiet through all the questions and answered what he could, but I didn’t miss the smirk he kept trying to hide when I gave the police a piece of my mind.
He had the shadow of a black eye forming and a fat lip, but all in all, I’d say he fared better than my dad did. If this situation weren’t so serious, I’d be dragging him up to his loft right now to show him the lady boner he gave me when I witnessed the beast inside him.
After the police leave and Andrea stops doting over her son, understandably, Barb makes us all hot chocolates, and we sit around the dining table, chatting about what happened. My mum is quiet. She’s hardly spoken throughout the whole incident, and as she stares into her cup of steaming hot chocolate, I recognise the guilt she is trying to hide. I’ve felt that exact same guilt so many times over the past couple of months. Guilt for dragging other people into my mess. Guilt for other people getting hurt because of me.
Standing from my chair, I release Ayden’s hand, which was wound tightly with mine under the table, and walk around the other side to my mum, squatting down next to her chair. She looks to the side, tilting her brown eyes down to meet mine, her brows meeting in the middle.
“Stop.” Keeping my voice soft, I rest my hand on her leg.
“Stop what?”
“Stop blaming yourself. This is not your fault.” My words induce my mum’s tears, and her hand comes to rest over mine on her leg.
“I can’t help it. If I didn’t torment your father so much about the file, he would never have come here.”
Offering my mum a sympathetic smile, I rise up a little closer so only she can hear, “He deserves everything he gets, mum. How he chooses to react is on him. It’s a lesson I’ve had to learn myself. One I’m still learning. He will never learn it, though. He will always blame everyone else for his shortcomings instead of taking responsibility for being a shitty person. This. Is. Not. Your. Fault.”
My mum’s eyes warm, softening at the corners as she studies my face. “I’m lucky to have you, Lexi.”
“I’m lucky to have you too.” I smile, meaning each word. For so long, I thought she was a shitty mum, but there was a reason behind everything she did. Even though the drugs changed her persona, she never stopped trying to protect me, even when I didn’t realise it.
Mum’s phone starts to ring with Burt’s name flashing across the screen. I smile at her and nod to her phone, letting her know it’s okay for her to take his call. I stand from beside her chair and make my way around the table back to Ayden, who hasn’t taken his eyes off me once, when my mum’s concerned voice draws my attention again. It draws everyone’s attention. Her eyes widen before they dart to me, and when she ends the call, she clears her throat to speak.
“Our house is on fire.”
For a few long, tense moments, we all stay silently rooted where we are before everyone leaps into action at the same time, running around frantically trying to find shoes and jackets to slip on. Within a couple of minutes, we pile into Andrea’s car, and she speeds through the sleepy streets of Fox Pines to get to our house. The house that holds all of our nightmares.
Fire trucks and emergency vehicles block the mouth of our street, so we leap from the car before Andrea has even parked it, and run up the street. Ayden has my hand, running faster than me, dragging me along, which is fine with me because I’m not watching where I’m going, not when all I can see is flames rising up into the dark sky from my house.
Coming to a stop on the other side of the road, we watch past the busy fire crew who are running around trying to connect hoses while some firefighters run into my burning house.
“Holy shit.” I think the words, but it’s Ayden who says them as we take a step back, the heat from the flames almost too much to bear.
“Fuck, Lexi. I’m sorry.” Marcus says, coming to my other side.
I don’t say anything. I can’t. All I’m able to do is watch on as the flames build in intensity.
“Lexi.” My mum’s cry gains my attention, and Marcus steps out of the way so she can hug me to her side. She’s upset, but as I take her in, I see a hint of happiness. Why would she be happy?
Glancing back at the engulfed house, I realise I feel a little happiness, too. I hate that fucking house! It holds nothing but toxic memories, and the fact that it’s burning right now is fucking deserving, if you ask me.
A couple of firefighters come rushing out of the front door, calling to their commander that the house is all clear but is not safe to go back into and that the line needs to be moved back. I don’t know what that means, but when a neighbour from up the road who is hovering on the sidelines having a sticky beak calls out, dread fills my gut.
“There’s someone in there, on the second floor!”
The firefighters turn to where my neighbour is pointing, and that’s when I see who it is—my dad.
“Where is it, Ruth?” He bellows from my shattered bedroom window upstairs, and the firefighters yell for him to climb out the window, that it isn’t safe to be inside.
He doesn’t listen. “Where’s the file, Ruth!” He screams out into the night, sending chills up my spine.
“Mum.” I cry as she moves from my side and takes a step towards the house.
“Get out of there, Max!” She screams, cupping her hands around her mouth, trying to force the words past the roaring of the flames.
My dad screams with rage like a crazy man and steps back from the window into my room and closer to the flames licking up the walls.
“Dad!” The moment the words leave my lips, the house explodes.
The force of the explosion throws us backwards. As if in slow motion, I feel the rush of heat as it passes over our falling bodies, singeing and scolding while debris rains over us and the surrounding houses.
After a dizzying moment, I prop up on my elbows next to my mum, whose face is a mixture of stunned and devastated.
“Mum,” I whisper, and without taking her eyes off the inferno, she reaches out, grasping my hand.
“Lex.” Ayden sit’s up by my side, his hands roaming over me frantically, checking for injuries. I can’t look at him. All I can do is look at my mum.
“No one was meant to be in the house.” She whispers, and my eyes widen before I glance at Ayden. He heard what she said, too.
“It was meant to be empty.” She whispers again, and I quickly throw my arms around her and pull her to my side, pressing her cheek against mine.
“Mum,” I whisper, “You need to stop talking.”
“Max wasn’t meant to be inside.” She whispers back, and I pull away to place my hands on each side of her face, forcing her to look at me instead of the fire.
“Mum, listen to me,” I growl, her brown eyes looking confused. “Are you listening?”
It takes her a moment, but I see when the fog starts to clear in her eyes, and I know she is listening. “Stop. Talking.”
Understanding dawns and her hand flies to her mouth. “Oh my god.” She looks around frantically to see if anyone overheard her.
“It’s okay. I don’t think anyone heard but lets not talk about that here.” I whisper, and she nods.
We both turn back, huddled together, watching the flames as the firefighters start to douse the inferno with water. There are emergency services officers running around everywhere, but amongst the chaos, we stay sitting in one of our neighbour’s front yards, where the force of the explosion left us.
The soothing touch of Ayden rubs over my back constantly, and Barb comes up to do the same to my mum, offering her support she probably isn’t used to receiving. At some stage, Simon turns up with Garrett and Shaun, and Jared comes with his parents. I guess Marcus contacted the guys. I don’t know, and I don’t ask. I’m just glad that they are here with me to watch the house that held my nightmares, my mum’s nightmares, turn to ash, and with it, my dad.
Silent tears stream down my face as bittersweet feelings play with my emotions. The monsters, both of them, are dead. Gone. They can no longer hurt us or anyone else, yet the little girl in me, the innocent one who looked up to her dad, her hero, mourns his loss. I remind myself that I lost him weeks ago when he revealed his true self. Maybe even long before that, when he stopped returning home. He had me fooled for so long, and now, the toxic man he was can no longer taint this world.
It’s well into the early hours of the morning by the time the fire is out, and police are left to rummage through the wreck with a couple of firefighters to search for my dad’s body. An ambulance is parked off to the side, and when they pull the gurney from the back, I know they got the call that a body has been found. Or whatever is left of a body.
“Mrs West?” Officer Zimora approaches us, dressed in uniform and acting formally.
Barb helps my mum up off the ground while I stay in place on the grass, looking up at them.
“I’m sorry to inform you that we have recovered a body in the fire and believe it is your husband, Maxwell West. An autopsy will confirm his DNA, but we don’t believe it could be anyone else.” Jason’s eyes flick to mine, and even though the monster is gone, more tears spring free.
My mum doesn’t speak. She just nods, still crying too.
“Why don’t you go home and get some sleep. We can catch up tomorrow if you would like to go over any other details.” Jason says, and my mum nods before letting Barbera lead her away.
Squatting down on his haunches, Jason addresses me. “I’m sorry, Lexi. I know this is yet another terrible thing to happen, but if you can take anything positive from this, at least it’s all over now.” He’s not being a cop right now. He’s being a friend.
“Thank you,” I say through my tears, and he shoots me a sympathetic smile before standing and walking away.
“Lex,” Ayden’s low voice rumbles quietly next to my ear, “I think someone wants to talk to you.”
Confused, I look at him, and when he turns his eyes towards the shadows across the road, I squint, trying to see what he sees. My heart rate picks up speed when I see the shadowed silhouette of a small frame that looks very much like Valarie.
“Val?” I whisper and stand up from the grassy ground.
Walking hurriedly across the road to the shadows, I come face to face with my twelve-year-old neighbour, Valarie.
“Hey Lexi. I’m really sorry about your house. And your dad. Not your brother, though. I’m not sorry he’s dead.” The sweet innocence that I’d become so familiar with is void in Val’s tone. There is no sweetness, just a hardness that only comes from experiencing unimaginable pain.
“Can I hug you?” My lip wobbles as I speak, and when she nods, I wrap my arms around her so tight that I think I’ll never be able to let go.
“I miss you,” Val whispers in my ear before she returns my hug, and we stand wrapped in each other’s arms, crying silently for the longest time.
When we finally pull apart, Val swipes her tears away like they scold her cheeks, and then she sucks in a deep breath, the hardness I saw before returning.
“Mum’s moving us up to New South Wales to live closer to her sister. I don’t want to go, but I don’t get a say.”
“Oh.” My heart sinks. This is because of me.
“Keep your Instagram account open. When mum stops watching me like a hawk, I’ll make a fake account, so I can contact you. If that’s okay?” Val shifts nervously, and I smile.
“Of course it’s okay. But try not to get into trouble. Your mum loves you. That’s why she is overprotective.”
She smirks. “You call it overprotective. I call it psycho.”
I laugh before Val’s next words wipe the smile off my face.
“Thank you for killing him, Lexi. He deserved to die.”
It’s heartbreaking to hear those words come from a twelve-year-old. I may have slayed that demon for her, but I know from experience that the demons in her head are now what will plague her for a very long time.
“He did deserve to die.” I agree with Val, and she gives me a nod.
“I’d better go before mum finds me gone.”
“Good idea. Talk soon, okay?” I don’t want to let her go. I want to grab her and hug her for the rest of time, so when she offers me one last tiny smile before turning her back to sink back into the shadows of her front yard, I fight the urge to reach out to her, knowing that I have to let her go.
Exhaustion sends us crashing to our beds when we finally get back to the Grady’s. We don’t even shower away the soot and dirt, which is a regret when we wake at lunchtime on Friday smelling like a campfire.
I shower first, and by the time I return, Ayden has stripped the bed and taken our dirty things to the washer. I wonder if he realises how fucking hot it is that he does things like clean? He’s a keeper. I’m never letting him go!
While Ayden showers, I go in search of my mum. Last night was a lot. This whole week has been a lot, and my emotions are all over the place. Surely hers are, too, especially after the odd things she said last night while we watched our house burn with my dad inside.
I find her sitting on the bed in the lilac bedroom that was mine a short time ago. She looks younger than she is with her legs crossed as she scrolls through something on her phone.
“Mum?” My words draw her attention, and when she sees me standing in the doorway, she pats the bed next to her.
“Come in. Close the door.”
I do as she asks and shut the door before climbing next to her to take a look at her phone screen when she angles towards me.
“There are a few rental properties that are close by. I figured it would be nice for you to stay close to your friends.” My mum’s smile is small and unsure, so I ease her worry by beaming happily at her.
“I’d love to stay close to Ayden and Marcus. Andrea too.” I shrug, and her smile widens.
“Andrea is lovely. I’m so grateful she was there for you while I got my shit together. She’s been here for me, too, helping me sort through my own issues. She’s also connected me with a local addiction support group. She’s going to come with me for my first session tomorrow.”
“Wow, mum. That’s so great.”
“We’re going to get through this, Lexi.” Sighing, my mum drops her phone to the bed and stares at her hands for a moment. “You make me want to be a better person.”
Confused, I frown at my mum’s words, and she brings her eyes to mine.
“Your strength is inspiring. You are so much stronger than I have ever been. Your drive to fight for what’s right is so honourable. I’m so proud of you, Lexi, and one day, when I’ve worked through the mess in my head and faced the things I’ve been ignoring, I hope you’ll be proud of me too.”
