Chapter 15
Emily's POV
I stared at my phone for the third time in ten minutes, thumb hovering over Ethan's contact. The cursor blinked in the empty text field like it was mocking me.
Just say thank you. It's not complicated.
Except it was. Because thanking him meant acknowledging what he'd done—sitting outside my building for an hour in a neighborhood where people didn't park unless they had to, where his truck probably stood out like a beacon screaming "rob me." It meant admitting I'd been wrong about his question this morning, that my paranoia had twisted something kind into something threatening.
It meant letting him see that his words had gotten through.
I typed: Thanks for the ride today. Stared at it. Deleted it. Tried again: I appreciate you waiting this morning, even though I wasn't there.
That sounded worse. Like I was some charity case he needed to rescue.
I locked my phone and tossed it onto my desk. The physics homework I'd been pretending to work on sat untouched in front of me, the equations blurring together into meaningless symbols. My mind kept circling back to the same moment—Ethan's voice in the hallway, steady and certain: You're not him. That's not who you are.
He'd said it like it was a fact. Like there was no question in his mind that I could be separate from my father, that whatever violence lived in Jack Gray's DNA hadn't somehow transferred to me through proximity and genetics.
I wanted to believe him. God, I wanted to believe him so badly it made my chest ache.
But I'd spent Friday night in a man's doorway, manipulating him into committing murder. I'd watched my father drive away toward a confrontation I'd orchestrated, knowing someone would die, and the only thing I'd felt was cold, surgical satisfaction. When the police knocked and I'd learned it was done—that Marvin was dead and my father would be blamed—the relief had been so sharp it had felt like vindication.
You're not him.
Maybe not. But I wasn't innocent either.
The knock on my bedroom door made me jump. "Yeah?"
Mom pushed the door open halfway, leaning against the frame. She looked tired—the kind of bone-deep exhaustion that came from years of holding your breath waiting for the next blow. "Just checking on you. You've been quiet since we got home."
"I'm fine." The lie came automatically. "Just homework."
She didn't move, her gaze lingering on my face like she was trying to read something written there. "That boy who drove you home. Ethan?"
My stomach tightened. "What about him?"
"He seems nice." She said it carefully, like she was testing the words. "Is he... are you two...?"
"No." I cut her off before she could finish. "We're just classmates. He was being nice because of everything that happened."
Mom nodded slowly, but something in her expression shifted—a flicker of what might have been disappointment or maybe concern. "Okay. I just wanted to make sure you knew you could talk to me. About anything."
The irony of that statement sat heavy between us. I'd never told her about the decision I'd made. I'd never told her about Marvin's apartment or the lies I'd fed him or the satisfaction I'd felt when I heard he was dead. There were whole rooms inside me she'd never been allowed to see, doors I'd locked years ago because opening them would mean admitting how much damage had already been done.
"I know," I said. "Thanks."
She hesitated another moment, then pushed off the doorframe. "Dinner in an hour. Try to take a break from studying, okay?"
I nodded, and she pulled the door closed behind her.
The silence that followed felt suffocating. I picked up my phone again, opened the text field, and this time I let myself type what I actually wanted to say: I know you waited this morning. My mom told me. I'm sorry I snapped at you. You didn't deserve that.
I hit send before I could overthink it.
The response came faster than I expected. It's okay. I get it.
Then, a few seconds later: For what it's worth, I'd do it again. Anytime you need a ride, just ask.
Something cracked in my chest—not breaking exactly, but shifting, like a frozen lake starting to thaw. I stared at those words until they blurred, until I had to blink hard to clear my vision.
Why? I typed. Then deleted it. Then typed it again and sent it before I could lose my nerve.
The three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.
Because I want to help. And because I think you've spent way too long dealing with everything alone.
I read it three times. Four. The words didn't change, but their weight did—settling somewhere deep where I'd been carrying the certainty that nobody would choose to stand beside me if they really knew what I was.
Okay, I typed back. It was all I could manage.
Okay, Ethan sent. See you tomorrow?
Yeah. See you tomorrow.
I set my phone down and pressed my palms against my eyes, breathing slowly through the tightness in my throat. This was dangerous. Letting someone get close meant risking exposure, meant trusting that they wouldn't look too hard at the parts of me I kept hidden. And Ethan was already looking. He'd seen the bruises, heard the fear in my voice, sat outside my building in the dark because he wanted to make sure I was safe.
If I let this continue—if I let him keep caring—eventually he'd see the rest. The coldness. The calculation. The part of me that could stand in a kitchen and wait for someone to die without flinching.
And then what?
You're not him, he'd said.
But what if the thing I was turning into was worse?