Chapter 92 Part 92

Chapter 92 Part 92
Axl

They left that same night and boarded a commercial flight to Boston. The decision had been made quickly, almost instinctively, leaving little room for hesitation. He moved through the airport on autopilot, muscles tight beneath his skin, his thoughts racing faster than his feet. They flew first class, and he kept the baseball cap pulled low on his head, the brim casting a shadow over his eyes. It didn’t matter. People still recognized him—the double takes, the whispered names, the phones raised just a little too casually. Even when he turned his face away or shifted in his seat, someone always seemed to catch a glimpse. It was ridiculous how little privacy existed anymore.
Aspen sat beside him, calm on the surface, though he could feel the tension in her whenever their arms brushed. Her fingers curled and uncurled in her lap, a small, unconscious movement that told him she was thinking just as hard as he was. When the plane finally landed and they disembarked, the stale cabin air gave way to the colder night breeze outside the terminal.
Aspen rented a car in her name when they finally collected their luggage. Axl grabbed the keys without a word and loaded their suitcases into the back of the SUV, his movements sharp and efficient. He slid behind the wheel and sped away from the airport, the city lights blurring past as his foot pressed harder on the accelerator than usual.
“Is this to do with Weston?” Aspen asked quietly, breaking the heavy silence that had settled between them.
“I think so,” Axl replied, eyes fixed on the road. “There’s no other reason North would sound like he’s shitting himself. Something happened.” The words tasted bitter as he said them, the old dread crawling back up his spine.
It took a little more than half an hour to reach North’s apartment building. Axl pulled into the underground parking area, and slid into North’s second parking spot. They left their luggage in the car. Axl took Aspen’s hand as they headed up the maintenance stairs, the metal steps cold beneath their feet, the air smelling faintly of oil and dust.
He knocked once. The door flew open almost immediately. North stood there, his face pale, relief flashing briefly in his eyes before he pulled Axl into a hug.
“Come in.”
“Hey,” Aspen said softly as she stepped inside, her gaze sweeping the apartment. It looked the same—neat, orderly, sterile. “Where’s Jordan?”
“Visiting her sister,” North said, giving Axl a pointed look that carried far more weight than the words. “We need to talk.”
Axl clenched his jaw. “Aspen knows. I told her everything.”
North’s eyes widened. “What the hell, Axl? What happened to ‘we never, ever talk about this again’?”
Axl glanced at Aspen, his expression softening despite the tension coiled in his body. “It’s Aspen we’re talking about. You know if she was here two years ago, she would’ve helped us get rid of the bastard.”
North dragged his hands through his hair and dropped onto the couch, elbows resting on his knees. The exhaustion etched into his face was impossible to miss. “The cops know most of it,” he said. “They had me in an interrogation room yesterday.” He swallowed. “They say the last person that called Merit’s phone was our dad. They’re making the right theories. They think we killed him. They just don’t have any proof.”
“We need to go back to that house and get rid of his body,” Aspen said, her voice steady but firm.
“They can’t ever find him, North,” Axl said, the words heavy with finality.
“I know,” North replied. He leaned back and stared at the ceiling for a moment. “But I’ve been thinking. What if Weston had Merit there at that house? What if he killed her before we killed him?”
The thought made Axl’s stomach twist. “You think he’d kill her?”
North let out a harsh snort and looked at him. “Yeah. I think he was completely capable of killing her. He called her, Axl. Tell me, why haven’t we heard from Merit again? Two years, and nobody’s heard from her. Doesn’t that strike you as a little odd?”
A cold weight settled in Axl’s chest. “We should go now.”
“What if the police follow you?” Aspen asked. “If they already think you killed him, they’ll have people watching you.”
“I told my lawyer to let me know if they get a search warrant for that house,” North said. “I played it off as making note of the contents. We could always say we went there to make an inventory of anything valuable before they searched it.”
Axl nodded slowly. “That’s good. Let’s go then. If they do follow us, they can’t go onto the property without a warrant. They can assume as much as they want. There’s no evidence linking us to his death. They don’t even know for sure that he’s dead.”
Ten minutes later, all three of them were in the car. Aspen sat in the back, her presence a quiet anchor as Axl sped down the street toward Charlton. The roads were empty, dark, stretching endlessly ahead. No headlights followed them. Still, his grip on the steering wheel remained tight.
He pulled the SUV around the house and parked it at the back, where anyone driving past wouldn’t be able to see it. The property was isolated, surrounded by trees and silence, the kind that pressed in on you. It was remote enough for them to spot any approaching cars long before they arrived.
North switched the lights on in the barn, dust motes swirling in the sudden brightness. Together, he and Axl pushed the tractor back, metal groaning under the effort. Axl pulled the trapdoor open and took out his phone, the flashlight casting harsh beams down the narrow stairs.
When they reached the bottom, they froze. “Where the hell is he?”
There was nothing there. No body. No blanket. The space was empty, eerily clean. A few feet ahead stood a wooden door, half-hidden in shadow. They exchanged glances, unease settling deep in their bones.
“What is that?” Aspen asked.
Axl moved first, pulling the door open. Aspen’s breath caught as they stared at the underground bedroom—too deliberate, too intact.
“You think Merit was in here?” North asked quietly as they stepped inside.
Aspen opened drawers using her shirt sleeve. “There’s even a bathroom.”
Axl searched the room, pulling drawers open. Nothing. A plastic container held games and notebooks, neatly packed, untouched. The bed was made, the room disturbingly orderly.
“Are you guys sure you killed Weston?”
They both turned toward her. North answered without hesitation. “I shot him between his eyes, Aspen. I’m sure.”
“Then whoever found him didn’t want anyone to know he was dead,” she said. “They did us a favor. But this room?” She gestured around. “It’s a problem.”
North shook his head. “Or we say it was a safe room.”
“Who the hell has a safe room underground with the trapdoor in plain sight?” Axl said, rubbing his chin against his shoulder. “It won’t work. But we can repack it. Make it storage.”
They spent hours moving furniture, sweat soaking through their clothes, muscles aching. By the time they finished, the room no longer looked like someone’s sick underground refuge.
When they drove back to Cambridge, silence filled the car. North sat in the back now. Aspen rested her hand on Axl’s thigh, grounding him.
“We’ll be fine,” she said softly. “We’ll get through this.”