The Fall of V

by Jessica Gadziala

  Even though I had a text from Lo that claimed the other girl - Chris - said that Ferryn hadn't been abused. Other than the bumps and bruises she got for striking out first.

  It wasn't about the severity of the damage done to her.

  It was that no harm should have ever come to her on my watch. And my watch was twenty-four-fucking-seven hours a day.

  That was my one goddamn job.

  And I failed at it.

  I had failed her.

  So badly that she now couldn't trust me to do a better job in the future.

  So badly that she thought the only answer was to run off, find someone to turn her into an even more lethal weapon than she already was.

  And then what?

  Even if she managed to sneak away with all of us looking for her, what was the plan?

  Weeks?

  Months?

  God, years?

  I couldn't fucking fathom that reality.

  "She said she was going to call or write," Iggy said, seeming to sense my worry, my uncertainty, my confusion. "She said as soon as she lands somewhere, she was going to get in contact. She doesn't want you to worry."

  Right.

  Like there was any chance of us not worrying.

  For however long she was gone.

  Didn't matter if four years passed, she was over twenty, and had a life of her own going. I would still worry. Every fucking moment of the day.

  And Summer.

  Fuck.

  Summer.

  She had to have known what this would do to her mother, her mother who already felt guilty about the entire V situation as a whole even though she had no hand in it, couldn't help where she had come from.

  And she had just started to come back to us. After Lyon's murder right there in front of her eyes. After the long spell of grief that came from that.

  Then this fucking V shit.

  And now Ferryn was going off on her own.

  At sixteen years old?

  Couldn't even drive a car yet, and she was going to make a life for herself without us?

  God, I hoped she at least had the sense to take money. Hell, fucking drain the account for all I cared. Whatever she needed so she never felt desperate, never had to stay in unsafe areas, never had to defend herself against predatory hands again.

  "Anything else you can think to tell me, Iggs?" I asked, watching as she seemed to replay the whole situation in her head.

  "I gave her a piece of jewelry to hock if she needs it. And my laptop."

  "You're a good kid, Iggs. I'll pay you back for that."

  "That's not necessary," Vance cut back in.

  "It is," I countered. "And if you two need anything, you let me know. You two did everything you could to help me find my girl. I won't forget that."

  They left a few minutes later.

  I didn't see Iggs for years.

  Or the dark-haired guy who used to sit in the driveway not looking at my daughter.

  Not until he showed up at my gates for a third time.

  Calling in his marker.

  Wanting to prospect.

  But that was a story for another day.

  --

  Summer

  Everyone was watching me as though they expected me to splinter apart.

  Maze had called in the girls club like some emergency intervention, like they would all be there with tweezers and glue in case I needed to be put back together.

  My daughter was gone.

  My daughter who I had spent every single day with for sixteen years... was gone.

  The most surreal part of that whole realization was that it couldn't overtake everything, it couldn't change the fact that, well, even with her absence a giant hole in our home, in our hearts, life had to go on.

  Dishes still piled in the sink, needing to be cleaned. Laundry piled in the hampers, needing to be washed. My hollow-legged boys still needed three - or, let's face it, at their age... five - square meals a day. Homework needed to be done. Bills needed to be paid.

  Life had to keep moving forward.

  Even as her bedroom collected dust bunnies in corners.

  Even as her library books went so overdue that Reese showed up to the house to retrieve them herself.

  Even as our phone didn't ring.

  Even as our mail never brought word from her.

  And I couldn't get a moment alone to process the whole situation. Even when the boys went back to school, giving me my mornings and early afternoons.

  Even then, the times when I was usually left to my own devices to catch up on chores, or wallow as I wanted to do now, there was no peace.

  Someone showed up at the door with food, with plans to go out, with demands I come back to training.

  As if keeping me busy could make me forget that my daughter was missing. That a giant chunk of my life was gone. That life would never again be the same.

  At least not until she came home.

  If she came home.

  "Mom," Fallon said, making me jolt hard away from the potato I was supposed to be peeling as Reign sat just a few feet away, casting worried glances in my direction every few minutes.

  "Yeah, bud?" I asked, forcing a small smile.

  "Where's Ferryn?" he asked.

  He hadn't.

  Asked.

  Finn had.

  Twice.

  He was younger.

  He was easier to placate with a careful white lie.

  Fallon?

  Yeah, he was getting older, smarter.

  And, like I had come to expect from him with his quiet introspection, he bided his time, weighed his words.

  Then came for the gut-punch.

  Two weeks later.

  When I had taken a breath finally, thinking he was just going to let it go, that it was one thing off of my very full plate.

  "And don't tell me that camp story," he added when I opened my mouth to tell him exactly that.

  My gaze found Reign's, seeing his opinion there before he even opened his mouth to tell me it. "He's not a kid anymore."

  I looked back at Fallon, unable to see him as anything other than my little boy.

  But, at the same time, I could see my mistakes so clearly in hindsight.

  The lies or evasions we had fed to Ferryn over the years, over the last several months especially.

  Had she been in on things from the beginning, would the situation had played out differently? Would she never have slipped her guard? Would she have understood why we had been so strict? Would she never have been taken? Would she be here right now with me?

  And because I had no answers, because all I had was the harsh reality that may have stemmed from our silence, I took a deep breath, and I told our son what had happened, where his sister had gone.

  He was silent for a long few moments after, thinking it through, considering his words.

  "She'll be back," he decided, tone full of a confidence I wish I possessed. "You know her. She'll be back. When she feels ready," he added. "And until she's ready, I don't think you're going to find her."

  There had been no leads.

  Some bus drivers who remembered her, though had mistaken her for a boy, but couldn't remember in which direction she had taken off in after they dropped her.

  Janie and Alex and a whole slew of hackers they had hired for the job hadn't found a single trace of her.

  They looked in the most likely of places.

  New York

  Philly.

  Chicago.

  Nothing.

  Not a single breadcrumb.

  Not even Gunner, who had been on it day and night, could pick up a trace.

  Our girl was a ghost.

  Utterly un-find-able.

  Just how she wanted to be.

  And Fallon was right.

  We would only find her when she was ready.

  When she wanted to be found.

  That was a hard reality to accept.

  First, as an adult, a whole team of worldly, exp
erienced adults actually, to be bested, thwarted by a teenager.

  Second, as a parent, to be unable to know the most basic of things - if their baby was okay. If they were eating. If they had a roof over their heads at night. If they were safe.

  But that was the reality we were forced to live with.

  It was a full month before we got a letter with no return address, though the postmark was from Pennsylvania.

  "Mom, Dad, and, well, everyone else -

  I know you're worried. I know you don't understand. But I had to do this. I promise I am safe. I'm eating - you can even tell Rey that I am eating the veggies she always tried to push on me. I have a place to stay. I don't know how long I will be here. But I am welcome for however long I need to be. And when I am ready, I promise I will come home.

  And until then, I'll write.

  Mom, I know you need more than that. So, I will write once every week.

  Dad, stop beating yourself up. This isn't your fault. This is just something I had to do for myself.

  Fallon, watching other kids play Minecraft is a waste of time. Go take some lessons with Uncle Pagan.

  Give Finn my room. He's too old to share with Fallon now.

  And please tell Aunt Lo and Uncle Cash to take care of Chris. She needs them. She was so broken. But if there is anyone I know with a steady hand with glue, it's Aunt Lo.

  Tell Aunt Janie, and Uncle Malc, and, well, anyone who ever trained me for even one afternoon that it helped. It all helped. When I wanted to give up, give in, just surrender to it all, it was their voices in my head telling me to get up, to fight. And thank you, Mom. Because I know you were the one who made sure I got that training.

  Oh, and my library books are overdue. Can you give them back before Aunt Reese has a heart attack?

  I love you, more than you know. And I'm sorry I am making you worry. But I promise I am fine.

  XOXO Ferryn."

  Fallon started lessons the next day.

  Finn moved into Ferryn's room a few months later, when we knew for sure that there was no reason to leave it as a shrine.

  And me, well, I waited for that letter.

  Every single week.

  Of every single month.

  Of every single year.

  It always came.

  Until one week... it didn't.

  TEN

  Ferryn

  You could count the time that passed in many different ways.

  By the birthdays of my brothers I missed, and felt an almost crippling stab of guilt over.

  By the Christmases I didn't spend baking cookies with my mother.

  By the sheer volume of times I considered giving up, giving in, going home.

  You could even measure it by other things.

  Newer things.

  Like by the number of bruises I had accumulated over the course of each twelve-month period.

  How many times I broke the little bones in my hands.

  How many times I had to have something stitched.

  How many new styles of fighting I learned.

  How much skill I had managed to pack into that time.

  Until one day, I did it.

  I bested my teacher.

  A feat never before accomplished.

  One I never thought would occur.

  But I did it.

  And that meant one thing.

  I had no idea what I might return to.

  What hurt feelings there might be to be found.

  What resentments I would have to bear.

  What awkwardness I would have to endure as people grew without me.

  What new faces and connections I would have to learn.

  But regardless of all of that, it was time.

  I was going back to Navesink Bank.

  DON'T FORGET

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for taking time out of your life to read this book. If you loved this book, I would really appreciate it if you could hop onto Goodreads or Amazon and tell me your favorite parts. You can also spread the word by recommending the book to friends or sending digital copies that can be received via kindle or kindle app on any device.

  ALSO BY JESSICA GADZIALA

  If you liked this book, check out these other series and titles in the NAVESINK BANK UNIVERSE:

  The Henchmen MC

  Reign

  Cash

  Wolf

  Repo

  Duke

  Renny

  Lazarus

  Pagan

  Cyrus

  Edison

  Reeve

  Sugar

  The Savages

  Monster

  Killer

  Savior

  Mallick Brothers

  For A Good Time, Call

  Shane

  Ryan

  Mark

  Eli

  Investigators

  367 Days

  14 Weeks

  Dark

  Dark Mysteries

  Dark Secrets

  Dark Horse

  Professionals

  The Fixer

  The Ghost

  STANDALONES WITHIN NAVESINK BANK:

  Vigilante

  Grudge Match

  OTHER SERIES AND STANDALONES:

  Stars Landing

  What The Heart Needs

  What The Heart Wants

  What The Heart Finds

  What The Heart Knows

  The Stars Landing Deviant

  Surrogate

  The Sex Surrogate

  Dr. Chase Hudson

  DEBT

  Dissent

  Into The Green

  Stuffed: A Thanksgiving Romance

  Unwrapped

  Peace, Love, & Macarons

  A Navesink Bank Christmas

  Don't Come

  Fix It Up

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Jessica Gadziala is a full-time writer, parrot enthusiast, and coffee drinker from New Jersey. She enjoys short rides to the book store, sad songs, and cold weather.

  She is very active on Goodreads, Facebook, as well as her personal groups on those sites. Join in. She's friendly.

  STALK HER

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  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JessicaGadziala/

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  <3/ Jessica