SAY YOU LOVE ME (Eva Rae Thomas Mystery Book 4)

by Willow Rose

  I drove onto the side of the road, making sure I wasn’t on school grounds, then got out and approached her. She spotted me and stopped the bike, then took off her earbuds.

  “Lauren,” I said. “Could I take five minutes of your time?”

  She looked at her watch, then nodded. “Sure. I’m late anyway. It doesn’t matter. They’ve cut us a lot of slack these days, after the … well, you know that day. They don’t even give us tardy slips anymore. It’s been hard for us all to get out of bed these days. It’s also hard on our parents. This morning, my mom kept crying; I just couldn’t … I couldn’t leave her like that. She’s so worried something is going to happen to me. I keep telling her that the chance of something like that happening twice is really small, but she’s just … so worried. I can’t blame her. I’m terrified too. I can’t stand being in a crowd of people anymore, you know? I keep looking around me and checking every face and hand, thinking I can spot it on them if they’re about to pull out a gun and start to shoot. I’ve looked into the eyes of a school shooter once, and I keep thinking I now can see it in them as if there’s some sign to look for, some tell. But there isn’t.”

  “I’m sorry you have to deal with this, and your mom too,” I said, thinking about my own daughter, Olivia. She had been through her share of tough stuff to deal with this year, and it broke my heart. All you want to do is protect them, but no matter how protective you are as a parent, you just can’t control everything. It was a hard lesson for me to learn. I wanted to wrap my poor babies in the softest cotton and keep them safe from anything this world might expose them to, but I couldn’t. Some things were just out of your control. You had to send them off every day and pray that they’d make it home, that some guardian angel watched over them, helping them get through the school day alive.

  “And I’m not going to take up much of your time. I just need you to take a look at a picture.”

  I pulled out my phone and showed her the picture that was found in Adam’s hand.

  “That’s Allyson,” she said.

  “That’s what I thought,” I said. “But what about this? It was written on the back of the picture. These letters here. SYLM? Do you know what that means?”

  I showed her the text, and she read it. Her lips pulled into a sad smile. “It’s an abbreviation for something they used to say to one another. One would say: Say you love me, and then the other would repeat back: you love me. It was a thing between Adam and Allyson. It was kind of cute.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The hospital was so quiet. At least in the small room he was in. E.T. stood bent over the boy, filming him with his phone. The machines were breathing for him, making sweet music, as his chest heaved rhythmically up and down. The smell in the room was of decay. The boy was half-dead already.

  E.T. reached out and stroked the boy gently across the cheek, then whispered in his ear.

  “It won’t hurt, not even a bit.”

  E.T. filmed the entire body and looked at the numbers on his phone. So far, only fifty had tuned in. There weren’t as many as last time when he had filmed the men dying at the Ritz-Carlton. That one attracted almost a thousand viewers and hundreds of comments. Today, there weren’t even close to one hundred people watching, but it would have to do. The few that checked in certainly shouldn’t have done so in vain. They came to watch a show, and he’d give them just that. Besides, more might check in as he went along.

  E.T. smiled deeply before he reached over and pulled out the tube from the boy’s mouth and throat, making sure he filmed every part of it as it slid out. The sound it made when coming out made him think of a slithering snake. He stood for a few seconds and looked at the sleeping boy, while the boy gurgled, then gasped for air, and his body began to spasm.

  E.T. felt his heart rate go up as he watched him, filming the entire thing. He noticed that the numbers were going up rapidly. Word that he was at it again was spreading among his followers, his fans. He reached a hundred and fifty; then it bumped up to almost five hundred. That wasn’t half bad.

  E.T. felt that the seconds went by like years. The monitor next to him finally flatlined, and an alarm went off. E.T. kept filming as he could hear voices coming from outside the door. He put the tube back in the boy’s mouth, stuffing it forcefully down his throat as far as he could get it with the little time he had, then turned around and left. He got out of the door and filmed just as nurses rushed in, fixated on the boy, not noticing him at all.

  He then gave his viewers a thumbs up before he rushed down the hallway, looking forward to seeing her face when Eva Rae found out, once she realized what had happened.

  He wanted her to know he was in charge. That was his message for her today.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  I drove back to the house, feeling disappointed. No, it was more than that. I was discouraged. I really wanted those letters on the back of the photograph to be something else. I wanted it to be something that would break open the case for me, giving me a lead of some kind, but it wasn’t. It just confirmed to me that they loved one another and that Allyson had something to do with why Adam decided to go into the school and shoot.

  I just wasn’t sure it was the reason that everyone else believed.

  “Maybe there’s something else in the report that can help us,” Sydney said as I drove the car up in front of our grandmother’s house. Her car was gone; she had gone to visit Adam like she told us she would this morning.

  I exhaled, feeling flustered. Was I just grasping onto a string that wasn’t there? Was I trying too desperately to prove that my brother was innocent?

  And if yes, then why?

  Because I wanted to prove myself to my dad? Because I wanted to prove something to myself? Was that it? And was it blinding me completely to the truth, a truth I refused to face?

  No, something is wrong. You saw it. You saw the bullet holes under the ceiling. You heard that he closed his eyes. Nothing about this boy adds up to the picture that the police are painting. He doesn’t fit the profile, not even a little bit.

  “Maybe you’re right,” I said and killed the engine. “I’ll have to go back and look again. There’s got to be something that can help us.”

  “I’ll go read the script for my movie,” she said. “I need to get into this character if I want to nail this one.”

  Once inside, I sat down at my laptop, staring at the screen in front of me, not knowing how to go about this. I felt so certain that my brother was innocent, and somehow, I had this notion that it all had something to do with the many deaths at the Ritz-Carlton the night before. I don’t know why I was so obsessed with that thought, but I kept going back to it. It was just so unusual for so many people to die on this island at almost the same time.

  I ran a search and began reading what the media was saying about the incident. There were many speculations, but most seemed convinced that it was food poisoning, which I found to be odd. According to the journalists, they had all been eating dinner with the men that had bought their company after signing the contracts. They had eaten at the restaurant Le Clos, an upscale restaurant in downtown Fernandina Beach. But they hadn’t eaten the same thing, and the two men who had bought the company weren’t sick, nor were any of the other guests who had visited the restaurant that night.

  Why was it only those ten men?

  I heard Sydney’s phone ring upstairs and heard her pick it up, then go quiet. There was nothing but silence from upstairs for a few minutes; then she came rushing down the stairs and into the living room, where I was sitting.

  Her eyes were wide, and she looked pale.

  “We need to go to the hospital.”

  I gave her a frightened look. “Why? Did something happen?”

  “Adam just went into cardiac arrest.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  We met David and Eileen in the hallway at the hospital. He looked like he was sick, while Eileen stared into the air, an empty look in her eyes. Adam wasn’t in his room.


  “What happened?” I asked.

  “He went into sudden cardiac arrest,” Eileen said. “They took him down the hallway. We haven’t heard anything since.”

  David was biting his nails. He looked like he was about to break down any second now, and part of me wanted to put my arm around him and comfort him. He suddenly seemed so fragile … and nothing like the man I had been so angry at. He didn’t look like he could steal a kid or make someone’s life miserable. He didn’t look like the monster I had made him out to be.

  He still did it, Eva Rae. No matter how innocent he looks, no matter how sad he appears, he is still guilty. It doesn’t change the fact that he took Sydney and destroyed everything. Everything.

  “How could he suddenly go into cardiac arrest?” I asked.

  David shrugged. “It happens, they said. I think … I think I need to sit down.”

  David looked like he was losing his balance and staggered toward me. I grabbed him in my arms and suddenly stood there, hugging the man I refused to call my dad, the man I loathed. And suddenly, I couldn’t feel angry at him anymore.

  “Help me, Syd,” I said, and she rushed to grab his other arm. Together, we helped David to a row of chairs and sat him down in one of them.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, eyes filling. “You must think I’m such a fool. Can’t even stand on my own two feet anymore … I’m just …” He looked directly into my eyes, and my heart sank.

  “I can’t lose him too.”

  Don’t give me that. You’re the one who left.

  “Adam was my second chance; you know? The chance for me to do it right this time. Somehow, having him around made it easier for me to accept that …” He shook his head. “Listen to me. I sound like an old fool. Old and weak.”

  I swallowed the knot growing in my throat. I didn’t know how I was feeling anymore. It was all in a whirlwind of emotions, and I hardly knew what was up and what was down anymore. Did I feel bad for him? Was I letting go of my anger? Was I ready to?

  I stood up straight, biting back my tears.

  “I’ll go see if I can find a doctor,” I said.

  My grandmother put a hand on my shoulder, and I got a brief look of sympathy from her, then I rushed down the hallway, tears piling up in my eyes.

  Please, don’t let Adam die. Please, don’t let him die before I even get to know my own brother.

  I sniffled, then tried to stop a doctor who rushed toward me, but he didn’t have time and just continued past me. A nurse did the same, and I ended up just standing there, all my emotions swirling inside of me, wanting to cry, but not really able to one second, then fighting to hold it back the next. It was the strangest thing.

  I turned to face Adam’s room, then rushed inside and closed the door behind me. I slid to the ground with my back rubbing against the door and finally let the tears roll freely.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I sat by the door, tears rolling down my cheeks. I was feeling hopeless and sorry for myself when I spotted it. I stared at it for a few seconds, then rose to my feet and walked closer. The bed had been rolled out of the room, with Adam in it, and there was an empty spot where it had been. But on the floor, I found something that made my heart drop.

  What the …?

  I got up and walked closer, then bent down and picked the nail up from the dusty floor. I turned it in the light while my heart began pounding in my chest. The nail was long, and it was coated with light pink nail polish.

  This is a girl’s nail.

  I stared at the nail in my hand, and I could hardly breathe. The room was spinning around me as I tried to make sense of it all. Then I turned around — still with the nail in my hand — and rushed outside. I found Deputy Corel standing outside with my grandmother.

  “Hey,” I said and approached him.

  He turned to look at me, startled at my sudden approach.

  “Where were you?” I asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “When Adam went into cardiac arrest, where were you?” I asked. “Were you on your post outside, guarding his room?”

  “I was just down the hall, why?” he answered, visibly offended by the question.

  “Down the hall? So, anyone could have walked into my brother’s room?” I asked. “Aren’t you supposed to be guarding him?”

  “I need you to calm down, ma’am. Not that I need to justify myself to you, but my job is to keep the kid from running away if he wakes up.”

  “Someone recently threatened to kill him right in front of you, and you don’t think it’s a good idea to guard his door, to make sure this person doesn’t actually try to make good on his threats?” I asked.

  “Now, ma’am …”

  “Is everyone on this forsaken island completely incompetent?” I yelled louder than I wanted to.

  “What’s going on here?” David said and approached us. He pulled me aside. “Why are you attacking the deputy, Eva Rae?”

  I tried to calm myself down. It was easier said than done, especially with David standing right in front of me. Sydney came up behind him.

  “You think someone tried to hurt Adam?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “And you think it might be Ryan, Allyson’s father?” David asked. “You think that Ryan tried to kill Adam?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know who it was, but he did threaten him the other day, remember?”

  “And why do you think someone tried to kill Adam? The doctor said it was cardiac arrest; it’s not uncommon in comatose patients,” David said.

  “I know. But I … well, I found this in his room.”

  I opened my hand and showed them both the nail. David stared at it, then up at me, a look of concern in his eyes.

  “A nail? I don’t understand … what does that mean?”

  “It’s a girl’s nail,” I said.

  “And?”

  “It’s been pulled out by the root, look.”

  “I … I’m still not quite following you,” he said.

  “I think it might be Allyson’s. The detective at the sheriff’s office told me she had her nails pulled out when still alive. I think the killer is sending me a message by placing the nail there and trying to kill Adam. He wants me to know that he knows I’m trying to stop him, and he wants to tell me that he can get to me anywhere. He probably also wants to get rid of Adam since, if he ever wakes up, he can tell us who made him walk into the school with that gun. When Adam wakes up, the killer will be exposed.”

  David bit his lip in the same manner I always did, and it made me want to scream. I hated how much I looked like him, whereas Sydney looked like our mother, always gracious and flawless.

  Why did I have to be the one who took after him?

  “I don’t know, Eva Rae,” Sydney said, her head slightly tilted. “It sounds a little out there, even for you.”

  “Maybe,” I said pensively. “But my instinct is telling me to pursue this. He is showing me he’s ready to play games. I’ve been down this road before. If he wants a war, then he’s got it.”

  “The doctor is here,” our grandmother said coming up to us, a serious look on her face. “He has news about Adam’s condition.”

  We all turned to face the doctor, who came walking toward us. He took in a deep breath before he spoke, then looked at David first. In a moment of despair, David reached over and grabbed my hand in his. I gasped and looked down at our clutched hands. He was squeezing it hard, and I let him, while the doctor spoke.

  “We were able to resuscitate your boy. The next few hours will show if his heart is strong enough to keep him alive.”

  A sigh of relief went through us all.

  “But he’s alive for now?” David asked, tears springing to his eyes once again, but this time of joy.

  The doctor nodded with half a smile. “Yes. He is. His status is the same as before, but his heart is beating again.”

  “Oh, thank God,” Eileen said, clasping her chest.

  A
s the doctor left, I realized David’s hand was still in mine. I pulled my hand away before things got awkward. Secretly, I couldn’t help noticing that he had grabbed my hand when he needed someone to hold onto.

  Not Sydney’s and not his mother’s, but mine.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  David and Sydney stayed at the hospital to spend the night there, keeping an eye on Adam. Meanwhile, Eileen took me back to the house. I needed to get some research done, and Eileen needed to feed the neighbor’s cats that she was taking care of while they were away.

  It felt strange to be in the car with the woman that was my grandmother. I had never had one, so I wasn’t really sure what to make of it, if I wanted her in my life or not. I guess a big part of me did. She seemed pretty cool with her silver mane under the bandana and Harley Davidson T-shirt. I couldn’t help picturing her as young. She must have been one hot chick.

  “The thing you said the other day in the garage,” she said as we reached a red light and she stopped. “About us, that the least we could do was to try and reach out to you?”

  I fiddled with the corner of my shirt while looking out the window. “Yeah, well …”

  “The thing is,” she said. “We tried.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Well, I tried. Your dad went to London with Sydney, and I never heard much from him during that time. I went there a couple of years later to visit and especially to see Syd, but I never got to know her really well either. I didn’t have much contact with my son for those years, not till he came back, suddenly with a son, asking for my help to raise him properly. But the thing is, when he left for London, I reached out to your mother and asked if I could see you. But she wouldn’t let me. I can’t blame her. She was angry with David, of course, she was. And probably me as well because I didn’t stop him from doing what he did. But how was I supposed to know that he would kidnap her and take her out of the country? It’s not like he came to me and told me his plans. I would have told him he had lost his mind; of course, I would. But the thing is … well, it wasn’t just your mother who lost someone. I did too. I lost my son and both of my granddaughters. I was robbed of the chance to see you both grow up. I have been so angry at my son for what he did, but at some point, I had to forgive him, you know? Not because he deserves it, but because it was eating me up. A life lived in anger and bitterness is hardly a life worth living, if you ask me.”