“Okay.”
Bree approached Melissa. “So . . . congrats.”
“Thanks.” Melissa brushed some blonde curls behind her ears. “Same to you. And, um, congrats on the scholarship too. That’s great.”
“Yeah, it is. I don’t know how I would have possibly afforded college without it. I had planned to go to the same school as Travis. He had—and still has I guess—his football scholarship. His parents were going to pay for me to go with him. They were going to pay for everything.”
“Bree . . . there’s something that I want to say to you. Something that I should have said a while ago.”
“What is it?”
“That I’m sorry. I know this is all my fault. If it wasn’t for me interfering . . . you and Travis would still be together, you would be engaged, and you would be happy.”
“No, we wouldn’t be,” Bree corrected her. “Travis was going to cheat on me regardless of whether it was with you or with somebody else. I’m glad that things ended between Travis and me. If we had gotten married, I would have ended up in a world ruled by that psychopath Roland Emmerson. I don’t blame you for anything, Melissa, and I hope that you don’t blame yourself for anything either.”
Melissa smiled faintly. “Thanks . . . I’ll try not to.”
“Good. So what’s next for you? Now that we’re both leaving this place behind for good.”
“I don’t know yet. I’ve never really been good at making plans. I’ll probably stay in Trenton for a little while longer. Maybe think about community college, or maybe just help my mom out at the diner.”
“Well, whatever you decide to do, I hope everything works out for you, and I hope you will keep in touch.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Of course.”
“Okay.” Melissa’s smile broadened. “I would like that.”
“Great. Well, I have to get going. I got this big dinner thing with my family. I want to go home so I can change first. I can’t wear these graduation robes obviously.”
With a parting smile, Bree turned away and started back towards her mom and Veronica. It was amazing how a single event could change the way that she felt about someone. She hated Melissa before they were abducted, but after that night of surviving in the forest together, everything changed. They shared something that they would never share with anyone else, and that created a bond that Bree hoped would last for the rest of their lives.
It was a nice silver lining to what was otherwise the worst night of her life.
***
When Bree got home, she went straight upstairs to her bedroom. As great as the whole ceremony had been that morning, it was also exhausting, and she was very pleased to be home to have some time to chill and maybe take a shower before getting dressed for lunch with her family.
Sitting down on the bed, she took her cap off. Held it up and stared at the tassel for a moment before she set the cap down on the nightstand. As she did, she noticed something else on top of the nightstand. Something that definitely wasn’t there when she left for school earlier.
A diamond engagement ring.
The same one that she was offered by—
“Congratulations, Bree. You looked really cute in your cap and gown today.”
Bree turned to see Travis standing in the bedroom doorway with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his varsity jacket. His hair was disheveled, his cheeks and chin were dotted with the shadow of a patchy beard, and there were dark circles under his eyes. He was dressed in blue jeans and a plain white t-shirt underneath his jacket.
“W-what are you doing here?” Bree shot to her feet.
“I came here to see you.”
“How did you know that I would be here? Did you follow me?”
“Yes, I did.” Travis started towards her. “Did you find the little gift that I left for you this morning?”
“You were here this morning?”
“Yes. Right after you and your mom left, I let myself in and left that gift for you. Then I went to the school to watch the ceremony.”
“Why?”
Travis didn’t answer. He just stared at her. His lip curled at the corner to form a crooked smile.
Bree’s stomach tightened. “Travis . . . you’re starting to really freak me out. You barely talk to me at all the last two months, and now suddenly you’re following me around and spying on me. I don’t get it.”
“You don’t get it?” Travis snorted while shaking his head. “Of course you don’t get it. You’re not the one who lost everything that night.”
“Travis . . . I’m so sorry about your parents. I really am. But you have to know that I never wanted that to happen when I—”
“You never wanted that to happen?” Travis cut her off. “It’s your fault that they’re dead. You ruined my entire life.”
Bree opened her mouth to respond, but she couldn’t manage to get any words to come out. She didn’t know how to respond to that.
But she wasn’t struggling for words for long before her ex-boyfriend spoke again.
“Why couldn’t you have just married me? We had our entire lives planned out. Everything was going to be perfect . . . but you ruined that.”
As Travis continued to draw closer to her, she noticed the distinct odor of alcohol wafting from him, which somewhat explained his behavior.
“Travis, have you been drinking?”
He ignored her question and asked one of his own. There were tears in his eyes. “Do you feel any remorse at all? Do you even care that it’s your fault that my parents are dead?”
“I wish that it didn’t end that way—I really do—but I’m not to blame for what happened.”
“Yes, you are,” Travis roared.
Bree winced when he shouted at her. As tempting as it was to fish her phone out of her pocket, she didn’t bother since she was sure that Travis would stop her before she could call the sheriff or anyone else. Her best course of action was to try and calm him down.
“Travis . . . I really am sorry about what happened to your parents, especially your mom. She didn’t deserve what happened to her. She was a good person. But I’m not the one who killed her. Your father did that.”
“But that never would have happened if you had just stayed with me and accepted my proposal. Everything would have been fine.” Tears were streaming down his cheeks now and his words were getting more and more slurred as he carried on. “I have nothing left because of you.”
“That’s not true, Travis. You still have—”
“I have nothing.” Travis suddenly took his hand out of his pocket, and revealed that he was clutching a revolver. It looked like the exact same gun that was used to kill his mother. He pointed it at Bree. “And it’s all because of you.”
Bree held up her hands and resisted the urge to back away from him. She didn’t want to make any sudden movements that might provoke him into pulling the trigger. “Do you really want to kill me, Travis? You loved me once, and I loved you.”
“But you didn’t love me enough to marry me, isn’t that right?”
“I know you don’t really want to do this. You’re not like your father. You don’t kill people.”
“Are you sure about that?” The hand that clutched the pistol was shaking, but his finger was still hovering over the trigger.
Bree had never seen Travis like this before. Even at the funeral for his parents, which she attended despite her mother and Veronica advising her not to, he didn’t seem as upset as he did today. He appeared to be so broken that he had given up entirely. He had to be in such a state of desperation for him to come here like this.
But even with him pointing a gun at her, Bree didn’t believe for a second that he would actually pull the trigger. He made some mistakes, and did some things that he shouldn’t have, but he wasn’t a murderer.
Just as Bree hoped he would, Travis lowered the gun.
“Everything is going to be okay.” She braved a couple of steps towards him and held out her
hand. “I just need you to give me the gun . . . please.”
He didn’t respond.
“Travis . . . please. I promise that everything will be okay, but you have to give me that gun.”
“No . . .” Travis met her gaze and shook his head. “It’s not going to be okay.”
Before Bree could say another word, Travis suddenly raised the gun again, but he didn’t point it at her this time. Instead, he pointed it at himself. The muzzle just an inch or two from his temple.
“Travis, what are you doing?” Bree’s heart leaped to her throat at the sight of her ex seemingly about to shoot himself. “Don’t do it, Travis. Please, don’t do this.”
“Shut up.” His hand wasn’t shaking anymore. He looked more than prepared to end his own life.
But Bree wasn’t about to just stand there and watch him do it. She was determined to stop him.
“Travis . . . please. You don’t really want to do this.”
“How do you know what I want to do?”
“Because I know you. I know the kind of person that you really are. I know how much it hurt to lose your mom and dad, but you still have so much to live for.”
“Look away, Bree. You don’t need to see this.”
“No, I’m not going to look away.” Suddenly, Bree found tears in her own eyes. Travis was a lot of things, but he wasn’t a monster like his father, and Bree certainly didn’t want him to die. He needed help. “Please . . . I promise you that you have a lot more to live for than you think. You have to believe me.”
“Like what?”
“What?”
“What do I have to live for?”
“You have your whole life ahead of you. Think about your mom. Think about how much she loved you. Do you really think that this is what she would want? Don’t you think that she would want you to live as long as possible and be as happy as possible?”
Closing his eyes, Travis nodded. “Yeah. She would.”
“Then give me the gun.” Bree braved a few more steps forward. Stopped when she was just a couple of feet away from him. Extended her hand. “Please.”
Travis opened his eyes again, but only stared for several of the longest seconds of Bree’s life while still holding the revolver up to his head.
Unable to stand the waiting, Bree reached out with a shaky hand and grabbed the muzzle of the revolver, never breaking eye contact with Travis.
“It’s okay,” she told him. “Just let it go.”
Finally, Travis relinquished his grip on the pistol, allowing Bree to take it from him. Once the gun was in her hand rather than his, Travis buried his face in her shoulder and began to sob.
“It’s okay,” she assured him as she put an arm around him. “It’s over.”
18
BREE KNEW THAT THIS DAY was coming for a long time, and she was thrilled to be in the position that she was, even if the path that she took to get here was very different from what she expected.
“Well, I guess that’s everything,” Bree said after stuffing her last bag into the trunk of Veronica’s car. She dusted her hands off on her jeans and then closed the trunk and turned around to face her mother. She wasn’t surprised to discover tears in her mother’s eyes.
“I guess I’m going to have to say goodbye now, huh?” Her mom wiped the tears away with the corners of her sleeves.
“It’s okay, Mom. You know that I’m only going to be a two hour drive away. I’ll come back to visit every chance that I get.”
Her mom shook her head. “Liar. I’m sure you’re going to meet lots of friends in college and have so much fun that you’ll come up with every excuse in the book to avoid coming home to see me.”
“Mom . . .”
She held up a finger. “Let me finish. I think all of that will happen, and I want it all to happen. I want you to go to that school and enjoy every second of it. I don’t want you to worry about the past. I want you to thrive there and not worry about me. I’m going to be fine.”
Bree smiled and nodded. “I’ll try.”
“Good. That’s what I want to hear.”
“We should probably get going now, Bree,” Veronica spoke up. She was standing next to the car with her hands in her pockets. “It’s a long drive, and we don’t want to get stuck in traffic.”
Bree nodded. She stepped closer to her mom and gave her a hug. “I’ll call you when we get there.”
“Okay.”
Bree turned away and started towards the car. She blinked back some tears of her own. She would be lying if she said that she didn’t feel some guilt for leaving her mom all alone, but no matter what her mom believed would happen, Bree had every intention of returning to visit as often as possible.
Once Bree was inside the car with Veronica, her friend stabbed the keys into the ignition and brought the engine to life. She pulled away from the curb in front of Bree’s house and started to drive away. Bree waved to her mom from her window until both her mom and the house that she grew up in were out of sight.
Knowing that she had a long car ride ahead of her, Bree settled into her seat with a sigh. Even with her guilt about leaving her mom alone, she was still ecstatic about the future. About going to college with Veronica. And about embracing the next chapter of her life.
About ten minutes into the drive, Bree was gazing out her window when she noticed that they were passing the massive estate that used to belong to Roland and Vivien Emmerson. A place that now belonged to Travis, even though he wasn’t living there at the time.
He wasn’t even in Trenton anymore.
He had gone away to a facility to get help with both the grief of losing his parents, and undoing the years of brainwashing that his father did to him. Roland filled his head with so many horrible things that it would surely take time and lots of therapy to get him back on track, but Bree was rooting for him.
Despite everything that transpired, she didn’t have any ill feelings towards her ex-boyfriend. She knew that Roland was the cause for everything that Travis did wrong. He was a good person at heart—Vivien made sure of that—and Bree was confident that that good person would eventually shine through the layers of evil that Roland shrouded him in.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Veronica spoke up suddenly.
Bree glanced at her friend and raised an eyebrow. “For what?”
“For driving past here. I should have gone a different way to get to the highway. I mean, I’m sure you have a lot of bad memories of this place and would rather not be reminded of all that by seeing it again.”
Bree shook her head and turned to look out her window at the Emmerson house again. “No. It’s okay. I do have a lot of memories of that place, but not all of those memories are bad. In fact, some of them are very good memories that I’m always going to cherish. The good memories outnumber the bad, and I would much rather remember the good times than focus on the bad.”
With one last lingering look at the Emmerson house, Bree turned to gaze at the road ahead instead. She shifted her mindset from dwelling on the past to thinking ahead to the future, and to everything that life could have in store for her as she embraced that future.
The good.
The bad.
And everything in-between.
Bree was looking forward to all of it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nicholas Jordan is a writer of fast-paced and suspenseful thrillers. His philosophy for crafting stories is to focus on real world terrors rather than just supernatural dangers that exist only in our imaginations—although he’s not afraid to blend the two. Themes of revenge, obsession, and morality are all common in his novels.
There is nowhere that he would rather be than sitting in front of his computer with a mug of tea, diligently working on his next novel, which is more than likely where he is right now.
Check out his website to sign up for a FREE BOOK and to learn more about him.
www.nicholasjordanbooks.com
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hide and Seek: A Suspense Thriller Page 11