Tethered Souls | Books 1, 2, and 3

26 | Guilty

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• Liberty •

Guilty.

Chase Marquette is guilty.

Liberty Carlyle pondered that for several minutes, trying to figure out what he'd done to her sister. While standing at the doorway of her house, she contemplated how to bust him. But now, she was ready to see Luna, with Vikram and Sarah.

"Sarah! Are you ready to see mummy?" Liberty yelled, calling out for her little niece.

"Yay!"

Luna had been in the hospital for over a week, and it didn't feel right to Liberty. Chase had been acting strange around both her and Vikram, and he'd struck her as somebody who was hiding something.

He dared to show them a video of Luna talking to herself, but she was sure it was a fake copy. Liberty had been with her sister the whole time they were in the city. Luna told her about the last time she spoke to Sam. She watched her sister sob and curl up into a corner for months because his death was difficult for her to process.

And Chase ticked her off the other day when she wanted to grab clothes for Sarah, but he ignored that. So she and Vikram rented a hotel room for a few nights and grabbed some toys when he let them into the house.

What Chase didn't realize, he wasn't the only one on Luna's health care directive. Liberty was added as a secondary Health Care Proxy and will make other arrangements. She had planned for Luna and Sarah to stay in Houston until things had calmed down.

She knew that when she last hugged Luna, her sister sobbed tremendously in her arms. What set her off was getting a call at midnight from Chase telling her he brought her into St. Matthew's. She was appalled by how Luna was admitted, and how Sarah was now kept away from her mother.

Liberty wished Vikram was there at the house with them, but he stayed at the hotel until it was time to visit Luna. They had spoken little about the moment Luna hopped into Chase's Porsche, with her clothes torn and no shoes on.

She even noticed a few splotches of blood in the bathroom and thought Luna must've started her period while they were in there. But something still didn't feel right with that. If her sister had her period, surely she'd clean herself up. Chase was guilty of something, and Liberty couldn't figure it out.

She'd even found pills hidden under the bed and was sure Chase slipped Luna narcotics. She would've grabbed a pill to have it analyzed, but Chase may notice it was missing, and more problems would occur.

"Do you have the directions, Libby?"

"Yes. I remember where it is. I've been away from New Orleans for a while, but I can still find my way." Liberty leaned down and grabbed her keys off the end table. "What about my sister's studio? Luna may lose her customers who pay good money for her services. Do you even care about that?"

Chase smirked, and she wanted to slap it off his face. She disliked using any negative tone of voice in front of Sarah, but she despised this man. "Luna's going to lose her business. She loved her studio."

He asked, "Could you please do something for me?"

"Hell no."

Chase let out a sigh and rolled his eyes. "Just tell Lu that I'm sorry."

Liberty laughed. "Don't call her Lu, and I won't tell her anything. You know that's a trigger point for her."

"That's what you call her.  What is the difference?"