FORBIDDEN: The Stowaway PART ONE

Chapter Twenty-Three - Zay

He gets up and squeezes my shoulders, leaving a kiss on the back of my head. His grip tightens before he drops his arms at his sides, removing a picture frame that Lillian gave me right before she died. She said it was a piece of us we'd both have hanging in our dorms. Me and her smiling at the camera as a reminder of who she used to be. "How do you know her?"

"That's Lillian, my best friend."

He looks up from the picture and scoffs quietly. "This is Natalia."

I frown, taking the picture frame from him to hang back on the wall. I hung it there when Adam broke up with me. Replacing his picture with her smiling face. "No." I chuckle awkwardly. "That's Lillian. She was the sweetest woman this world ever saw. She wouldn't get herself messed up with bikers and cops and—" I pause, Peter's words infiltrating me.

She saw something she wasn't supposed to see.

Riggs shakes his head. "This is how we're connected. She—fuck." He runs his fingers through his hair. "We gotta leave. Now."

I'm trying to put the pieces together.

Trying to understand how Natalia and Lillian are the same person.

My Lillian was a saint.

Calm. Careful.

Riggs isn't someone she would have gone for.

But I always encouraged her to break out of her shell.

She broke out.

Now, look at her.

He's pulling me out of my room toward the stairs. But I stop, tears streaming down my cheeks. "I don't understand. Why would she do that? Why would she risk her life to bury you guys? Why would he kill her?"

Riggs takes me by the shoulders and lowers his face to my level. "We have to go, okay? Let's just get out of here before they come looking—"

"Just give me a minute. Please."

I storm back into my room and slam the door, sliding down until my butt meets the floor.

I'm hyperventilating.

My heart is beating rapidly.

My palms are clammy.

And all I want to do is scream.

This can't be happening.

I somehow stand and stagger to the picture of Lillian and me.

Natalia.

It's a copy of the picture that Peter salvaged from the trash. The one with the cracked glass on her face.

Why did she insist I have this before she died?

Did she know it was coming?

Did she know she was in trouble?

Goddamn it, Lillian, I could have helped you!

Riggs opens my door and sees me standing there with the frame in hand. "We gotta leave."

"Did you know she gave this to me days before she died? Exactly a week later I get a call from her parents." I shake my head. "How is that possible? Did she know?"

He takes the picture from me, his face pinched when he looks at Natalia. She was a dream to all of us. The perfect little woman that melted our hearts and fluttered them in so many ways.

He smashes the picture frame on my dresser, glass scattering all over the place.

I gasp, bringing a hand to my mouth. "What the fuck are you doing?"