Secrets Are For Keeping

Chapter Forty-Eight

I walked into the room filled with silent stares from silent people, all with their attention focused solely on me as I was brought towards the very center of the room. I didn't look over at Kain, who I knew would be standing just to the left of me. I couldn't force my eyes to turn over and meet his gaze.

My knees fell to the ground as the inspectors attached the center chain to me. I winced at the sharp pain that came from the fall, but it was nothing compared to the pain in my heart and in my head from dread. From knowing what was about to happen.

Standing in the middle instead of being on the outskirts of the room felt so different, even though I was still in the same room and I was still chained down. Instead of joining the crowd of onlookers staring at the person confessing in the middle, I was the one being stared at. I was the one who was going to confess.

I imagined Mr. Neilson standing in the room just behind me, holding Olivia at gunpoint, and the thought brought the words that I needed to say to my mind. But I couldn't say them. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Without meaning to, my eyes found Kain, and I had to look away. I couldn't look at him because it hurt to.

Then the words were back, so simple, all I needed to say to save my sister's life. And with it they brought memories, painful memories that hurt to even think about.

I remembered the man pointing the gun at Beckam. I saw the anger lighting up in Beckam's eyes, and then him carefully getting up, him tackling the man to the ground before he could shoot.

My eyes stared at the ground as the memories began eating away at my thoughts, torturing everything else away, but the one single memory.

I saw the gun. It spiraling away from the man's hands. I saw myself weakly scrambling away, out of the cell as Beckam fought the other man. And yet the gun still sat there, now right in front of me since I'd moved out of the way.

My memories seemed to skip, skip, skip, like a broken record, what I'd trained my mind to do. I'd skipped over the same part so many times before, because I'd never wanted to think about it. I never wanted to think about Beckam getting shot in the chest and me sprinting to his side, but knowing deep down that it was too late. Too late.

Always just too late.

My mouth opened again, and my throat cleared. I stared at the ground, my face pained with my own thoughts. I saw the gun pointing at Olivia. I saw Olivia's face. I couldn't let her die.

The dread roared inside me like a beast. But then Olivia's face appeared once more in my mind, followed by Beckam's.

I had to say it.

I had to say the words I'd gone through my entire life knowing I'd one day have to say, but never wanting to say them. There was no escaping it. There was no turning back. Nothing I could do.

My vocal cords took a second before they were able to work, to speak, to say anything. And then the words came out, painful as they exited my mouth.

It was over.

"I killed Beckam."