Unwanted Blood (Harper) novel Chapter 105

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Chapter 105

The car turned onto the street where my apartment was.

Ryder turned to me. “Do you want to go to the Wilson house tonight?” My first instinct was to shake my head.

The Wilson house. The name alone brought back a series of images I didn’t need to summon. the dark at the end of the hallway, the edge of the stairs where I’d been tripped, the door that was always closed to me.

But before I could act on the instinct, Logan leaned forward from the back seat.

“Aunt wants to see you. She called a few times today when she heard you were at the auction.”

I was quiet for a few seconds.

Aunt? Lily’s mother? The woman in my memory was faceless in the same way most of the Wilson family had beenba blur of hands and voice and the sound of my own small footsteps running away I remembered her fingers digging into my arm. I remembered being pushed to the floor, and I have no strength to fight back.

But I also remembered what Ryder had told mebthat after he’d explained the truth, she’d left the old house and never gone back. She’d locked herself in an apartment in another city and hadn’t come out for months.

I looked down at my hands. Then I looked up. “Okay.”

The car turned at the intersection. The route changed.

The Wilson house looked the same from the outside as it always had

I opened the car door and stepped out. For years, every time I stood in front of this gate, my back had been tight and my breathing shallow. Every approach had felt like walking into a room where the air had already been decided for you.

Now I stood here again. The gate was the same. The house was the same. But the memories didn’t

cut anymore

I walked in

The entrance hall was hit in warm yellow I followed the corridor toward the living roomband

10 04

Chapter 105

stopped

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Every wall the entrance hall, the corridor, the living room, the stair landing was covered in my photographs.

There was one of me crouching down to help Mia stick a paper butterfly onto the community centre wallbmy profile caught in afternoon light. One of me and Lily sitting on a seaside bench, eating ice cream, both of us mid-laugh. One of me walking out of a convenience store with a plastic bag in my hand, looking tired but ordinary. One of me standing on a balcony, looking out at the street belowbjust my back, the city stretching out in front of me.

In every photo. I was smiling. Or at least unguarded. These were moments I hadn’t known anyone was watching. Moments I hadn’t known anyone had captured.

I stood in the centre of the living room and turned slowly, taking in the walls. The house was filled with my shadow.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen anything of myself reflected in this building.

My throat tightened. But before I could say anything, quick, uneven footsteps came down the

stairs.

My aunt stood three steps away from me.

She was wearing a plain house dress. Her hair had gone significantly greyer since the last time I’d seen her. She looked smallerblike she’d folded in on herself over the months I hadn’t been looking.

She looked at me. Her lips trembled. Then she closed the distance between us in two strides and grabbed my hand hardly, and then she pulled me into her arms.

Her shoulders were shaking. Her breathing was uneven against my earbfast, irregular.

I froze. Istood rigid, and my arms hung at my sides.

After a few seconds, I brought my hands up and pressed them against her shoulders. I pushed her gently half a step back.

She let go When she pulled away, she brought her hand up to wipe her eyes quickly, but the tears had already run, cutting faint tracks through the foundation on her cheeks.

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