Chapter 384 Finally, My Sister Was Free
After a few more rounds of bickering and teasing that honestly bordered on performance art, the two of them finally seemed to remember I was standing right there. They both looked up at the same time.
Amber fixed me with a sharp glare that could have cut glass. “You cursed child this is your fault! Lewis got hurt because of you!“
By this point, I had a solid read on Amber’s personality. She ran hot, she ran loud, and she loved fiercely in all the most inconvenient ways. So I played along, widening my eyes and pressing a hand to my chest. “I didn’t exactly invite Wisteria to attack me I’m a victim here too!”
Amber whipped around to Dominic, and the second her eyes landed on him, he instinctively rubbed the back of his neck and looked sideways. “That girl was unstable,” he muttered, already sidestepping. “I told her specifically not to touch Elena. She went rogue. That’s on her.”
Watching Dominic a man who commanded an entire network with a look shift his weight like he was half a second from dropping to his knees just to appease this woman was something I genuinely hadn’t been prepared for. I could see this going on well past sunset. I cut in before it could. “Lewis’s asleep. He’ll be hungry when he wakes up.”
That was all it took. Amber dropped the bedsheet without another word and started walking back toward the house, already thinking out loud about what kind of soup would help him recover fastest. Just like that, the storm passed.
The moment she was out of earshot, something shifted in the air around Dominic. He straightened, and the soft, almost bumbling man who’d been kneeling in the grass evaporated entirely. What stood in his place was something older and heavier a dominant energy that pressed against the space around him like a physical thing. He leaned back against the nearest tree and pulled out a cigarette, lighting it slowly, his eyes on me the whole time.
If it weren’t for my bond with Lewis if Dominic didn’t already understand what that connection meant I was fairly certain he could end a conversation with me in the most permanent way imaginable, and do it without breaking a sweat. He was built like consequence. Every line of him said so.
It struck me then that the version of him I’d seen earlier, softer and almost boyish around Amber, had been something he’d grown into for her. Even his body, the sheer physical presence of him, felt like it had been shaped by devotion. The Blackwells loved like it was a sickness all-consuming and completely without brakes.
He exhaled a slow stream of smoke. “You’ve got nerve, coming back to face me. You really think I won’t do something about that?”
I kept my voice even. “Mr. Blackwell. I don’t know who was right and who was wrong in everything between the Blackwells and the Morrigans. Maybe no one was, entirely. But what I do know is that my grandparents died at your hands, and the two Morrigans brothers and I were brought here completely at your mercy.” I paused. “Greg is the only one left. I’m asking you to leave him alone.”
He exhaled again, unhurried. “I keep my word. Your father’s gone, and I won’t touch Greg.”
“I’ve cut my ties with the Morrigans,” I said. “Outside of my sister, I won’t involve myself with that name again. But the way things unfolded the deaths, the destruction it wasn’t only the Blackwells’ doing, was it? The Commander played his part too.”
A cold laugh escaped him, low and sharp. “Little girl. You lay everything on the table just like your grandmother did. Always calculating.”
“If Grandma didn’t lie,” I said steadily, “then yes she wronged Mrs. Blackwell Senior. She took something that wasn’t hers to take. But if the Commander and his wife were the ones behind her humiliation, behind everything that was done to her after then they’re the real enemy. Not just yours. Ours.”
His eyes narrowed slowly. “And what exactly are you planning to do with that?”
“I want to use your network to find the truth. You have access to information I’ll never be able to reach on my own.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I thought you were going to run to the authorities.”
“With what proof?” I said. “The police have been circling the underground trafficking operation for a long time. If they could have connected it back to you, they would have moved by now. Your son is either clean or covered well enough that nothing’s stuck. Without hard evidence, the legal system can’t do anything and I don’t have that kind of evidence. I don’t have your kind of reach either.” I held his gaze. “I’m not coming to you with hatred, Mr. Blackwell. I’m coming to you because we want the same thing. Justice for everyone who was lost on both sides. So let’s work together.”
He dropped the cigarette and ground it under his heel. A long moment passed before he spoke. “Fine. We work together. I’ll look into it myself as well. The people who harmed the Blackwells will answer for it. Every last one.” Something dark and almost satisfied crossed his face like a man who had made peace with walking straight into fire. “We all go down together.”
I let out a slow breath. “I also want to take Whitney home with me.”
“Do whatever you want. As long as that stubborn brat is willing to let her walk.”
The relief that moved through me was so strong my knees nearly gave. Finally. My sister was free.
But before I could hold onto that feeling, his voice came again flatter, colder. “The old woman’s ashes stay with the Blackwells. She atones here. I won’t be giving her to you.”
He’d already anticipated it. Of course he had.
“She was a Morrigans,” I said quietly. “Whatever she did, she deserves to rest with her own. Please, Mr. Blackwell just a portion. Enough to place in the Morrigans’ cemetery. She’s already gone. There’s nothing left to punish.” My voice dropped. “I’m begging you.”
His expression went to ice. “She got exactly what she deserved. Don’t push this, Elena. If you keep negotiating with me, none of you leave this island.” The words were quiet, which somehow made them worse.
I closed my mouth. The silence stretched between us, tight and unmoving.
He turned and began walking away. Then, after a few steps, he stopped. He didn’t turn all the way around, just enough to speak over his shoulder. “You can take Malcom’s ashes.”
His silhouette disappeared between the trees.
Night was falling over Rosbel Island, and the sea breeze rolling in from the water carried something melancholy with it a softness that didn’t belong to the day’s events, like the island itself was exhaling. Then I heard it. A low, wandering melody drifting through the cooling air, played on something small and hollow.
I followed the sound and found Yael standing at the water’s edge, his back to me, looking out at the darkening sea. The music moved like a farewell slow, and searching, and deeply sad.
“It’s finally over,” he said, without turning. “My father’s heart can finally rest.”
He turned to face me then, and his expression was quiet in a way I hadn’t seen from him before. “Elena. I’m sorry. For everything the Blackwells put you through. All of it. I mean that.”
My eyes dropped to the instrument in his hands and the blood drained from my face.
He walked slowly toward me. “I made it myself. Had a lot of time on my hands out here no signal, no internet, nothing. Little things like this kept me sane.” He held it out. “Do you like it? If you do, it’s yours.”
I took it from him carefully, and a chill moved through my entire body, from my hands all the way down to my feet.
It was him.
It had been him all along.