Baby Doll(61)

Wes stepped forward, holding up his hand as if refereeing a fight. “Lily, stop it. Come on, Abby. I’ll take you to Eve’s and I’ll come back for Lily.”

“I don’t need you to come back for me,” Lily spat at him. She glared back at Abby, her fury building. “I asked you a question. Tell me, Abby, do you know why I can’t go home?”

Abby was crying even harder now. But Lily kept at her, not an ounce of sympathy on display. “I don’t have a home, Abby. I don’t have a life. Not anymore. You stole my f*cking life.”

The look on Abby’s face was exactly what Lily wanted to see. Devastation, sorrow, regret: all of these emotions crashing into her. The instant Lily said it, the instant she saw Abby’s look, Lily’s legs gave out and she tumbled to the floor. She heard someone calling for a nurse, but all Lily could do was sit there on the scratchy carpet and stare at Abby, her body contorted as she sobbed, eyes haunted and swollen and clutching her pregnant belly. Wes moved to Abby’s side, whispering something to Abby that Lily couldn’t hear.

This is what he did, Lily thought. This is what Rick did. He found your weakness and then he pushed and pushed at you until he broke you down and destroyed you. That’s what he’d done to her, and now she’d done the same thing to Abby… and it couldn’t be undone.

Abby pushed Wes aside and almost crawled over to Lily.

“You think I wouldn’t give up all of this? You want Wes, you can have him, Lily!” Abby’s voice was barely a whisper. “Take him. It’s always been about you. It’s always been about us. We’re the twins. Me and you. That never changed. When you were gone, I was gone too. Three thousand one hundred and ten days, Lily. All I wanted was you. I’m sorry I blamed you for stealing the sweater. I had it. I had it all along. And I’m sorry I’m fat and gross and I’ve wasted my life. And I’m so sorry I can’t take all this pain away. I can’t change the past. I can’t change what happened to you. I can’t change what Wes and I did. Or what Rick did to you and these girls. But I would, Lily. You have to believe me. I’d do anything to change it.”

Lily began to cry. How could Lily help that child when she was so broken herself? Ashamed, Lily stood up and headed for the exit. Bursting out of the hospital doors, she started running. She owed Abby an apology. She owed Wes one too, but she wasn’t strong enough for that right now. The only thing she cared about was getting back to Sky. It had been the two of them before. It’d be the two of them against the world now.





CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO


RICK


He’d miscalculated. Rick had looked into Lily’s eyes and he’d listened to her make him a promise. And she’d lied. She’d flat out lied to him without even batting an eye. Once Lily was gone, he’d lost his cool completely, giving the officers the chance to pounce: pepper spray to the face, kicks and punches to his lower extremities long after they had him subdued. He kept thinking about ways he could stop Lily from killing his child, how he could ensure that his baby was protected. He’d hoped that when Missy came to visit him, he might convince her to help him. He was sure they could file some kind of an injunction. Missy could even raise the baby if she wanted.

But the minute she sat down, Rick realized that he’d lost Missy. It wasn’t her appearance. Her makeup was now flawless, her black pantsuit tailored to perfection—icy and untouchable, a perfect Southern belle in fluorescent light. It was the vindictive gaze in her eyes that told him everything he needed to know.

“So, I heard the news,” Missy said from behind the glass, carefully cradling the phone in her hands. “It appears one of your other girls killed herself. They’re charging you with manslaughter.”

He wondered which girl it was. He’d bet it was the older one. She’d been a hassle from the moment he grabbed her. He’d been aware of the risks, how brazen it was to keep all three girls. It was a little greedy; he knew that. And it wasn’t that he didn’t still love Lily. She was his baby doll after all, but he needed someone younger, a new challenge. He’d liked both girls, figured he’d train them both and then pick his favorite. Which is why this was so ridiculous. They’d barely even gotten to know each other. It wasn’t his fault that weak-minded twit had taken her own life.

“You’re going to rot in prison for the rest of your life,” Missy said, the hint of a smile on her face. She was enjoying this. Damn. He hadn’t seen this side of Missy before. Her vindictiveness was starting to turn him on.

“Mother and Daddy put the house on the market. The Realtor said it would sell in no time because people are so screwed up and would find living in a monster’s home a novelty. I thought about moving back to North Carolina with them, but people would never stop talking about how dumb I was, wondering how I could live with you, how I could go to bed with someone like you and not know what you are.”

Her voice dripped with hatred. Rick almost felt sorry for her.

“Tell me, Rick, did those other girls trap you too? Did that fourteen-year-old hitchhiker tell you that she loved you? Or that sixteen-year-old girl, the one who hung herself with a bedsheet, was she also madly in love with you?”

Really, what more could he say? Maybe Missy was dumb enough to buy his story about Lily, but even she was smart enough to see what kind of person he was. He shrugged and leaned back, giving her a dismissive wave.