Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
We didn’t talk about his parole hearing this time. I didn’t spend months collecting, drafting, and rewriting letters to present to the board with the hopes they’d actually be read. And I didn’t lose myself down a rabbit hole of hope only to end up in a black abyss of depression for days after the decision was made.
We didn’t give up though. Ramsey still put in his paperwork and worked with his attorney. I still prayed to any and every God in existence, but we went into it with real expectations and restrained hope for the very first time.
And somehow, someway, it had finally happened.
“Holy shit, Ramsey. Is this real?”
He let out a loud laugh that cracked at the end. “God, I hope so. I could be out of here in a matter of weeks, Nora. Fuck.”
Weeks.
Over twelve years in a cell and he could be home in a matter of weeks?
My nose stung, and tears burned my eyes. “Wait, is this a done deal? When the Caskeys hear, Jonathan is going to lose his shit. Is there anything he could do to mess this up?”
“I…I don’t think so. They brought me the paperwork and had me sit in on a call with this guy named Lee who’s been assigned as my case agent. He’s supposed to be calling you to check out the house and stuff.” He blew out a ragged breath. “I think this might really be it.” Emotion lodged in his throat, making his words jagged as he forced out, “Please let this be it.”
I ignored the twist of the permanent knife in my heart when it came to Ramsey’s time in prison. There was not a day that passed when I didn’t feel a sense of guilt, but I was no longer drowning in it.
We’d both made choices that day. They were both right and wrong depending on whose eyes you were looking through. I wished every moment of every day that I could change the past, but I couldn’t turn back time. It had taken a lot of years and soul searching for me to get to that place of peace. The pain was still there, but I no longer allowed it to dominate my life.
If this was real and Ramsey was finally coming home, there was a chance we could put this behind us once and for all.
“I have to tell Thea,” I rushed out, the combination of excitement and adrenaline making my body hum like a hive of bees had taken up residence in my veins.
“No,” Ramsey barked.
Jesus. Those two were going to be the end of me.
I’d spent twelve years being the middleman for Ramsey and Thea.
Ramsey desperately, and somewhat successfully, trying to force her to let him go.
Thea holding on to a ghost and the promises made by a seventeen-year-old boy.
Both of them equally as stubborn.
Leaning around the bar dividing the kitchen from our living room, I peered down the hall. Thea’s door was still shut, and if I knew her at all, she had her headphones on, watching travel videos while planning a top-of-the-line vacation she should have been taking herself. But just in case she wasn’t, I kept my voice low as I laid into my brother.
“What the hell do you think is going to happen, Ramsey? You’re going to get out and she’s not going to find out? If nothing else, she deserves the chance to yell at you. You cut her out of your life completely.”
He let out a groan. “I’m not having this conversation with you again.”
“Fine, then just listen to me have it.” I looked at her door again. “I love you and I respect you, so I’ve kept my promises. But when you get out of there, that word is no longer valid. You owe her a conversation. Hell, you owe yourself a conversation. You love her, dummy. Let her love you back.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, please. I’m the only one who knows what I’m talking about here. But I’m going to drop it for now because today is huge and I don’t want to spend it fighting with you over the inevitable.”
He cussed under his breath, but I smiled.
He was coming home.
Ramsey was finally coming home.
We talked for a few more minutes. I asked a million questions he didn’t have the answers to. And we briefly talked about the logistics of his homecoming. He asked me to find a place for us to live without Thea. I lied and told him I would. If ever two people needed to be under the same roof, it was them. I’d tried to keep the drawers in my head as empty as possible over the last few years, but I was positive Cupid had told a few white lies in his time too.