Tethered Hearts | ✓ | Books 1 & 2

Episode 49| On Death's Doorstep

Bryce's P.O.V.

I hadn't told Sophia everything.

My retelling of my relationship with Julia skipped one grave detail that I couldn't get myself to speak upon. The memories were too fresh - as if they occurred yesterday - and the emotions were too vicious, leaving wounds unhealed. The words were just about to leave my mouth when she weighted the option of Julia being alive. I couldn't tell her though, no matter how many times that thought resurfaced in my mind, haunting me for years.

There was no doubt in my mind that told me Julia was dead. Sending photos wasn't the only thing my father did. Four months after she vanished from my life, she appeared at my uncle's bar near the single loading dock he had in the back. For countless weeks, I had fed off the silly hope that she wasn't gone forever. But that day, when a package arrived with my name scribbled in black ink, I didn't expect for her to come back to me....

In pieces.

We called the police in and they took the remains. After doing an autopsy, it was concluded that because of the freezer burn on her flesh, it was hard to say when she died. It wasn't her entire body, which left officials scratching their heads as to where the rest of her was. I didn't push for an investigation because I already knew who had done it.

Before moving to California, I had dropped all forms of communication with my parents. But when Julia's body parts were located, I spread that treatment to my siblings. They had pressured me to come back home when I told them about Julia's death, telling me that dad would "forgive me" for my mistakes if I came back and admitted I was wrong.

He wanted me to kiss his boots and crawl back like a baby. I wasn't going to give him that satisfaction. From how my sisters sounded, they were on my father's side. I was wrong for stealing, I was wrong for running away, I was wrong for going with Julia.

It was my fault to them.

My calls stopped all together and I gave up on them. I didn't need any of them from that day on.

What I did need, however, was information on the thugs that had taken Julia in the first place. My father hadn't left New York City - not even once - since her abduction, which meant he outsourced his hit from someone he trusted on the west coast.

I found the people who did it, seeing that they were linked to a guy named Julio. This was the start of our half a decade long feud, leading me to leaving him with a scar on his face and four of his men dead. He no longer bothered me and I hadn't bothered him in personal recently. But that might change.

"Are you awake?" Sophia's groggy morning voice pulled me away from my thoughts from the past. She craned her neck to the side and laid a hand over my arm that was on her hip. "You were muttering in your sleep again."

I brushed my nose to her shoulder blade. "I'm awake. I was kind of thinking out loud."

"You do that a lot."

"It's a good way to organize my thoughts."

She turned around, now facing me completely. "What were you thinking of?"

"My parents," I uttered earnestly. "You know, my mom called my uncle yesterday –her brother. He's the only family I talked to anymore. He said he got a call about my dad being in the hospital."

"Oh, right. I think you said something about him being sick last night."

"Yeah, he has cancer." I supplied, traveling my hand to her cheek and swiping away the loose strands of hair that escaped from her ponytail. "He ended up telling me that my dad was back in the hospital with another tumor. He doesn't plan to fight it this time. Since this is the end for him, my uncle told me he asked for me to visit him."