He looks at me with a pained expression and shakes his head. “Alanna, you have your whole future ahead of you. You’re meant for so much more than I can give you. I don’t want you to struggle the way I always have. I want you to go to college and have fun. I want you to enjoy the experience and look back on it fondly. You can’t do that when you’re tied to a man like me.”
I tense and look into his eyes. “What are you trying to say, Silas?”
He nods and runs a hand through his hair, his expression pained. “You’re about to go to college, and I don’t want you to be with me because you have no other choice, because our circumstances forced us together. If you accept that room, you’ll always have the freedom to leave. You’ll have a space of your own.”
“That’s not what I want, Silas. I want the future we envisioned, every single part of it, not just the good parts. I know it isn’t going to be easy, yet I’m choosing to walk this path with you. I have no intention of leaving you, so stop this, please.”
“I won’t let you walk this path with me, Alanna. This isn’t what I want. I want more than that for you.”
I freeze, my eyes filling with tears I can’t blink away. “W-what does that mean, Silas?”
He looks up at the ceiling and inhales shakily. “I don’t know, Alanna.”
I sniff as a tear rolls down my cheek and rush past him. Si reaches for me, but I shake my head. “Get away from me,” I snap. “I can’t… I can’t deal with this right now, Si. I really can’t. Just leave me alone.”
I turn and rush out the door, my tears running down my cheeks uncontrollably. Just as I round the corner, thunder erupts in the sky, followed by a heavy downpour. It’s as though the heavens are weeping with me, and I burst out crying in earnest. How could Si believe we won’t last? How could he not believe in us?
I don’t know how to reassure him, and I don’t know what to do. The expression in Silas’s eyes told me he wouldn’t budge. He truly wants me to accept the discounted room I was offered, but what would that mean for us? He’s in every single one of my plans for the future, but am I truly in his?
I’m so distraught that I don’t hear the car approaching over the sound of the rain, not until it’s too late. I look up into blinding headlights, seconds before I’m lifted off the ground by the impact of the collision, my body landing with a loud thud. The pain barely registers as my eyes fall closed, bathing the world in darkness. The last thing I think of before I lose consciousness is Silas, and how I wish I’d told him that I love him one last time.
PART TWO
The Present
Five Years Later
Chapter Twenty-Four
Silas
I open my desk drawer with trembling hands, taking out one of the hundred cranes that I keep hidden in there. I still remember the smile on Alanna’s face as she gave them to me, each of them folded out of gifted printer paper because origami paper wasn’t something we could afford.
I open it up, my finger tracing over her handwriting. Hug, it reads. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to have Alanna in my arms today, a sweet smile on her face as she leans in to kiss me. She told me that she’d hoped these one hundred cranes would last me until she was able to fold me a thousand, and I’m starting to run low.
Each time missing her becomes too hard to bear, I unfold one of her little cranes, imagining her right by my side as I show her the writing on it and cash in my coupon. It’s torture. It’s a reminder of everything I should have had with her, but simultaneously, it’s the one thing that makes me feel closer to her.
Today marks five years since Alanna went missing, and I only have three paper cranes left. Maybe I’m crazy, but a small part of me is still convinced I’ll find her before I give into temptation and unfold the last one.
What would she think if I told her I founded my entire company in an effort to find her? She still is at the core of everything I do, everything I am. Sinclair Security is the result of my search for her. Starting off with only private investigation services, we’ve grown to encompass all kinds of security, yet we still haven’t accomplished our main aim. Finding Alanna.
According to our case file, she was in a car accident five years ago. We traced back her movements until several months after her accident, after which the trail ran cold. Seven months after her accident, Alanna disappeared entirely, and I haven’t been able to find her since.
I know every detail about her case by heart. She was flown to an out-of-state hospital due to the extent of her injuries, making it impossible for me to find her at any of the hospitals near us.