Golden & Gone

Chapter 15

"He really said that?" asked the investigator.

"He really said that. I wouldn't lie about something like that. If anything, it makes more sense for me to not have told you about that since I really do love Connor"

"Why did you tell me that then?"

"Because I love Jacob more" I answer, matter of factly, without a second of hesitation.

"Now it's your turn. I've give you every bit of information that I have. I have been as honest as I can be. And you have got to admit, I have shared some very personal stuff. Tell me what you know." I say, putting my elbows on the table in an attempt to figuratively turn the tables. I know they know something about Jacob though I can tell that they aren't ready to give it up yet...

"And that is all you know? The last time you saw him was when you left him on that dock?" 

"Yes. Now will you tell me what happened to my boyfriend..." I am pleading now. I am desperate to know what happened to know. I had pulled myself together to answer the investigator's questions, but now I was starting to crack again.

"Fine. I will tell you, even though I am supposed to get every bit of untainted testimony out of you as possible. But I will settle for what I have...................Brie. I don't know quite how to say this, but I just will. I lied to you. Jacob isn't missing. He's been found... dead" he paused, sizing up my reaction. I just nod my head. I knew it. I knew it the minute my mother woke me up this morning. I just knew it. He was gone. It was a pit in my stomach from the moment I opened my eyes.

"How?" my voice cracks a little.

"strangulation and fatal stab wounds on the dock. The perpetrators waited until you left and then stroke". It hit me like a ton of bricks. I could picture my beautiful Jacob being stabbed to death, his breathtaking body being ripped to shreds. His neck being held tightly as his life drained out of him. Wait, "perpetrators"? Pleural?

"Who" I muttered, tears streaming down my face.

"Connor". No. No. No. Not my precious church going Connor. Not the boy who loved me.  How could he tell me he loved me when he would willingly cause me so much pain...

"The man from Jacob's father's office meeting". Shockingly, that surprised me more than finding out Connor had participated. Why would a stranger kill someone?

"And, Brie, poor girl, I am sorry to tell you that your father participated and orchestrated almost the entirety of the thing". No. No. No. I let out a scream. I have lost a close friend, my boyfriend, and my father. My life is falling down and everyone who I thought was decent is  dead or at least dead to me.

"Why!" I shrieked. Pounding my head on the table.

"From what we have gathered, your father truly detested Jacob. You see, Jacob had been arrested just a few months before you met him for an accused rape case, something about trying to socially pressure a younger girl  into sleeping with him. Your father didn't want the same thing to happen to you, so he took matters into his own hands once he realized that you and Jacob were only growing closer together."

It made sense.

"Your father reached out to Connor, after seeing the way he hung around you at church social events and after hearing rumors about the apparent hate between Connor and Jacob with the school fights and all. Connor obliged"

Of course he would oblige. Connor worships my father, he would do anything that he told him to, especially if he thought, in some twisted way, that it would make me date him.  

"Connor's uncle is the man from the office, Mr. Evans, apparently an authority figure in cow sales as well as participates in the illegal drug trade, second only to Jacob's Father. Mr. Evans wanted the Sterns out of the way, and the only way he could do so and put Connor as the head of his own company one day, with no competition from other drug families. The only way to do who would be to destroy the Sterns' future, by destroying their heir, Jacob. That's why Connor and Jacob had un-proportional rage towards one another, their families are enemies and they had been pinned against each other since the first day of their lives. One day it would have been over the drug war, but for then it was over you". 

No. No. No. No. NO!!!! It can't be true. The truth was there though. I knew it just as I knew it when I woke up that Jacob was dead. 

"Brie, I know you have had enough bad news. But you deserve to know everything. Maybe it will be like ripping off a band-aid if I do it quickly enough... After killing Jacob, Connor took his own life out of regret. Bullet to the head; simple, clean, and quick. His uncle fled south of the border after realizing that the kill wasn't as clean as he had expected and it would only be a matter of time before he was arrested. Your father turned himself in but used a bedsheet from the prison cell he was in to hang himself". My world turned black as I tumbled to the ground. I had truly lost everyone I loved; Connor, Jacob, and my father. And, all had either killed or died for me.