Emily Rose

I stuffed the delicious, cold material into mouth before smacking angrily.

"God, are you trying to break your teeth?" Camara glances at me as she scoops up some of her chocolate ice cream in the small bowl with her spoon before lifting it to her lips and eating it.

My hand clenches around the cold spoon as I take another scoop.

"I just- I just can't believe that he's been behind this." I mutter as I tried to sallow down my enormous irritation, ultimately failing. "How the hell could I be so blind?" I asked myself.

I make sure to keep my voice down, it was unfair for the people in ice cream parlor to have to deal with a woman screaming her head off.

"You know," Camara pauses thoughtfully, the ice cream on her spoon slowly dripped onto the table. "When I brought you here, I thought it would help you cool down, not fire you back up." She giggles to herself.

I furrow my eyebrows, "Camara, this is serious!"

She smacks her lips, and rolls her eyes, "I know. I'm jut tired of your wining, it's annoying. All you're doing is crying about how stupid you are. You're not even fighting." She gestures towards me with a whip of her hand.

"Fighting what?"

She groans and places her fingers on her temples, "shit, I swear you're an idiot." She takes a few deep breaths before answering, "fighting the problem. And by problem, I mean, Parker. Confronting him. Finding out everything that's needed to be known."

I bit my lip. She was right. Moping won't do anything good, it'll only kill me more than this does.

She nodded, "so what are we gonna do, huh? Jump his ass?"

"We?" I raised an eyebrow at her.

She dropped her spoon onto the table, her face scrunching up in disbelief, "yes, we. Who'd you think was going to be with you? Chucky?! When I said I was all in, I meant it."

I shook my head, "nope, you're not coming. This is my fight-,"

"That you asked me to join." She finished my sentence, "so I did and now I'm in this."

I sighed, we could at this all day. "Fine." I grumbled.
"But let me confront Parker on my own, and we'll see what happens then."

She nods before pausing, "should we call his sister?"

"Cameron? Why would we do that?"

Camara shrugs, "maybe she knows something. As far as we know one Bowmen is a backstabbing asshole, why trust the other?"

I shake my head as endless emotions slam into me. Cameron has been a sister to me for years, I'd learned so many lessons from her that no one has taught me. She was the only one there for me when he left...

Nausea hit me and I shook my head. "No. No. Cameron would never keep something like this to me."

Camara reached over and land a hand on my shoulder. "I'm sorry but we can't take any chances. You thought Parker was a good guy, but look he's not. He knew about the murdered guy. It was in his computer. He might be dangerous, so could his sister."

"I've known her since I was a kid."

"Did you, though?"

*****

We stopped off at Cameron's house after leaving the ice cream parlor. I couldn't stop thinking about how messed up my life has become after one piece of information. My lungs felt as if they were filled with water, constantly drowning me in the pressure.

I bit my lip and glanced at Camara, who stood behind me. She nodded at me and I shortly hesitated before knocking on the apartment door.

A couple seconds passed before the door opened.

"Hello?" A deep voice asked and suddenly appeared a sleepy Tristan, Cameron's on-and-off boyfriend.

"Hey Tristan, this is my friend Camara, is it a good time?" I smile at the shirtless man as he rubs the tiredness out of his eyes.

He glances at me again before flashing a camera worthy smile. "Of course, Emily, anytime's good with you." He opens the door wider and waves us inside, "come in. Sorry, I was taking a nap before I had to go back to work."

"No, you're good." I said as we walked into Cameron's studio apartment, that seemed to scream Art Deco everywhere you looked.

"She changed it up again?"

Tristan rubbed the back of his neck before gazing around, "Yeah... it's a phase. Well, I hope it is."

A voice answered from the back, "it's not." Out came Cameron, from the back, with a large white blanket covering her shoulders.

"Welcome girls." She smiled before smacking Tristan in the shoulder, "go put on a shirt."

He shrugs before walking into the back, where Cameron appeared from a couple seconds ago.

Once Tristan's gone, she gestures us to a couch and all sit.

"So," she snuggles into the blanket. "what brings you to my humble home?"

Camara and I share a look, and I demanded. "Cameron. We need you to tell us everything you know about Fredrick Dixon and Parker. Now. No more lies."

Cameron's smiling face dies and she sits up straight, her spine like an iron rod. "I don't know what you're talking about."

I sigh. "Cameron, I know everything now. It's time for you to speak up."

"Did Parker tell you?"

Cameron bits her lip as she twiddles her thumbs. I'd never seen Cameron like this. She's usually a confident, no shit kind of girl, not meek and quiet. A frown curled my lips downward. I turn to look at Camara, who's eyes are trained on me, she supports a wary expression on her face.

"Yeah, yeah, he did." I lied.

Remorse filled me.

Sorry, I thought to myself.

Her hands folded like rose petals as she lowered her head, chewing the inside of her cheek. "I don't know the full story, but a couple years ago I was talking to Park. He looked pissed and not just any pissed, furious. I'd never seen him so mad. He told me he'd curse the ground someone walked on. When I asked who, he stormed out of the room we were in." She took a deep breath. "I thought it was nothing, that was until, Tomas got into that car crash and Parker disappeared for a couple days, I stopped him in the hospital and asked him where he was and he said he had to look for someone. I begged him to tell me and he said Frederick. Frederick Dixon. I left it alone, that was until I found this in Park's car one time." She swiftly stood up and went to the back.

I let out a shaky breath and kept my attention to the grey carpet, not daring to look into anyone's eyes or they'll see the tears slipping down my face.

Suddenly, a small picture fell into my lap.

Blond hair and a happy smile, stood Tomas in the picture. He looked a couple years younger than he does now. The picture was ripped in half since someone's arm was around Tomas' shoulder.

Camara stared at the picture, "where did you find this again?" She asked Cameron.

"In his car. Look, I don't know what that means, this is all I know-,"

"Emmie, do you still have the locket we got from his sister?" Camara interrupts Cameron.

I nod before reaching into my pocket and pulling it out before handing it over to her.

"What locket?" Cameron asks as Camara picks up the picture on my lap and opens the locket. I shoot Cameron a dirty glare.

"Umm... Emily?"

"Yeah, Camara?"

Camara lifts up the locket and picture from her lap. "Doesn't the picture in the locket looks like it attaches to the one that Cameron just gave us?"

"What?"

I look up at the picture and am shutter-shock. The two pictures connected together.

Two boys, one connected picture.

Fredrick sported a grand smile on his face as he hugged a smiling Tomas to his side.

"They're the same." I take a closer look at the photo.

"Yeah, but here's the thing, why is it ripped like that? And how did they know each other?"Camara asks with her eyebrows raised.

"Holy shit." I grab the locket and picture before standing up. "We gotta go."

Camara nods and walks towards the door.

"Wait!" Called Cameron. I looked back at her to see a guilty frown. She stands. "I'm so sorry, Emmie."

Camara opens the front door, and I mumble, "well talk about this later," before walking out of the door.

*****

Camara and I storm into Parker's apartment to find his phone to his ear.

Rage steams through me as I walk up to him and slam the phone out of his hands.

"What the fuck Em-,"

"Why is there a picture of Tomas and Frederick Dixon smiling all buddy to buddy? What do you know about Amber Dixon? Why did you visit her? Why were you looking for Frederick before his death? Who are you and why are you such a scum liar?" With every question asked was every hit my hands landed on Parker's chest, was every tear falling down my face, was every memory of my stupidity filling my mind.

"Emily!" Parker gripped my hands, a worried expression overtook his face.

He took a deep breath before telling something that destroyed me even more.

"Tomas just woke up."

*****

I hope you liked Chapter 22 of The Love That Is Parker Bowmen.

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