Free Home Is Where the Heart Is by Abigail Hart

noticed the front door ajar, and Liz didn’t seem like the type of person to let her door stay open.
    With his police training kicking into high gear, he stepped in front of her, pushing her behind him as he pulled his gun. “Stay here,” he told her.
    Kyra gasped when Dylan had pulled his gun, but her mom was in there. She wasn’t just going to stand outside in the yard and wait. “No, I’m going with you.”
    Frowning at her, Dylan apparently decided it was quicker to agree than argue. “Then stay behind me.” His eyes bore into hers until she nodded. He turned and slowly approached the house, keeping one arm angled out in case Kyra tried to slip past him.
    As he eased the front door open, he noticed the overturned furniture, the chaos of the once-immaculate room. This definitely wasn’t good. Kyra stayed pressed to his back, easing inside behind him not wanting to separate from him, and at the same time fighting the urge to run through the house looking for her mother. She could feel his muscles clenching tighter and tighter as they moved from the entryway to the living room. Her eyes lit on the destruction in the living room and her breath whooshed out, tightening her lungs. What the hell was going on?
    “Mrs. Michaels?” Dylan shouted. “Are you home?”
    He knew she was; her car was in the driveway. An overwhelming feeling of dread rushed through his body, mixing with the adrenaline coursing through his veins. As they rounded the overturned sofa, noticing the jagged rips made in the floral material, they heard a pleading moan coming from the kitchen. Kyra and Dylan rushed to the doorway, finding Mrs. Michaels covered in blood on the kitchen floor.
    “Mom! Oh my God!” Kyra screamed. She rushed across the room, falling to her knees as she huddled on the floor next to her mother, not caring that she was sitting in a pool of her mother’s blood. Dylan ripped Liz’s shirt open, trying desperately to locate all her wounds. The attack had been brutal, almost mindless, in its ferocity.
    He grabbed several kitchen towels and firmly pressed them against the stab wounds on her abdomen. There were too many wounds to count, and from his experience, it didn’t look good. So much blood had already been lost. Swallowing the lump rising in his throat, he knew he had to stay strong for Kyra. She had already lost her father, and now this had to happen. He had no idea if she was strong enough to handle this much horror.
    Dylan gently placed Kyra’s hand on the towels that were covering her mother’s abdomen. “Kyra,” he said, trying to keep his voice as calm as possible, “Press as hard as you can. It should help to slow the bleeding. I have to call 911. Do you understand?”
    Kyra nodded, unable to speak.
    Liz Michaels was knocking on death’s door when they had arrived and she wasn’t out of the woods yet. She had lost so much blood that Dylan could barely believe she was still alive. The ambulance was on its way and he hoped like hell that they could make it before it was too late.
    Kyra held her mother tight. “Mom, please don’t leave me. I love you so much. Please, Mom, don’t go.”
    Liz was in terrible pain, but she had to speak to her daughter. She had so much to say to her beautiful baby girl and feared not having the time. “Kyra,” she gasped, “I… so many… secrets. Don’t… trust the cops.”
    “Mom! Oh God! Please don’t die. I can’t lose you too!” she sobbed.
    “Love him with all of your heart,” Liz whispered, raising her hand to touch Kyra’s cheek. “Dylan’s… home” She closed her eyes and drew her final breath in her daughter’s arms.
    “Mom!” Kyra screamed. “No!”
    Kyra sobbed uncontrollably. Sirens screamed as they approached the house. She grasped her mother’s lifeless limp body tighter, rocking back and forth. Eyes closed to the world around her, she prayed a silent prayer for her parents and vowed to never stop searching for the men responsible. Anger and