Chapter 38: Not A Job

"You can't really be suggesting splitting them up?" Stef asked the man from CPS. "They are holding each other together. I'm sure you know what they have been through," she complained. She couldn't understand what this guy wasn't understanding.

"I do know. But I'm being put in a difficult situation myself. The only available foster family on such short notice is only willing to take in the boy. And the group home that I've found for Callie is only for girls. Now, I don't like it anymore than you do, but like I've told Callie and Jude, this is only temporary until—"

"That girl has trust issues as it is and I promised her that I wouldn't allow them to get split up. There has to be something else you can do."

"Are you suggesting you'd take them in?" Kenny asked.

"I—" Stef stopped talking at the suggestion, knowing very well that she shouldn't be making any rash decisions without talking to Lena about them first.

"I didn't think so," Kenny nodded. "Look, these two kids aren't your problem. I appreciate your concern but you've done your job already... Now, let me do mine."

Something that Kenny said through Stef off.

The fact that he mentioned all of this as being her job reminded her of the first day she found Callie and Jude. It reminded her of what Callie said when Stef was interrogating her.

You don't even understand what I'm saying, but you're still here thinking that you want answers when in reality you don't. You want the answers that will help you close the case; the ones that will help you sleep better at night so just…write whatever you want to write down on the statement. It's doesn't even matter.

Stef couldn't prove that girl right. She couldn't let Callie think that there wasn't any good in this world.

Chapter 39: Sooner Or Later

Stef walked back into the room without Kenny and took a seat on the empty chair before grabbing her phone and texting Captain Roberts to let her know that there was a family emergency and she couldn't make it back. She knew that Mike would complain about it later but pleasing Mike was the last thing on her mind right now.

This was something she had to do and Lena would just have to understand.

"Where did the man go?" Jude asked the blonde.

Stef looked back up at him and smiled, "He left for now. Don't worry about him," she tried to tell them both. But neither of them were too quick to believe her.

"You don't have to stay," Callie informed her in a harsher tone, when she really wanted to just tell her to leave so that they wouldn't have such a hard time attempting to escape with even more eyes on them.

Stef knew exactly what Callie was getting at but took in a deep breath and tried to smile, "I know, sweets. But I want to. Is that okay?"

Callie sighed and shrugged her shoulders in response. She would have to leave sooner or later, she thought to herself.

Chapter 40: Complicated

After an hour of waiting, Stef felt her cellphone begin to vibrate on her belt. Assuming that it was Mike calling her to complain about getting too attached, she shook her head and unhooked it from her belt clip to press ignore. Immediately she recognized the number as Detective Holden's.

"Kids, I'll be right back," she told them both. Callie and Jude looked up from the board game Stef had found in the kid's playroom to meet the woman's gaze. "Callie, I'll be right outside," the blonde gave her a warning look causing the brunette to give her an annoyed glare in response.

Once they watched her walk outside of the room, Jude spoke up, "How long is she going to stay in here with us?"

"I don't know, Jude. I don't know what's her problem," Callie admitted. "I'm sure she'll leave soon though. So don't worry."

Jude stared at her blankly, causing Callie to shake her head. She hated that Jude didn't trust her. She was the only one who had been there for him this entire time and had never lied to him. Not once. She wasn't anything like their mom, and the fact that Jude kept related them was beginning to piss her off even more.

Callie instantly stood up from the bed and began to walk over toward the doorway to see if anyone was really keeping an eye out for them. Immediately her eyes spotted Stef, who's eyebrows raised the second she saw the teen at the doorway. Callie's nostrils flared as she forced herself to walk back over toward Jude's bed.

"What happened?" Jude asked.

"This is going to be more complicated than I thought," Callie confessed.

Chapter 41: Lies, Lies And More Lies

Stef wasn't sure she heard Detective Holden correctly the first time he spoke. "I'm sorry, what?"

"The grandfather. He passed away over 3 years ago. 3 years at 8 months to be exact."

"I don't… I don't understand," Stef confessed. "Callie told me that the mother promised to let them out the second that he passed away. That doesn't make any sense," Stef shook her head.

"It makes perfect sense, Stef... Colleen never mentioned what her father wrote in his will, to any of those kids."

"What did he—"

"He included that if there was proof that Colleen ever had children with her ex-husband Donald, that Colleen wouldn't get a penny from his estate."

"So, wait a second," Stef stopped as she took in a deep breath, "…Are you telling me that she had locked her children in the attic, and told them that they'd be out the second their grandfather died for over three years?"

"That's exactly what I'm telling you. And that's another reason why all of this makes sense. The poison, the body—"

"Whoa," Stef stopped him again. "What body?"

Holden sighed before answering, "…There was a body found buried in the backyard. It appeared to have been a young male, and judging by the decomp, it could've been there anywhere from eight months to a year and a half. Our medical examiner took the body in for a thorough examination but from your description so far it's a match…Those kids were lucky to get out of there when they did. I mean, I've never seen anything like this before."

Stef tried to swallow hard and not show any kind of emotion but the thought of anyone murdering their own child was enough to get to her. And these kids had no idea about what really happened to their brother. "And the mother?"

"Both women are going to be singing like canaries by the time the tox screen comes in. The kids are going to have to take DNA tests to prove that they are Colleen's children but with everything that we have here, those two will be lucky if all they get is life."

Stef shut her eyes and tried to listen to what Detective Holden was telling her but she couldn't bring herself to accept it all.

How was she supposed to tell these two kids that their brother didn't just leave them behind?

That their mother murdered him and buried him in the backyard?

That their grandfather had died just months after they got placed in the attic and they were only kept up there for over three additional years because of their mother's greed?

And even now, that she was denying any relation to them whatsoever and was indeed trying to kill them too?

They had been through too much.

She wouldn't put them through even more.

Chapter 42: Hope

Stef barely slept from fear that Callie would try to escape with Jude in the middle of the night. And when the sun came up the doctor came into their room, he allowed the blonde to sign their discharge forms.

He handed her a prescription of some meds to help Callie sleep if it became too difficult for her and gave her some names of a few therapists that he recommended.

Callie woke up the second that the doctor walked in but tried to pretend still being asleep.

What did this mean? she wondered. Was she going to be the one taking me to the group home and Jude to the foster home? If that was the case then it was going to be more difficult running from her than it would have been running from Kenny.

And when the doctor left, Stef sat down on the edge of Callie's bed and smiled before she spoke, "Kid, I have three kids at home. I can tell when they're pretending to be sleeping so you're not going to pull one over on me. That's for sure."

Callie opened one eye to stare at her at first and found the blonde smiling in response. The teen couldn't even force a smile back if she wanted to.

"Where are you taking him?" she finally asked with the hope that she would find Jude again one day, whether it be tonight or another four years from now. She would always come back for him no matter how bad their situation was.

The cop sighed before she responded, "The same place I'm taking you. So don't worry."

"Yeah, well usually when someone tells me not to worry that means it's the one thing I should be doing," Callie replied as she began to sit up from the bed. She turned her head over towards Jude who was smiling back at her.

"We're going with Stef… to her house," Jude told his big sister, silently hoping that she would accept her offer.

Callie turned her gaze back toward Stef, and it was obvious that she was confused. "Why?" she asked in a firm tone. "I already told you that we don't need your pity."

"…For once Callie, this isn't about you," the blonde informed her. "This is about me keeping my promise. And you, keeping yours too. Isn't that what you want?" Stef questioned.

Callie stared back at her, wanting nothing more than to say yes. But fearing what would happen if she did.

She didn't want to believe her.

And yet she did.

Stef nodded and stood back up from the hospital bed, "So are you two kids ready?"

Jude smiled as he stood up to follow her and for some reason Callie found herself following the woman out of the hospital building as well.

She found herself standing out in the sun for the first time in four years.

The bright and yellow light confused her at first, and then she realized it was true, what those books she read in the attic said.

Yellow was the color of hope.

And she was finally able to see it for the first time and smile.

THE END

A/N: Okay, I'd like to thank all of you that have stuck with me for the duration of this story. I'm so sorry it took so long to complete it. I did have some serious writer's block at times.

And this story was inspired by the book Flowers In The Attic by V.C. Andrews. The story (which is believed to be a true one) was about 4 siblings that were locked away in an attic for four years because of their mother's greed. I kept a lot of the backstory the same but the youngest boy died inside of the attic. I didn't have the heart to kill Jude. Though I made up the part of the oldest brother escaping and getting buried by the mother. Towards the end of the actual book, is when they actually escaped. I made that more of the beginning for this story and there was no cop like Stef that found them, so I made all of that up too. The actual book was really good and I definitely recommend reading it, along with the rest of that series. Though it was a sad story, it was very intriguing. And V.C. Andrews was one of those authors that could captivate you in anything that she wrote. So I recommend a lot of her work.

On another note, I'm on the fence about making a sequel of when Callie and Jude actually show up at the Fosters' home. If that's something you would like to see, please let me know. Otherwise, I'm going to leave it here.

As always, thank you for reading/reviewing/favoriting. I appreciate every single one :)