Chapter Twenty #2
I swung the butt of my gun into her temple with a brutal precision. She crumpled to the floor with a thud, and I held my breath, waiting to see if anyone was coming around the corner to see what the noise was.
I pulled the pair of handcuffs from my back pocket and locked her to the toilet. Then I stuffed a roll of gauze from the first-aid kit into her mouth, taping it there. She’d wake up at some point, but she wasn’t fucking getting away. Not before I dealt with her.
I found the basement door, and the stairs creaked under my weight as I went down. Cyrus’s voice was booming from down below. “… always knew this day would come, Seraphine. A perfect reunion.”
I reached the bottom step and saw them. Seraphine was tied to a radiator, her face pale but defiant.
Good girl.
And then there was Cyrus, standing in the center of the room with a gun in his hand, looking exactly like me but… wrong. It was like looking into a mirror at one of those twisted carnival games. Familiar features but twisted.
“Hello, Cyrus.” I stepped into the light, my hand brushing the gun hidden in my waistband, ready to draw.
Cyrus spun to face me, and for a moment, genuine shock crossed his face. He recovered, his eyes narrowing. “How the hell did you find us?” His gaze traveled up the stairs. “Where’s Judith? Did she tell you about the note? That bitch.”
I shrugged, taking a step closer. “The note was convincing, but you forgot one thing.”
“What? What did I forget?”
“You forgot that I know you.” I smiled, the kind of twisted smile that made grown men flinch in prison. “You always were sloppy, Cyrus. Even as kids. Remember when you killed Abby’s rabbit and thought you could hide it? I figured out it was you in a heartbeat.”
Something flickered in his eyes, a cross between hurt and then rage. “I’m not sloppy anymore, Valen. I’ve had five years to perfect my art while you rotted in that cage.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Seraphine yanking on her restraints. If I could just keep Cyrus’s attention on me, she might be able to break free.
“Have you now?” I took another step closer. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you’re still the same pathetic little boy who couldn’t stand that I got all the attention.”
Cyrus raised his gun, pointing it at Seraphine, making me freeze. “Careful, Valen. Keep insulting me and I’ll put a bullet in your pretty little girlfriend’s head so she can join her friends.”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I scoffed, the words tasting like venom in my mouth. But the less important she seemed to me, the better chance she had at surviving. “She was just the easiest way for me to get to you.”
Cyrus studied my face, and after a minute, he shook his head. “You’re lying. Trying to trick me. I see the way you look at her. It’s the same way you looked at Abby. Like she’s precious.” He threw Seraphine a dark look.
She froze, but the second Cyrus turned his attention back to me, she resumed working at getting herself free.
That’s it, little lamb. Keep going.
“You just don’t understand.” Cyrus’s face was twisted with anger. “You never understood. We’re the same. We share the same DNA, the same face, even the same scar.” He touched his cheek with pride. “We could have shared everything. But you always had to have something that was just yours.”
“What are you talking about, Cyrus?” He’d always had this strange vision of us being the same person, but it had never made sense. Not to me, my sister or our family. “Like what?”
“Like Abby’s love. Like our parents’ respect. Like freedom while I rotted away in that fucking hospital.” His voice rose with each word, making him sound more and more unhinged. “And now like her.” He gestured toward Seraphine with the gun.
I took another step, almost close enough to be in striking distance. But his head snapped toward me, and I froze in place.
“You want to know a secret, Valen?” His face lit up, and a shiver shot through me at the empty look in his eyes. “Do you know why I chose her? I saw you watching her one day on campus. I’d been following you all day, and you didn’t even know it.”
My blood turned to ice at his words.
No.
“You stopped dead in your tracks when you saw her. Then you just stared at her with a stupid smile on your face like she was the most beautiful thing you’d ever seen.
” Cyrus’s smile was wide, like he was enjoying this twisted confession.
“And I felt it, brother. That look you gave her was the same look you used to give Abby when she’d run to you, instead of me. The same look that said she mattered.”
The words hit me like a punch to the gut. All these years, I’d suspected, feared, but never known for certain. He’d seen me notice her. One minute of wishful thinking had signed the death warrants of five women.
“I knew then she had to be mine,” Cyrus continued, his voice almost dreamlike.
“You killed five innocent women because you were jealous of a glance?” I whispered, the shock of it almost snatching my voice away.
“I killed them because you forgot what we are to each other!” Cyrus screamed, all pretense of sanity slipping away. “You’re mine, Valen. You always have been. We’re two halves of the same whole, and I’m not going to let anyone take you away from me again.”
“You’re fucking insane.” Seraphine laughed. I gave her a look that said “keep your mouth shut,” but she ignored me. “I mean, it’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard. I’ve heard of daddy issues, and mommy issues, but fuck, I’ve never heard of brother issues.”
Cyrus’s face twisted, and he swung his arm toward her, raising his gun. “Shut up, you bitch!”
My vision tunneled as rage snapped inside of me.
Sharp, hot. The rest of the room seemed to disappear as I lunged toward Cyrus.
We hit the ground hard, the impact rattling my teeth as his gun went off.
The shot exploded through the basement, tearing through my left shoulder.
Pain radiated down my arm, but I didn’t stop. I fucking couldn’t.
Cyrus howled like a deranged animal, the gun jerking in his hand. Shots ricocheted, blasting through wood and concrete. Each shot was deafening, and each one could have hit Seraphine. I had to get the gun away from him.
I slammed my fist into his face, feeling his bone crunch under my knuckles. His head snapped back, blood dripping from his lip, but he wouldn’t let go of the gun. He thrashed beneath me, jamming his knee into my ribs, trying to throw me off of him.
“Valen!” Seraphine screamed, the terror evident in her voice.
I gritted my teeth and drove my weight down into him, trying to pry the gun from him even though pain was racing through me.
He dug his fingers into my wound, making me scream out.
Agony from the pain nearly blinded me, but I used it—the pain, the rage—because every second I stayed alive meant she could too.
With a guttural roar, I smashed his hand against the concrete, trying to break his grip. The gun went off again, the bullet flying past my ear so close this time I could almost feel the heat of it.
Cyrus laughed through broken teeth, blood streaking down his chin. “You can’t stop me. She’s mine,” he growled.
Not while I’m fucking alive.
I drove my elbow into his face, more of his blood flying. But he was strong, stronger than I remembered. With a roar he kicked me off of him, and I went flying backwards. The gun skittered across the floor, and we both made a run for it, but he got to it first.
He fired, the shot blasting through my thigh, dropping me to my knees. Blood poured from the wound, pooling onto the concrete. My vision blurred, my breathing coming out ragged.
“Look at you now, brother,” Cyrus seethed. “Not so fucking strong, are you?”
He pulled out a knife, cut Seraphine free from the radiator and dragged her over so we were kneeling in front of each other.
“First you,” he hissed at Seraphine, pressing the gun to her temple. “Then him. You’ll watch each other die. How does that sound?” He slapped Seraphine across the face so hard, her head whipped to the side.
My jaw clenched, a low growl vibrating through my chest.
“Oh, you don’t like that?” Cyrus snickered, tugging Seraphine’s head back by her hair.
Seraphine didn’t make a sound, not a scream or a whimper. She looked me dead in the eye, that same defiant look in her eyes that had made me fall in love with her.
Cyrus pressed the gun to her temple, then to mine, going back and forth. “Hm, now I can’t decide. Eeny, meeny, miny, moe.” He laughed hysterically, the sound making me sick.
“I love you, Seraphine,” I said, my voice thick with regret and blood. “I’ll find you in heaven or hell, in the next lifetime and all the ones after. I’ll always fucking find you, little lamb.”
Her hand slipped into her pocket, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I love you too, Valen.”
“Oh, isn’t this sweet?” Cyrus bent down, his face inches from her. “Guess what? It doesn’t matter, because you’re both about d—”
Faster than Cyrus could react, Seraphine pulled out the wooden knife I’d made her. Her scream tore through the basement as she drove it into his throat. The same spot where he’d cut her years ago.
Cyrus’s eyes went wide with shock as he staggered backward, blood pouring through his fingers as he clutched at his wound.
“You… b-bitch,” he gurgled, then collapsed to the floor.
My vision was going dark around the edges. I had lost too much blood, which was making me sway. Seraphine’s voice was all around me, but the sound was muffled. I blinked, trying to crawl toward her.
My vision tunneled, her face blurring in front of me.
If death was coming for me, it could fucking take me, but it would take me in her arms.