Chapter 32 #2
I dropped the gun where I stood and jumped to the stairs before it hit the ground.
I pulled Nessie into my arms, lifting her lifeless body. A small hole sat between her open eyes. Her skull was where my father’s bullet landed.
A scream ripped from me—one, so loud, I had no idea I could even voice it.
“No. No. No. NOOOOOO!”
I pulled her onto my lap, my long legs comforting her body as I brushed blonde curls from her face. My thumb wiped at the smudge of blood, trying to stop it staining my last memory of her.
I looked over her, my heart breaking all over again. My tears landed on her pale cheeks, making her open eyes look liked she’d cried them herself.
I pulled her into my chest and rocked her in my arms.
“I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so sorry.”
The blood between her legs almost made me sick. I tucked myself into her hair so I wouldn’t have to look at it. But I was still heaving over the idea of the pain and fear she felt before God welcomed his little angel home.
“Find peace, baby. Find that better place.” I placed a kiss on her wet cheek, saying my goodbyes long before I was ready.
A shadow darkened where I sat. My mother stood at the top of the stairs. Her face covered in badly-applied makeup, hiding the bruise matching the size of my knuckles.
“Nessie?” she called out. “Ville? Ville!” she screamed out.
But Ville wouldn’t rush to her side today. The fire was already eating him.
“He’s dead,” I said coldly.
I didn’t fucking care.
Actually, I was fucking glad.
“And her? What happened to my baby?”
I didn’t answer, remembering their threat from earlier, of how Nessie would suffer.
And, fuck, did she suffer.
“You don’t get to talk about her. You don’t get to look at her. You don’t get a fucking goodbye, because you sick fuckers caused all this.”
She screamed again, no words just a roar of intense hate. She launched at me, her pointed nails digging into my flesh as she tackled me to the ground.
We tumbled as a trio, toppling over each step and landing too close to the flames making their way through the house.
I landed on Nessie, my mother on my back, still beating at me, still scraping her vicious black-painted claws down my naked skin.
Nessie’s outstretched arm become appealing to the hungry fire. Orange flames moved towards her, and I had no way to stop them.
I flipped my mother from my back, making sure she landed in their path, preventing Nessie from becoming nothing but ash. I pulled open the doors and jumped the steps, my lifeless little sister still in my arms. I placed her on the grass, where decapitated daisies cartwheeled through the air.
I wanted to escape, but their scent kept me present.
Headlights zoomed towards me in the distance, their bright light shining through the darkness ahead.
“I’ll be back, baby. I’ll be right back,” I promised, placing a kiss on Nessie’s cheek.
I climbed the steps to the house, my bare and pained feet, flat to the porch as I prayed the lights of the vehicle moving closer, belonged to the sheriff’s department, and Jolie had asked them to come here, but I knew that was some kind of wishful thinking.
She probably hadn’t even hit the road yet.
It was more likely that car was arriving here, full of men, who would have taken their turns on my little sister, which was why I couldn’t leave her alone for long. Death didn’t bother them all.
I took one last glance at her, looking like she had fallen asleep in the grass, like she had many times after a busy day of playing in the sun.
I stepped into the house, and my prayers changed direction, following my girl and praying to God that whoever was driving here wouldn’t find her on their way.
My mother’s screams welcomed me home; she ran at me, her skinny body covered in flames. I didn’t run. I gripped her by her outstretched arms and swung her hard against the wall.
My hands burned, and as I stared down, I wasn’t surprised to see the vision of orange. And I felt a twisted kind of thrill as I wrapped them around my mother’s throat.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” I questioned, not expecting an answer, and not because she couldn’t give one as I applied more pressure.
“Imagine this constantly.” I squeezed until she could barely breathe.
“Imagine how ugly you’ll feel with all the scars on your face,” I told her, remembering the sneers she’d directed to my perfect girl.
“Imagine how you’d feel with someone constantly ridiculing you for them. ”
Flames moved up my arms, diluting the strength I had left.
“Don’t worry, Mother, that won’t happen.” I stepped back, confident that she wouldn’t survive.
I let my mother go, and her useless body fell to the floor. Her legs couldn’t hold her with the burns she suffered. She was burned to the bone.
Karma, for Jolie and her ruined leg, and the lack of help this woman gave.
Her arm swung out, a blaze of heat moving with it. She struck me in the crotch. The fire sucked at my shaft through my sweats, and I had to kick them off to avoid losing my dick to the flames.
Again, karma for Jolie and all her burns.
I accepted it, heat burning at my toes, fire climbing my legs, using the hairs standing on edge for purchase.
The ceiling behind me collapsed, landing on the heap that was once a man I loved. . . a man I wished would have loved me.
My mother grabbed at me, her skinny arms pulling me to the ground with all she had left. Her hate was the only thing keeping her alive—her hate for me.
She pulled me on top of her, too worn out to hold herself up and fight to kill me.
“If I’m dying here, so are you,” she spat, the flames climbing my neck as her hands clawed at me until she was in the perfect position to strangle me.
My eyes moved wildly; my hands batted her away as they searched for something—anything I could use as a weapon.
And there it was. . . Nessie’s cross, the edge much sharper than it should have been.
I gripped it in my hand, my fingers closing around the base before I gave myself any time to remember where it had last been, and I plunged it into my mother’s chest, and she screamed, bringing down the walls of the house.
I leaped from her, leaving the cross embedded and her blood gushing out as I rushed through the doors before my home buried me alive.
I ran through the field, an orange trail following the shadow of my footsteps. I jumped into the stream, praying once again to God, this time, to injure no fish.
The water wrapped around me, fighting off the aggressive flames that would change how I looked from the neck down, forever. I stayed beneath the surface for as long as I could, fearing the fire was waiting to claw at me again when I got out.
But, then, my time was up. The need for oxygen called me to the surface.
I struggled back to Nessie and collapsed to the ground, my eyes moving in search of the vehicle that had been driving this way. . . but there was nothing. I reached out and touched my sister’s hand, holding it, while my tight chest tried to suck in air.
The scent of daisies—my favorite scent—was overpowered by something else. A man’s heavy cologne filled my nose, and I stared up to find someone standing over me. Someone I’d met before.
I looked at his face, remembering it from when he stood in my kitchen, holding Jolie back and encouraging her not to do anything stupid.
“The silent man,” I breathed out with a cough.
“The name is Olivier, actually.”
Olivier. . .
I laughed to myself, remembering that name from an actor in old movies, and when one movie in particular—a tragic love story—popped into my head, I smiled.
“Olivier,” I struggled with the name this time, for the same reason I struggled with so many other things—this damn throat and the constant closing of my airway.
“My friends call me Ollie, if that’s easier.” He smiled at me, appearing like a real friend. His white teeth—the product of amazing genes or money well-spent—were the only brightness I saw right now.
I blinked twice, but he had no idea what that meant.
When my eyes opened, he was taking off his formal jacket, giving it to me to keep warm.
“Help me find her. And don’t hurt her.”
He nodded, knowing instantly who I meant. “After we get you some help.” There was a tightness in the smile he gave to me, but I held on to his promise. . .
And I’d never let go.