Chapter 37 - Juliet
JULIET
Lex’s face is twisted in pain. One bloodied hand comes out, scratching against the ground as he tries to pull himself closer to the two of us. It hurts to watch him, but I don’t want Roquel to see him moving, so I shuffle to the side. She follows me as I kick off first one heel and then the second.
Roquel’s eyes remain on me, curious to see what I’m planning as I take the hem of the shimmery silver fabric in hand. With a grunt, I grip the hem of my dress at the seam, the thin material crinkling under my hard grasp, and yank the two halves apart.
Riiiiiiiiip. The side of the dress splits upward, giving my legs more room. Cold air washes over my freshly bared calf and thigh.
“Nice.” She smirks.
I arch a brow. “You want me to jump,” I remind her. “I can’t exactly climb up there without better movement.”
“You’re right.” She beams. “Thank you. I do appreciate a decent friend.”
Right. A decent friend ready to kill herself…
Surreal. This whole conversation is a fucking surreal nightmare. It’s far worse than the ones I’d suffered after Morpheus had raped me because instead of fake shadow men, I’m forced to deal with a very real and delusional woman.
“Now, up you go,” Roquel demands.
Wanting to kill her more with each passing second, I turn back to the barrier. “Why did you even bother to help me find a job?” I ask. The stone is rough against my skin. Little rocks and pieces of concrete dig into my knees as I lift one leg to the ledge.
“It was easier to keep track of you…” Without looking at her, Roquel’s answer sounds absent-minded. I glance back as I set my second knee on the ledge and realize she’s turned to Lex and lifted her gun again.
“No!” I teeter, almost slipping over the edge. Fingers scrambling, I grasp at the edge of the barrier, gasping—air lodged in my throat. Finally, I stop my descent and stare back at both an annoyed Roquel and frozen Lex as he stares down the path of the barrel.
“Do you want me to kill your boyfriend?” she asks. “Is that what you want, Juliet? I thought you claimed to love him?”
“I’m fucking doing it, okay!” I shout. “I’m up here!”
Instead of focusing on me, though, Roquel pivots to fully face Lex. “I know you don’t understand now, but I’m helping you, Alexio,” Roquel tells him with all of the soothing gentleness of a kindergarten teacher.
He snarls back at her, baring his teeth like an animal ready to strike—a wounded animal struggling to get closer. “I’ll fucking kill you!”
Damn it. My arms shake as I remain perched on the ledge on my hands and knees in a thin dress. Something white filters down and touches my nose. A snowflake.
Don’t look back. Don’t look down. Don’t look back. Don’t look down. I repeat the mantra in my head over and over again.
“She’s a leech,” Roquel tells him, not seeming the least bit cowed by his anger. “She’ll destroy everything you love just like she did for me.”
“Roquel,” I call her name, desperate to get her eyes on me again. “He’s hurt, he can’t stop you. Just… let him go. I’m doing what you want.”
With exaggerated slowness, Roquel straightens and faces me. “You’re right,” she agrees. “But just to be safe…” She points the gun at Lex’s head and cocks a brow.
Fuck.
I close my eyes for a brief second and one by one, pry my fingers off the half-wall barrier.
The sky opens up to me, the biggest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Wider than the ocean. More vast than anyone can know. I only have one plan now. I hope this works. I hope this doesn’t kill me.
I force my limbs to straighten, standing to my full height as my body starts to shake. Behind Lex and Roquel, I see a head of blonde hair peeking around the wall where we’d come through the door.
Madison.
Her face becomes clearer from where I’m standing, the moon’s light shining down. She looks alive, but unconscious. Her chest rising and falling, but there’s matted blood on the side of her face. At least she didn’t betray me. If I do end up dying here, I’m glad to know that.
Wind whips at my face, throwing my hair back—almost catching me and sending me over the side too soon. I gasp, my arms pinwheeling. Thankfully, I manage to slow the movement and stop myself from falling.
“Get down!” Lex’s voice is shaking, trembling in fear even as he squirms closer, uncaring of the gun to his face.
It’s odd to hear him scared. Lex isn’t afraid of shit, but now, as he looks at me—eyes wide, bloodshot, and yes… even a little bit watery—it’s easy to see he’s fucking terrified. He’s not the only one. I’m not exactly having the time of my life up here.
“Baby… please, please get down.” That second ‘please’ breaks something inside me. The sound of his voice cracking over the word sends a sharp burst of pain right into my heart, splitting it wide open. Snot clogs my nose and my eyes burn with unshed tears.
My chest pumps up and down. Fear crawls up my throat, choking me.
I don’t want to die, but I’d rather throw myself from this roof now than let anything happen to him or the others.
Lex grits his teeth as he tries to move closer, only to be stopped as the back of my foot edges just over the brink.
Lex freezes in place, his eyes never leaving mine.
“Please…” he begs again. “Please get down, baby. Don’t do this. I’m not worth it.”
I’m terrified out of my fucking mind. I should be sobbing right now, but I’m afraid to.
I’ve never heard Lex beg. In other ways, yes, but not like this.
Not for anyone. He’s cruel to those he doesn’t care for.
He takes. He breaks. And he leaves no survivors.
But he’s wrong about this, about himself.
He is worth this. They all are. The Scorpion Kings are the only fucking things in my life that are worth this.
“Shit,” he hisses through his teeth and shoves up onto one foot, only to be pushed back down. The cocking of a gun echoes into the night as the barrel presses into his temple. Vomit claws at the insides of my throat, threatening to turn this nightmare into something worse.
My eyes shoot to where Roquel stands to the side, amusement suffusing her face with rapt attention. “Get on with it,” she orders.
Another snowflake flutters down in front of me. I look back. We’re so high up, it’s almost impossible to figure out how many floors. Just looking makes my head feel foggy. The edge of the rooftop is right there. Almost gone. One step and it’s all over.
“Juliet.” Lex’s plea captures my attention one last time. There are tears in his eyes and I almost let that stop me. “I don’t care if I die,” he tells me. “But you can’t expect me to watch you do this and live afterwards. I can’t do this without you.”
I never would have thought I’d long to hear those words. How many months ago was it that we were nothing more than enemies?
A year ago, I didn’t even remember him.
I’d forgotten the sad, broken boy that I’d saved. The boy that had never forgotten me. He’d kept me in his heart and loved me even when I’d detested him. He’d grown into the man I adored and fallen in love with along with his best friends. They are everything.
All that viscous, disgusting hatred I’d breathed in around me seeped into my lungs and I’d come out on the other side full of a cancer that only the three of them had managed to cure me of.
Him. Nolan. Gio. Me. I don’t know whether I should feel relieved that the others aren’t here to witness this last act of love for them or not.
I bite my lip until I can taste blood in my mouth. My vision blurs as emotion stings the backs of my eyes, and I manage to hold in all but one tear. It slides down my cheek as I stare back at Lex. My beautiful monster. I smile at him and he shakes his head.
“God, don’t fucking smile at me when you do it,” he says. “Don’t leave me like that, Juliet. You fucking bitch—do not leave me with that image.”
I almost laugh at his comment. He’s right. I am a bitch. This is cruel, and yet, I have to do it. There’s no choice because that choice was made the second I decided to trust them, to love them, to put them first.
I’d once thought myself incapable of loving someone the way I wanted to be loved myself. Now, I realize that our love is rare because it’s dangerous. It’s blood and violence. Our love walks the tightline between obsession and insanity.
“It’s going to be okay,” I tell Lex because I have to. I need to give him a hint that this will work.
I’ve got a plan. A crazy, fucked-up, insane plan.
One that—if it doesn’t work—I’ll die in the most gruesome, painful, suffering manner there is, with my bones shattered in a million places, bleeding out as the hormonal teenage shitheads that have made my life hell scream and act like it’s their world ending and not mine.
“For what it’s worth,” I tell him. “I love you, too.”
I turn away from the sight of him and face the city. Lights dance in the background. The sound of music and cars is a low buzz in the air. I take it all in and as I do, something tremendous slams into my mind.
Madness isn’t doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Madness is something else entirely. It’s obsession and broken pasts coming together to form a future that you know you’ll never be a part of.
I close my eyes and realize that I can't breathe.
There's no oxygen in my lungs, yet it lingers all around me, unwilling to give me a taste. As if even the air in Silverwood hates my fucking guts. It wouldn't surprise me if it did.
I’m fucking insane. Because even choking on nothingness doesn’t stop the smile from spreading over my face.
Nothing surprises me anymore.
"Well?" That voice holds no pity. "What's your choice? You… or him?"
Really, she should be asking—me or them?
And isn't that the question? That's always been the question. For the last several months, I've been asking myself that same thing over and over again.
Me or them? Me or them? Me… or them?
I didn't know until this moment. I never would have guessed what my answer would finally be. Now that we're here, though, I can't see how I would have made any other choice.
It's them. It was always going to be them and it will always be them.
My lips part. I inhale, but there's still no air.
Fuck. It's not like I'll need to breathe for much longer anyway if I can’t pull this off.
Life as I know it is over.
I'm done.
Finished.
All because I let the Scorpion Kings turn me into everything I said they wouldn't.
They made me theirs and because of that…
I have to die.
So, here it goes.
Life or death?
Me or them?
I choose them.
I said I’d never die for a man. Well, now that it’s about three of them—it’s time to eat.
Those.
Fucking.
Words.
My feet inch back, the backs of my bare soles hanging off the edge of the barrier as I face out towards the sight of my potential end. My breath comes in rapid pants.
“Juliet!” Lex screams my name and my eyes shoot open because it’s not the kind of sound that’s trying to stop me, but to warn me.
Roquel is barreling towards me, obviously far beyond waiting for me to take the final step myself. Her hands push out, the gun dropping from one as she goes to shove me off the ledge.
“Just fucking die already!” she yells.
The hotel door flies open and Gio and Nolan shove their way onto the rooftop. Their eyes widen in horror as they take in the situation. It’s too late. Roquel’s hands slam against my calves and I teeter backwards, a shout lodged in my throat as I bite down, grinding my teeth.
Fuck this, I think. If she wants me dead, then she’s damn well coming with me.
One of my feet slips off the ledge and the wintry wind rushes up to greet me as I reach out, latching on to Roquel’s dress with one hand and her hair with the other. Fabric rips under my grasp, the neckline of her dress tearing straight down.
My momentum is slowed, but only barely as she tumbles over the half wall, and suddenly the two of us are in complete free fall. The world is going up while we’re going down.
There’s only one thought in my head as I fall. Even if I survive this—man, is it gonna hurt like a bitch.