Chapter 29 #2
He tries to grab Monty's wrist, both hands wrapping around the bigger man's forearm, but Monty's got leverage and fifty pounds on him. They struggle, the knife wavering between them, both men pouring everything they have into controlling that blade.
Monty's free hand shoots up, massive fingers wrapping around Nate's throat. Nate’s grip on the knife arm falters as oxygen becomes a luxury he can't afford.
"Your brother's about to experience the greatest high and nightmare at once," Monty says, his voice conversational despite the exertion, like he's discussing the weather instead of murder.
Nate's face is turning red, then purple and I can see him weakening, his hold on Monty's knife hand slipping.
The blade inches closer to his chest.
Nate makes one last desperate play—he stops fighting the knife and instead drives his knee up between Monty's legs, hard. Monty's grip on his throat loosens for just a second, but it's enough.
Nate breaks free, stumbling backward, gasping for air.
But he's too slow.
The knife slides between his ribs with a sound I'll carry with me into whatever comes after this life.
A wet, tearing sound that echoes in my bones and rewrites something fundamental in my DNA.
"Nate!"
The scream that tears from my throat doesn't sound human.
Nate crumples to the floor, one hand pressed against the wound, blood seeping between his fingers like he's trying to hold himself together by force of will alone.
But his eyes—his eyes find mine, and they're still aware, still fighting. Still trying to protect me even as he's dying, even as the light starts to fade.
There's something in his expression that breaks me completely.
Not fear, not pain, but concern.
He's worried about me.
Even now, even like this, bleeding out on the floor, he's worried about me.
Monty pulls out the syringe, that needle full of liquid death, and kneels beside Nate.
"No." I try to crawl toward them, but the world keeps tilting sideways.
Blood from the gash on my head drips steadily, pooling beneath me, and my vision fades to black for a moment before snapping back.
The room spins like a carnival ride.
"No, please..."
My words slur together as consciousness threatens to slip away again. I blink hard, forcing myself to focus, but everything feels distant.
Blood trails behind me as I drag myself forward another inch, my head wound bleeding freely.
The needle goes into Nate's arm with surgical precision.
It takes only seconds until his body convulses immediately, seizes like he's being electrocuted from the inside out. His back arches off the floor not long after that and his eyes roll back until only the whites show, but somehow—somehow—they find me one last time.
In that split second, in that final moment of connection, I want to tell him everything I've never said.
That I'm sorry for being the reason he's here, for every beating he took that was meant for me. I want to tell him I love him more than I've ever loved anything in this world.
Something snaps inside me then.
Some final thread of sanity or self-preservation or fear for my own life. All that's left is rage and grief and the terrible knowledge that I have nothing left to lose.
I launch myself at Monty with everything I have left—all the fury and desperation.
I'm smaller, weaker, probably dying already from blood loss, but I'm fueled by something more powerful than survival instinct.
We struggle, and for a moment I think I might actually hurt him. My fingers claw at his face, his eyes, anything I can reach. I feel skin tear under my nails, hear him curse, and there's a savage satisfaction in knowing I've marked him.
Then a gunshot.
And for a split second there's just the weird sensation of something foreign punching through skin and muscle and organs that were never meant to have holes in them. The bullet tears through my abdomen like molten metal, then the fire starts.
Not just pain, but liquid agony spreading outward from the entry point like I've been filled with acid. My legs give out completely, and I hit the floor hard, the impact driving what little air I have left from my lungs.
The room tilts sideways then begins to spin, I can taste copper and something else—something that might be my own death working its way up my throat.
"Should've minded your own business, kid," Monty says, standing over me like some twisted angel of death.
The silence that follows is deafening.
Just the sound of my own breathing, getting shallower with each breath.
I can't move.
I can't speak.
The blood pools beneath me, warm and sticky, and my vision blurs until Nate's face becomes just a pale smudge against the darkness. But even like that, even still and silent, he looks peaceful.
At least the pain is gone for him.
I used to think people came in two kinds.
The ones who carry the fire, and the ones who get burned by it. I thought I knew which one I was.
But I didn’t see it until it was too late.
There’s a moment, right before everything splits apart, where it all sharpens.
Where you see the truth so clearly it almost hurts to look at. The people you love the most, they’re the ones who blind you the fastest.
And loyalty?
Loyalty can be a cage if you’re not careful.
It can convince you that monsters wear halos, and heroes wear bruises. I wanted to believe in him but sometimes the villain looks a hell of a lot like the man you were trying so hard to become.
If I’d known then what I know now, maybe I would’ve chosen differently.
Maybe I would’ve walked away.
But I didn’t.
And now I’m stuck in the silence between heartbeats, wishing I’d said more when I had the chance.
Wishing I hadn’t waited until the world was on fire to tell the truth. I think the worst part of all of it is knowing I won’t get the chance to say I’m sorry.
Not to you Nate, not the way you deserved.
So if you wake up—
If you make it out of this—
Just know this was never supposed to be your burden.
It should’ve been mine.