Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
MARLOWE
My sneakers sink into the soft rotting floorboards, and the stink of blood and piss hits the back of my throat. It’s darker in here than I expected. The air damp and clinging, like it hasn’t been breathed in years. But the sounds are alive. Groaning. Clinking. Breathing.
My eyes snap to the stage, and the world spins around me.
My father is hanging like butchered meat—arms pulled taut above him by thick chains bolted to some sort of tall scaffolding above him.
His face is a swollen mess of purple and red, barely recognizable, one eye sealed shut, lips split.
Blood pools beneath him, soaking the stage floor where his feet barely touch.
He twitches. A weak sound comes out of him, like he’s trying to speak through broken teeth.
Clay stands next to him. Towering. Broad.
Covered in blood. His eyes are flat, dead, like the light in him rotted out years ago.
There’s a stain of red blooming across his ribs, more slashed across his temple.
His mouth curls, but it isn’t a smile—it’s something colder. Purer. Like violence made flesh.
He lunges right at Damian. And Damian’s not looking at him. He’s looking at me. His eyes lock with mine. His chest is heaving, shoulder soaked in red, his face a mix of fury and something that makes my knees give—pure fear. Not for himself. For me.
He tries to move. To come toward me. But Clay slams into him first. The impact rattles the whole stage.
And Damian stumbles back. His heel catches on the edge of the broken floor.
Rotten wood ending in a deep dark opening.
And then—he’s gone. Swallowed by the hole in the floor like the earth just opened up and took him.
I scream. The sound tears out of me raw and guttural. My throat burns, my lungs claw for air. “Damian!”
I’m already running. I don’t remember deciding to move. I don’t care who’s in my way. My hands slam against the side of the stage as I try to climb up, desperate to see anything.
The hole is deep. Jagged. Pitch-black. There’s no sound from below. No movement. Nothing. And I’m dying. I can’t breathe. My hands shake. My knees threaten to buckle. There’s blood on the floor. Chains clinking. My father choking on his own spit.
Clay’s boot swings fast.
It clips my ankle, hard and sharp. Pain zips up my leg as I stumble sideways, my shoulder slamming against the stage.
I catch myself just before the edge. My fingers find purchase in a rotted beam, the wood soft and spongey with years of damp and decay.
Chunks crumble under my grip, and the dark mouth of the pit yawns inches from where I nearly fell.
A few more inches and I would’ve followed him down.
Clay laughs. A low, sick sound. “Lemme guess, you’re the baker?
” he sneers. His voice is slick with venom, all mockery and rot.
He gestures toward me with a bloodied hand, fingers twitching like he can’t wait to wrap them around my throat.
“Thought you’d be at least pretty. But you’re nothing but an ugly dog. ”
I stumble back. My chest is heaving. Pain shoots up my ankle with each step, but I don’t give him the satisfaction of wincing. Fury climbs up my throat like it’s choking me.
He circles slow, like a predator that’s already decided I’m a meal.
“How was the fire?” he asks, and his grin goes wide and feral. “Did I make it hot enough for you, sweetheart?” His laughter is a rasped bark, sharp and gleeful, like he’s proud of it.
Fuck this. Damian might be dead. If he is, then I have nothing left.
That thought punches through me like a bullet.
It sticks, jagged and cold, right beneath my ribs.
My knees wobble, but I plant my feet wider.
I will not fall. Not for Clay. He destroyed everything I had left.
My home. My bakery. The life I scraped together from nothing.
He turned it all to ash, like they meant nothing.
And if Damian’s gone, then I have nothing left.
Which means I have nothing left to lose.
I’m done with people like him—men who take and take and take until there’s nothing left of you but charred remains. I’ve been used my entire life by Vick. Terrorized by Joel. Pawned by Taylor and strangled by Zero. My body, my luck, my hard work—all just currency of someone else’s game.
Not anymore.
Something inside me explodes wide open with fire. And I don’t care how much bigger he is. I don’t care how strong. I will drag this bastard into the grave if I have to. I lift my chin, blood roaring in my ears, and spit the words like venom. “You picked the wrong girl to leave breathing.”
Clay tilts his head, blood staining his teeth, and chuckles low in his throat—like this is just getting fun.
I glare at him, teeth bared.
Behind us, I hear Neve sob. “Bridger!”
I whip around. She’s at the back of the stage, down on her knees beside him. His body’s twisted in a heap, blood on the side of his head. Still. Cody’s not far from her, curled in on himself and trying to crawl, every inch of him shaking.
Everything is noise. Blood. Pain. That gaping hole in the stage. Clay’s laughter, echoing like it belongs in a different kind of hell. He steps toward me again.
I pull the steak knife from my back pocket and grip it so tight my fingers ache. The metal is warm from being pressed against my body, and the weight of it feels both pitiful and powerful in my hand.
Clay barks a laugh, sharp and mean. “Is that a kitchen knife?” he scoffs. “What the fuck are you gonna do with that?” His eyes gleam with sick amusement as he lunges.
His hands come up—big, calloused, fingers curling like claws as he reaches for my throat.
But I don’t freeze. I drop low and twist sideways, my pulse roaring in my ears, and slam the knife into his side.
It sinks in with a sick, wet pop—like stabbing a slab of raw roast beef wrapped in sinew and fat. Resistance at first, then a give. Heat bursts across my knuckles, and the hilt shudders in my grip from the impact.
His body jerks. His mouth falls open with a ragged snarl of pain.
I rip the blade out just as fast, the sound squelching, blood spurting in a dark arc across my forearm. He howls, staggering back, hand flying to his side.
His eyes find mine, wild now, red with rage and disbelief. But I don’t look away. I’m breathing like a storm.
Behind me, Vick makes a sound—a low, wet moan. “Marlowe…” It’s slurred, barely audible. “Please… I’m your father…”
Clay stumbles, falling hard against the wall with a groan that vibrates through the room like thunder in a cavern. He clutches his side, blood seeping through his fingers in dark, pulsing streams, but he’s still on his feet. Still too damn alive.
I back toward Vick without looking away from Clay.
“Please,” Vick whimpers, voice trembling. “Please… help me.” The word cracks something in me—but it doesn’t break me.
I flick a glance up. The chains. One of the links isn’t welded—it’s held together by a cheap-ass carabiner clasp, the kind you can buy in a hardware store for ninety-nine cents.
My fingers move fast. I unhook it with a metallic snap.
Vick crashes to the ground with a grunt, his legs folding like paper under him.
But my eyes are back on Clay. He’s rising—slow and monstrously. His face is a mask of fury, blood trailing from his gut, his mouth twisted into something feral.
Oh fuck. A fucking crowbar. It’s there, just inches from his boot, glinting with old blood and rust like it’s been waiting for him.
He sees it too. A twisted smile spreads across his face as he bends down and grabs it—fingers curling around the grip like it belongs to him.
My stomach flips, ice-cold. A new kind of fear coils inside me.
This one’s not just panic. It’s primal. Instinct.
The kind that knows this is how you die.
“You’re gonna look a lot prettier with your fucking head bashed in,” he snarls, lifting the crowbar.
He starts toward me.
And my body hesitates even though adrenaline burns through my veins.
I have no plan. There’s no air. No more breath in my lungs.
Just the paralyzing understanding that the knife in my hand isn’t going to work against a swing piece of metal.
Shaking, I fumble for the pepper spray in my front pocket, nearly dropping it as sweat slicks my palms.
Clay is closer. Crowbar raised. His eyes—blank, black, soulless—are locked on mine like he’s already picturing my skull caved in. I try to back away, legs slow, heart racing—
Then everything moves too fast. My father lurches up from the floor and throws himself between us.
“No—!” he snarls.
The sound is sickening. Crack. The crowbar hits him square in the skull.
The sound is wet. A mix of bone and meat and metal.
And then Vick drops—like a string’s been cut.
Just drops. Blood—so much blood—sprays across my chest, hot and metallic, and something solid and wrong hits my cheek and sticks.
I stand there. Frozen. Blood drips down my throat.
It’s splashed across my lips. I taste it.
My knees buckle and I fold forward, gagging.
Over and over and over. Dry heaving until my stomach aches and the world swims and the only thing I can hear is my own gasping.
And Clay? He doesn’t stop swinging that crowbar. He swings and swings.
The crowbar lands again and again. My eyes blur, but I still see it—his arm raised high, his expression twisted and ecstatic, sweat and blood flinging from his skin like he’s baptized in violence.
He brings the metal down into my father’s skull over and over until it’s not a head anymore—just pulp. A ruined, wet mash of meat and bone.
I can’t move. Can’t scream. I just watch.
Neve’s hands grab at me—my arms, my shirt, my waist—pulling and yanking.
“Marlowe—Marlowe—we have to go!”
But my body’s gone slack. My legs won’t work. My mind is still stuck on the sound, the wet sound, and the way Clay breathes through his teeth like this is fun.
Neve shakes me hard, nearly toppling me.
“Come on,” she sobs, “you need to move—you need to move now!”
But I’m still watching the way Clay grins as he lifts the crowbar one more time.
Still watching him fall into a frenzy, splattering what’s left of Vick across the wood.
Neve yanks me back, dragging me by the elbow until my knees unlock and start to move.
I stumble, choking on sobs I didn’t know I was making, and then I see them—Cody, upright but swaying, his jaw tight and eyes wild with fury.
Bridger’s slumped against him, barely standing, his arm thrown over Cody’s shoulders like dead weight.
But they’re alive.
They’re moving.
Then I hear it.
Clay’s laugh.
Low. Wet. Unhinged.
The crowbar clanks to the floor behind us.
And then his hands—bloody and hot—are on me.
First my shoulders.
Then my neck.
I shriek and thrash, stabbing the knife blindly into his arm, slicing it across slick skin. The blade skips, bites. Blood sprays.
He grunts, more annoyed than wounded.
Neve’s screaming now, behind me, beside me, clawing at him, slamming her fists into his ribs. “Let her go! Let her go!”
His hand wraps tightly around my throat.
I can’t breathe.
He shoves Neve hard and she goes down with a cry. I hear her hit the ground but I can’t turn my head to look. My knife falls, my vision blackening at the edges.
Cody’s coming.
Staggering forward.
Bridger too, limping, his face pale and smeared with blood.
But it’s too late.
Clay’s hand crushes tighter. My fingers claw at his wrist, useless. My legs dangle, slipping. Air burns in my lungs, my brain fraying.
And then—
Bang.
The sound cracks the world open.
Clay jerks.
Blood sprays across my face, warm and shocking.
His grip loosens.
And he drops.
I crumple with him, coughing, choking, dragging air into my torn throat. His weight drags me down with him and as fast as I can take in breath it sucks out leaving my lungs sharp and my ribs screaming.
Through my spotted vision, I see Damian. Staggering. Blood dripping from his temple, smeared down his neck, soaking his shirt. His eyes lock on mine. The gun drops from his hand and clanks to the floor. His expression is savage. But he’s alive. He’s fucking alive.
He sways, unsteady, like something inside him just shattered. Then he drops to his knees and crawls the last few feet toward me like he’s being pulled by some invisible thread, his whole body trembling.
“Lo,” he breathes, voice wrecked and raw. “Lo, look at me.”
His hands are everywhere—my shoulders, my face, my neck, my arms—scanning for wounds. His palms leave streaks of red across my skin. Is it mine? His? I can’t tell.
He rips his shirt over his head and starts wiping the blood off me in frantic, desperate strokes.
There’s a wound high on his perfect chest—a deep, wet bloom just above his heart, bloody and weeping.
“You’re shot,” I gasp. My voice cracks. “You’re hurt, Damian—you’re hurt.”
I reach for it, but he catches my wrist.
“Lo,” he grits. “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding,” I cry. “You’re bleeding!”
“I don’t care.” His voice breaks. “I don’t fucking care, Angel. I need to hold you. Needed to know you were still—” He chokes off the rest. Buries his face in my neck. “I can’t lose you.”
I sob into him, fists clutching at his bare back, pressing to his slick, torn skin. His heart pounds against mine—fast, frantic, and alive.
“You didn’t,” I whisper. “You didn’t lose me.”
And I swear I feel him break—just a little—in my arms.