26
CHRIS
He opened his eyes to a stabbing pain, like daggers shifting underneath his flesh. He could vaguely tell that he was lying sideways on the cement basement floor. His head... something was wrong with his head. It felt warm and sticky where it rested on the floor. He sniffed and smelled blood.
What happened?
Flashes of lights appeared in his memory, blue and red, blue and red. He had felt a spark of hope when the lights spilled across the living room, but that had been swiftly replaced with terror as he tumbled down the stairs. He wondered if his skull was still intact or whether he was leaking out pieces of brain with the steady flow of blood.
His heart sounded too loud and felt too slow. At least he didn’t have that damn shirt stuck in his mouth anymore, although his hands were still bound behind his back.
“Daniel?”
The voice came from behind him. A hand stroked his shoulder—the one that didn’t hurt like hell.
“Daniel, are you okay? I’m sure that Trevor didn’t mean for you to fall.”
Chris shut his eyes. Even the dim light felt too bright. A sudden screeching sound from upstairs pierced through his brain like an arrow. Someone was moving the closet.
Maybe it isn’t Trevor?
A shred of hope reignited in his chest, momentarily pushing aside his pain. He squinted at the top of the stairs, waiting for red and blue lights to spill down.
“Is he okay?”
The sound of Trevor’s voice sent his hopes plummeting.
“He’s bleeding from his head,” Andy said.
Trevor hurried down the stairs and crouched next to Chris. “Bring me a towel and a first-aid kit. There’s one in the bathroom.”
As Andy scuttled upstairs, Trevor carefully tilted Chris’s chin. “Open your eyes. Come on, Danny—there’s barely any blood.”
With a sigh, Chris forced his eyes to open, blinking the blurriness away.
“I fucking hate you.”
“I know.” Trevor tore the duct tape from around his wrists. “You’re getting your wound dirty. Lie on your back.”
Chris growled as he shifted to his back. Despite the pain swimming across his body, his bones seemed to be intact. His right shoulder had taken most of the impact, the pain there burning and unrelenting.
“What about your brilliant plan?” Chris asked. “How will you make my bruised corpse look like suicide now?” He chuckled despite the pain. “You’re so fucked, Trevor. Kill me right now if you want, but you better start running.”
“I got the police to leave, didn’t I? Your big brother always lands on his feet.”
Chris was about to say that whoever had sent the police knew where they were, but he couldn’t decide if that was good or bad. He feared bringing anyone else into this madness.
But it’s not just about me.
Jay was still unconscious, his body flooded with drugs.
“I know what you’re thinking.” Trevor tried to sound calm, but Chris detected worry. “We can’t stay here. I’ll need to pack you into my trunk and find somewhere else for us to stay until you heal.”
“Jay?”
“Forget about him. I’ll bury him next to Dima. They can fight in the afterlife.”
Chris grabbed Trevor's shirt. “Don’t. Just leave him here. Please.”
“Is your brain still working? Jay knows too much, and I’m not going to drive around with both of you like a fucking road trip.”
Andy came back down and handed Trevor the first-aid kit.
“I’m going to clean and bandage your cut,” he told Chris. “Andy, start packing our things.”
“Where are we going?”
“I don’t know yet, but we need to get out of here. Wait, help me get Jay upstairs first.”
“Is he also coming with us?”
“He’s going somewhere else.”
“Trevor—”
“Shut it, Danny.”
They went to release Jay from the examination chair, then picked him up roughly; Trevor holding under his arms and Andy holding his legs.
“Don't do this!” Chris yelled, then almost threw up with the explosion in his skull.
“Shut up and stay where you are.” Trevor panted as they climbed up the stairs. “Be back in a sec.”
Once alone in the basement, he tried to roll over, but gravity rooted him in place. From upstairs, he heard a scraping sound of duct tape being unrolled. Chris tried once more to command his limbs to cooperate, but he only managed to slide a few inches, smearing the blood that had dripped from his head. He growled in frustration. Right when he needed to fight with everything he got, he was a useless lump.
The brothers came back moments later. Trevor sat next to Chris and wiped the blood from the side of his head while Andy stood close by, looking worried and agitated.
“Can we go back home?” Andy asked tiredly. “I miss my room.”
“We can’t. If someone knows about this place, they also know where we live. Once we’re on the road, I’ll think of something. Go pack our things. Oh, and there’s a shovel right outside the entrance door. Start digging a hole behind the house. Get past the first line of trees.”
“But it’s already dark!”
“Jesus, Andy, we don’t have time for this. Just do what I say.”
Chris raised his head despite the effort. “Were you a part of this from the get-go, Andy?”
“Ignore him,” Trevor said. “Go upstairs.”
“I thought you loved your parents.”
“I did!”
“Then why did you kill them?”
Andy’s mouth slowly opened, and Chris knew his suspicions were true. “You didn’t know that Trevor murdered your parents to get the money he owed?”
“He didn't, you're a liar!”
Trevor pressed on Chris’s wound, sending a knife across his brain. He hissed and sucked in the pain. “Robert must have suspected what Trevor was planning, so he left me the money to get even with him. Your father was never going to give your brother a million dollars willingly, so Trevor killed him and your mom.”
“He’s lying,” Trevor growled. “You know how he is.”
Andy crossed his arms, his body shaking. “You didn’t look surprised when the police told us Mom and Dad died, Trevor.”
“What? Of course I was! Listen, get our things ready, and we’ll talk about this later. I’ll get you whatever you want to eat, okay?”
“I think... I think you killed Mom and Dad.”
“Andy! Get the fuck out and do what I said. And start working on that hole. Go!”
Andy swung around and almost fell on his way upstairs.
Trevor looked down at Chris, his eyes blazing. “You really are something.”
“At least I didn’t kill my mother for money.”
“She wasn’t supposed to be in that fucking car. You really think I’d kill her?”
Chris knew he wouldn’t. As sick as Trevor was, his love for his mother had been genuine, although anything but pure.
“My dad knew I owed a shitload of money for a long time, but he never agreed to help. Once the guys I owed money to came to speak with him, he told them to piss off, then told me to find a new place to live. He didn’t care what it might do to Andy or to my mom; he just wanted me out of the way—his biggest disappointment. The one who couldn’t make precious Daniel stay.”
“Stop blaming me for how you fucked up your life. You should’ve left that house much sooner. Did Robert suspect you were planning to kill him?”
“Maybe. The house had become a battlefield for the last year. Kim was the only reason we didn’t kill each other sooner.”
Chris wondered how it must have felt like for Robert to live with the son he suspected was planning his death. He felt no compassion toward the man, but the morbid situation twisted his stomach.
Trevor cleared his throat. “I tell you what—you’ll never get Andy to turn against me, but you did just earn yourself a front-row seat to Jay’s execution. Lucky you.”