“Stop! STOP!” I ran out of the bathroom as their bodies rolled again.
My dad pulled a knife as Slade lumbered to his feet, his attention and his bloodied face pointed toward me. His eyes landed on my chest, widening like someone infected fear into them. The next few seconds happened in a blink. My gaze started to follow his. That was when I noticed a red dot, like a laser right over my heart. As I glanced up, the world around me erupted into chaos. Slade dove at me. My dad lurched from his position on the floor and buried the blade of his knife in Slade’s leg. He grunted. Retrieving another gun from his holster with one hand, he pointed it behind him while grabbing my shirt with his other hand and pulling me to the ground. Two shots fired at almost the exact same time. Pop. Pop.
Slade fell to the ground at my feet as my dad’s body flew forward, shielding me. A breath later he glanced over his shoulder and climbed off me.
“NO!” I cried when I saw blood saturating Slade’s shirt. As soon as I rolled him over, his left hand stretched across his body, slowly reaching to cover the gunshot wound on his right side. “Wylder!” I pressed my hands over his as if together we could stop the bleeding.
My head lifted and I saw a new monster. A different monster.
My father.
He took the front porch steps with brooding confidence. Abe was on the porch, shot in the leg. Slade shot him as he threw himself in front of the bullet meant for me. The monster’s boot landed in Abe’s face, making him grunt and moan. I couldn’t even see his actual face. It was like my father shattered his nose and mangled all the skin around it.
Abe groaned.
The monster rammed the heel of his boot into Abe’s hand, eliciting a howl as his fingers broke. He knew … I think he’d always known Mom’s death wasn’t an accident. And in that moment the monster inside of him needed revenge.
“My wife. You took my life. You took my daughter’s world.” He kicked him in the side of the head.
I sobbed, turning away, unable to watch my father torture another man. Tears ran down my cheeks, dripping onto Slade’s chest.
Grunts, gasps, and gurgling from Abe’s chest filled my ears, interrupted only by the thud and cracking noise of the new monster’s hands and boots slowly killing him. I thought I knew … I thought I understood my father’s pain after Mom died.
I didn’t.
“Daddy …” I whispered, squeezing my eyes shut, feeling at my very core the depth of his pain, like if he broke every one of Abe’s bones, it would bring Mom back. I wanted him to stop because a very selfish part of me didn’t want to believe my father could take another person’s life so brutally. “Please stop …” I knew he couldn’t hear me. Maybe my pleas weren’t for him to stop. Maybe it was my heart begging for the pain to stop—the pain of losing a piece of my father, the pain of losing my mom all over again, the pain of the man who lassoed my soul only to suffocate it before fracturing it and bleeding out beneath my hands.
That warm blood continued to gush out of control between my fingers and his. “No …” I cried. “Don’t you dare die. Don’t you dare.”
Jericho whined, nestling at Slade’s head, resting his snout on his shoulder.
“It’s not over. You don’t get to say when it’s over!” I sobbed.
“Livy, it’s time to go.” Dad rested his hand on my head, stroking my hair like he did when I was young, like he did after Mom died. “It’s time to let him go. There’s nothing we can do.”
“No … no …” I sobbed, interlacing my bloodied fingers with Slade’s.
His eyes blinked heavily, and I felt him squeeze my fingers too. “I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry.” I pressed my forehead to his, my tears falling to his face.
Sirens sounded in the distance because of me. I did call for help, but I also went back to the cabin. I followed half of Slade’s instructions. He wouldn’t have been on the floor, fighting for his next breath had I followed all of his instructions.
“Livy. Now! We have to go.” Dad pulled at my arm.
I yanked away from his grip, resting my forehead back on Slade’s. “I knew the gun wasn’t loaded when I pulled the trigger. I knew. I promise I knew …” More sobs ripped through my chest.
“Liv-y …” Wylder said in two weak syllables as he closed his eyes.
They stayed shut. All remaining rigidness in his body released … it surrendered. He surrendered.
“NOOOOO!” My hands released his hands, and they covered his cheeks, smearing his blood everywhere. My lips pressed to his. “Noooo …” I breathed into his mouth, trying so hard to give him more breaths. “I love you back … I love you back … I love … you … back …” I wept as my dad tore me from Wylder’s lifeless body and cradled me in his arms. “Jerry …” I said through my sobs. Abe’s mangled, disfigured, and bloodied body passed through my blurry peripheral vision as Dad hauled me down the porch steps.
My father must have carried me forever. By the time he set me in the back seat of the rental car with Jericho, my tears had dried. So had the blood on my hands. I should have walked away. That day I found the weapons in the dungeon, I should have kept going.
Had I just walked away and let him disappear to protect himself … to protect me … he would have lived.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Livy
Five Years Later
“There’s my favorite patient.” Dr. Jones hugged me.
“Graduation day, huh?” I grinned taking a seat on his sofa as he sat in a side chair.
“You graduated from therapy years ago. I just like seeing you.”
I smiled.
“When are you moving?”
“Tomorrow.” I rubbed my lips together while unwrapping a stick of peppermint gum. I held out the pack to him.
He shook his head as his eyebrows lifted a fraction. “Wow, I had it in my head you weren’t leaving for another few weeks.”
“I’m assisting Timothy Morten on a huge case that goes to trial next month, so they want me there as soon as possible to help prepare.”
“We’re going to miss you.”
My eyes rolled. “Sacramento is less than two hours away.”
“And Darren?”
I chewed my gum slowly and shrugged. “He’s staying here.”
“You’re breaking up?”
“Not sure. We’re both feeling very casual about it. If absence doesn’t make the heart grow fonder, then I’d say we’re breaking up. If we can’t stand to be apart, he’ll consider looking into finding work there.”
“I see.”
“What’s that look?”
“No look.” He shook his head.
I laughed. “I think I know you better than you know me at this point—at least I know when you have a look. You’re judging my relationship with Darren.”
“I don’t judge. Not my job.”
I sighed. “I know. If I loved him. If we were serious … every night apart would feel like too much. Is that still how you feel when you’re not with Jess, when one or the other of you travels alone?”