“How the hell are you going to do that?”
I gritted my teeth and rolled back to my side. I shimmied all over the place trying to get my arms under my ass, but it was no use. Pain shot through my arms, shoulders, and head as I tried and failed.
“Maybe if I dislocate my shoulder, I can get my arms out.”
“Are you insane! You’ll pass out again from the pain. Just try to ease up and bounce to me. Then I might be able to untie your arms,” Addy pleaded.
Now that idea was a good one.
I maneuvered back onto my hip then shifted my body until I was up on my knees. The world swayed as nausea stole up my throat again. I breathed through it and waited until it passed. Then I jumped as best I could, landing in an awkward crouch. With as much power as I could muster, I slowly stood up.
“Okay, good. Now jump over to me but try to be quiet. We don’t know where he is or when he’ll come back.”
I nodded and started to hop. It felt like it took a hundred years to get over to Addy and what I saw when I got there made a sour taste fill my mouth, so much so I had to spit on the ground in order to avoid being sick.
Her beautiful, long, elegant forearms had been destroyed by cigarette burns, the skin and flesh molten and black. Some of the wounds were deep enough he must have used the same spot more than once because I could see straight to the meat of her. I spat again and turned around.
Her fingers tugged on my zip ties to no avail.
“It’s not working.” Her voice cracked, and tears slid down her cheeks.
“Just keep trying.” I looked around the open space to see if there was anything sharp I could grate the plastic against but didn’t see anything but pipes, concrete bricks, rat droppings, garbage, and water dripping randomly from pipes. “Where are we?”
“Not sure. I think an old basement, where the heating and pipes run. I just barely got the gag out of my mouth right before you woke up. But he’s rarely gone for more than an hour or two. I passed the time by counting the minutes. He must live in this building. We have to get out of here, Si.”
I nodded and my body started to shake when we heard a door creak open somewhere in the back of the space and a quick sliver of unnatural yellow light broke through the dark. The light came and went so fast I barely had a chance to notice there must have been a door in the back of the room, behind the big pipes and metal, square-shaped machinery.
I stood in front of Addison, ready to take on whatever this monster had in store as long as he spared my sister.
What I saw made tears fill my eyes and fall down my face.
Tabby.
Dressed in black from head to toe, like I’d seen her at the bar. Her dark cap of short hair spiked up all over her head. Her body was barely skin and bones and yet she was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in that moment.
A huge wave of relief poured over my form.
“Tabby!” I cried out, tears falling down my cheeks.
She ran over to us, reached into her back pocket, and pulled out a switchblade. “Fucking hell, what did he do to you, Addy?” She swore, her hands behind me cutting the plastic.
Pain and pleasure shot to my aching shoulders in ribbons of heat, ice, and sizzling pin pricks the moment they were released.
Before long she’d cut the ties around my ankles and set about releasing Addison.
I moved around to the back of the chair to work on unknotting the huge rope he’d used to keep her upper body in the chair.
We couldn’t have noticed we weren’t alone.
The door didn’t make a single noise.
No light streaked across the room warning of his presence.
While I was bent behind Addison’s chair, Tabby was crouched over working on the ropes around each of Addison’s wounded arms.
“Stand up, skank,” I heard called out from somewhere behind Tabby.
My body reacted before I did, jolting to attention. I stood up, as did Tabby. Addison choked out a sob. Her shoulders sinking in defeat.
Tabby held her knife in her hand, gripping the small blade as though she were holding a kitchen butcher knife ready to strike. Her nostrils flared and she stared into my eyes. Hers were the deepest, darkest midnight blue and filled with determination. Her skin was pale. Cheeks hollow. There were smudges under her eyes but it didn’t take one speck away from her strength of character. The arrogant confidence exuding from every one of her pores.
“Remember, this was my choice. I love you all so much.” Her words were whispered but direct.
“Now turn around, bitch,” the man behind her demanded, his voice oily and gritty. I could see he was still wearing a mask. I shook, my body trembling in fear.
Tabby licked her lips and gripped the knife. “Mama Kerri and my sisters were the best thing to ever happen in my life.”
“Tabby…” I choked out. “Do what he says. Just follow along,” I begged.
She sniffed, firmed her jaw. “My love will never die,” she promised us. Then, she spun around on a booted heal and pushed her body to move at a dead run, knife held above her head. She looked like a modern gladiator, poised to strike with a mighty spear, not a small switchblade.
Two ear-splitting shots rang out.
Bang. Bang.
I watched in horror as Tabby’s thin frame took those shots to her chest, her form jarring with each hit, but it didn’t stop her trajectory as she came down on her target, arm in the perfect location.
She struck, the knife sinking right into the side of our attacker’s neck. It caught and she yanked as they both started to fall. Red liquid spurted out of his neck like a vulgar water sprinkler, painting the space in blood.
“Tabby!” I screamed.
“No!” Addison cried.
Both bodies went down, Tabitha right on top of the masked man as the door creaked from behind them and men in SWAT suits and black FBI bulletproof vests stormed in, massive guns at the ready.
Only they were a minute too late.
I ran toward Tabitha, but Ryan came out of nowhere and cut me off, body-slamming me and wrapping me up in his hold.
“No! Tabby!” I screeched.
“She’s getting help.” He turned my form to the side. A pair of paramedics rolled my sister off the man but even from here I knew what they’d find.
Her eyes were open and she stared lifelessly at nothing. One of the paramedics held his fingers to her neck.
I waited with my heart in my throat.
Time seemed to become sluggish as if everything was in slow motion around me. Blood pooled around her body, the mess growing larger with every second.
Then I watched as he shook his head and closed her eyes with his hand. Ryan tightened his hold. I bucked, my body losing control as the devastation tore through me like a two-hundred mile an hour bullet train moving between countries.
“Shhh, shhh, focus on my voice.” Ryan held me tight to his form and whispered into my ear. “It’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay. Eventually, honey, it will be okay.”
I shook my head knowing it would never be okay.
Tabby gave her life to save ours.
Remember, this was my choice.
She planned this. She’d planned to fall on the sword to save me and Addy.
I crumbled in Ryan’s arms.
My love will never die.
Her last words permeated my emotion-soaked mind on rapid repeat. I closed my eyes as I was passed into another pair of arms. Addison locked her body around mine and we held onto one another as time sped back up. FBI and other cops or medical personnel moved around us in a flurry of activity. Large sheets were put over both the attacker’s and my sister’s bodies.