AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Still.
Dead.
A gun a few feet from his hand.
I launched myself at it, grabbing it in my left hand, the other gun still in my right.
Then I slammed myself against the door where Aurelio had propped himself, unable to move, to even think.
It was like I lost all my senses at once.
I couldn’t hear anything but a buzzing sort of white noise in my ears. I couldn’t feel anything but a slight chill as the blood cooled on my arms, face, shirt, and pants.
I couldn’t see anything but the open door to the primary bedroom across from me, going in and out of focus as I sat there.
And as for thinking, well, I didn’t seem to do any of that.
I couldn’t explain it.
The numbness.
I was someone who always had a racing mind, each thought tripping over one another to try to get noticed first.
The silence, the stillness, would have been scary.
You know, if I could feel anything at all.
Which didn’t seem even remotely possible right then.
I couldn’t say how long I sat there like that.
All I knew was the next time I seemed to “snap to” was when there were footsteps rushing into the house.
It was then I remembered the guns in my hands, the need to survive, to shoot my way out of this if I needed to.
“Claire?” a voice called, the sound of it, the twinge of familiarity, pulling me back closer to the surface of my own mind. “Claire, it’s Luca. Honey, where are you? I know you have a gun. I want to help, but I’m trying not to get shot here.”
A strange hiccuping sound escaped me then.
“I’m here,” I called, placing the guns down like they were suddenly burning me.
It was then that the hall light flicked on, bathing the space in light, and making me painfully, gut-wrenchingly aware of the blood I was soaked in.
“Oh, fuck,” Luca said, dropped down on his knees in front of me.
“It’s not mine. It’s not… it’s… Oh, God,” I gasped, the memories coming back.
Of my hand.
Of the knife.
Of it sinking into Warren’s flesh.
Over and over and over.
But this time, I wasn’t detached from it.
My stomach roiled.
