AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She senses my hesitation as always, and her footing wavers. “I need to do this, Cole.” I glance over my shoulder and take her in, her chin is high, her shoulders pulled back, and her jaw set. Her steely demeanor has me nodding in agreement.
Taking a deep breath, I swallow back the ball of anxiety and push open the already ajar door.
The door creaks beneath my touch, and all my senses are on high alert as a muffled whimper sends an icy chill through my body.
“You’re not in control anymore, you sick bitch,” Jace spits out. I step into the small open living space with Tia tucked behind my back and take in the scene in front of me.
Jace holds Mrs. Lancaster’s hair in a tight grip, her face oozing blood, and a gun I don’t recognize is on the floor. When I glance back at the wall, there’s blood there too, as if Jace smashed her face into the wall, and I only wish I had been there to see it happen.
She’s not the perfectly-put-together person she always prided herself on, she looks her age; the dark bags under her eyes emphasize the stress she’s under. Her normally well-put-together clothes appear days old and wrinkled, and the carefully crafted makeup she uses to help hide her age is absent, she looks like a disheveled piece of shit who has lost it all.
She has lost it all.
Jace’s heavy breaths fill the room, the veins on his neck protrude, and he yells, “It’s fucking over! You hear me? Over.” His tattooed body coils, and he throws her onto the lone armchair behind him, then his darkened eyes slowly draw up to meet ours.
I take in my brother, his chest heaving as he fights to rein in his temper, his fists clenching beside him, and my heart aches for the torture he feels inside. “It’s over,” he repeats, as if talking to himself, as if needing to confirm it.
Tia steps to the side of me, and in a move I don’t see coming, she lifts her handgun, and, as if in slow motion, presses her finger to the trigger, sending a bullet through the air toward Mrs. Lancaster, who, unbeknownst to us, had crawled onto the floor toward the gun. She drops with a thud, her demonic eyes wide open and her neck pumping blood furiously onto the withered carpet.
Tia’s hand trembles as she holds the gun up where she released the shot. I gently place my hand across her arm, and her taut body sags in relief, and she lowers her gun.
“Where’s Lucas?” I ask Jace, frowning.
He shakes his head and bites into his lip, guilt floods his eyes. “I didn’t get that far. The hag was waiting for me behind the door.” I nod at his words, confirming what I assumed had happened.
A tortured scream reverberates through my soul, and every cell in my body freezes at the sound of Lucas’s pain from below us, each of us stilling as the chilling echo pierces through the room.
TIA
Seeing Jace’s hands covered in blood from Mrs. Lancaster doesn’t scare me, nor does the rage radiating from him, but when he throws her into the armchair and turns his back to her to tell us it’s over and she crawls toward the gun with Jace oblivious to her plight, fear grips me. I don’t even have a chance to contemplate my next move as I step to the side of Cole and aim at her head.
My aim is shitty and off, and the bullet fires through her neck in a move that could have been considered a success if it wasn’t for me aiming for her forehead. Still, she drops to the floor with a strangled sound that I relish in, and blood pools around her in an instant.
Jace’s frantic gaze finds mine, and the tension in his coiled body eases.
Cole gently lowers my arm, and the warmth of his touch allows me to breathe again, giving me the time to take in the scene before me.
A shudder works over my body as I scan the familiar room. I squeeze my eyes closed at the memory of being carried from the house by paramedics.
“Where’s Lucas?” Cole asks, and Mrs. Lancaster is forgotten as my pulse races with uncertainty.
“I didn’t get that far. The hag was waiting for me behind the door.” Cole nods in understanding.
A gut-wrenching scream comes from the basement, and my heart freefalls at the pain in Lucas’s tone. We all still, as if frozen to the spot and unable to contemplate what is happening to him.
Movement at the door catches my eye, Jace’s too, then he spins around and widens his stance as if to protect us, while Cole pulls me behind him.
“Your man has it all under control. Let me know when you’re done here.” Finn strolls past us and heads through the front door, and I glance at his retreating form in confusion.
Jace moves first, but I’m quicker. I need to see Lucas for myself, I need the reassurance, because that scream, that scream did not sound like he’s in control.
It sounded barbaric, and the thought of his terror brings bile to my mouth.
My feet move toward the basement, and a rush of apprehension makes my footing waver as I reach the basement door.
The very door that held the key to my nightmares, his too.
I only hope the demons behind the door are not causing him to drown in his darkness.
