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Stella
No matter how many times I blink, the dead man laying in the dirt just doesn't disappear.
Surely this can't truly be happening.
Chance kicks me hard in the gut and I look down to make sure he's okay. "Shh, baby, everything is okay." He'd already stopped crying and was trying to get back to sleep but I'm holding him too tight. I readjust the carrier and wrap the blanket so it covers him from the top. I bounce slightly hoping to help him get back to sleep.
I let my eyes drift back to the dead man lying in the dirt and to the crazed psycho lying right next to him. Vitto. He's the man who has been terrorizing my dreams for the past eighteen months and now he's right here in front of me. I've been in his presence for no longer than a few hours and already two people have tried to kill me and he's made me come more times than I can count.
I need to get away from him before it's too late. He's toxic, I know it just from the way he looks at me. The problem is I've always been attracted to the most toxic people I can find. It's the reason I'm on the run now. Hanging around the wrong people at the wrong time.
Getting away from him is my only option. Slowly, moving my feet as softly as I can I begin to take a few steps backward. Vitto doesn't move from the ground. He is still just staring up at the sky. Maybe he passed out and I'll be able to get away without him noticing. Maybe -
"If I have to chase you down, I'll cuff you to me and throw away the key. If you think that was the only killer after you, you're mistaken. You won't get more than a mile without me by your side." Vitto says from where he's lying on the ground.
"This isn't my fight."
"No, it's my fight. This is just supposed to be where you die." He says nonchalantly as he stands unsteady on his feet.
My breath catches in my throat, it's not like I didn't know that but hearing him saying it doesn't make it any less surprising. "So now what, you're going to finish what he started? You're going to kill me?"
"No, I'm not." Vitto trains his expressive eyes on me and I find myself sucked in.
"Why not, you're a killer, aren't you? When you came here you were going to kill me." I don't know why I decide to poke the bear but I don't understand why all of a sudden he doesn't want to complete his job.
"I'm not the person I was yesterday, hell I don't think I've been the same person I've always been since the day I laid my eyes on you." He looks down at Chance who is still strapped to my chest. "Is he going to be too heavy for you? We're going to need to stay on the move."
"No, I carried him for nine months, I'm used to his weight. "
"Good, let's get going."
He turns his back on me as if he trusts that I'll follow behind him without another word. As if he trusts that I won't take this chance to find a weapon and bury it deep between his shoulder blades. This man trusts me more than he should or maybe I'm just more naive than I thought.
My mind replays what he said moments ago. The warning that I won't make it more than a mile without him by my side.
Vitto's dangerous, there's no doubt about it.
But what's my alternative, try to make it through the backwoods of Virginia with an unknown number of assassins hunting me and my child. I've spent my life making the wrong choice about the type of people I decided to get involved with. All my friends, all my lovers, each and every one of them toxic. Vitto is by far the worst of the bunch but if I want to survive I'm going to need Vitto's type of toxic.
Quickly, I rush to catch up to him. "What are we going to do now?" I ask him as he bends down near the body of the man he just killed.
"We need to get rid of this evidence, at least for a little while. We don't need to be running from the cops and the people trying to kill you." Vitto grabbed hold of the dead man's arms and began dragging him toward the west.
"There's an old well that way," I point to the east, "It's dried up and hasn't been used in years. My house is the nearest property to it." I say, instantly feeling bad that I'd just help a killer find a way to hide a body.
"Good." Vitto mutters and begins dragging the body in the opposite direction.
I follow behind him, tearing off a piece of my shirt to pick up the four severed fingers on the ground. I gag at the sight before I wrap them up and put them on the dead man's chest.
Within twenty minutes we are at the edge of the abandoned well. Vitto has to pry off the wood that covers the opening. He grunts and even in the dark I can see how pale his face is. When I look down at his hands I see one of them is shinier than the other one. Fresh blood.
"You're still bleeding," I whisper and walk over to the other side of him. There I see my pillowcase wrapped crudely around his upper arm. The blood isn't gushing out but it's dripping down his arm steadily.
"I'm fine." He grunts again as he pulls the last wood slate from the top of the well.
"You're not fine. You're going to bleed out if you don't get this stitched up." I argue with him.
"Well if you haven't noticed I'm a little too busy for that right now." He squints his eyes at me before he uses his foot to push the man's body down the narrow hole.
