AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I keep seeing Vinny drop again and again. As if I imagine it enough times, I might be able to change it somehow, to go back and get control of the way it happened. The world is wrapped in static and cotton, but that memory is sharp and clear, the only thing that feels real.
Vinny.
Kay’s grip on my wrist aches it’s so tight. It grounds me like an anchor, keeping me from flying off into that horrible sight playing on repeat behind my eyelids.
“We gotta get out of here, Tessa,” she’s whispering fervently, over and over. “We’ve gotta get out of here. Me and you. Fuck this. We gotta get out.”
Suddenly, a voice from the back of the room speaks up.
“Where’s Nate?”
I turn slowly, a stab of panic breaking through the fog.
Vera wanders in circles, around and around the room, looking every which way in a daze.
“Where’s Nate?”
My heart skips a beat as the world slides into focus again. I turn to look around the room, realizing that Lana is standing still and pale among the others, but Nate is nowhere to be seen.
Vera grows more inconsolable by the minute, her distraught questions turning to frantic, panicked screams as she can’t find him.
I break away from Kay and head up the stairs. Marcel stands between me and the doorway.
“Let me out,” I tell him.
“Contessa, you know I can’t do that.”
“Marcel, I’m the one person who can go out there and not get shot. Now let me out.”
He shakes his head.
“You could still be killed; you could run off with your family—”
Vera screams again, drowning out his logic with ear-piercing panic.
“Open this door, Marcel. That’s an order.”
We lock eyes, dread written over his face.
“Goddammit, you’re just as crazy as he is,” Marcel snarls, rending open the heavy door.
I step into the main house as if it’s a dream, everything about it wrong somehow. Glass glitters on the marble floor, the kitchen windows shot open. The empty house feels like a giant skeleton, and I crawl through its bones as I yell for Nate.
I run as quickly as I can, looking under couches and chairs, daring to peek through windows. I don’t have the first clue where he would be.
“Nate!” I call out, desperation straining my voice. Every time I swallow, it tastes like pennies.
I do a double-take in the dining room, my shoes skittering on the polished floor.
Two bright light-up sneakers flash below the long curtains, a figure shaped suspiciously like a six-year-old behind them. I gasp with relief.
“Nate,” I whisper to him. “Nate, come here, honey. Your mom—”
Footsteps crunch on glass behind me.
Two strong arms lock around my head before I can scream, a gloved hand clamping over my mouth.
“Tessa, it’s me. It’s me—”
