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His eyes are shut now, his focus consumed by the lies I fed him. He doesn’t see it coming.

I swing.

The first blow lands with a sickening thud, his head snapping to the side. Blood spatters the wall, vivid and wet, painting the room in streaks of red.

“Wh–” His groan is cut short as I swing again, harder this time. His body jerks before slumping forward.

I don’t stop.

The candlestick connects again and again, each impact punctuated by the crack of bone and the splatter of blood. My chest heaves with the effort, my vision blurred by tears and fury.

Finally, his weight falls off me, his body rolling to the side and hitting the floor with a heavy, wet thud. Limbs splay awkwardly, blood leaking across the floorboards. I lie there for a moment, chest heaving, my vision blurred with sweat and tears. The silence stretches, unnatural and heavy, broken only by the slow drip of blood hitting the floor in steady, rhythmic splashes.

For a second, I think it’s done. That I’ve escaped him. But the faint sound of movement, a guttural groan, tells me otherwise. He tries to speak, his words slurred and unintelligible. Panic surges through me.

I act on instinct, I roll off the bed, grabbing his ankles. My breath comes in sharp gasps, my chest heaving with everything I’ve just done. The stairs leading down to the first-floor loom in the corner of my vision, their shadows stretching long in the dim light.

I drag him toward them, his dead weight pulling at my arms with every step. My muscles scream in protest, but I don’t stop. His legs bump and thud against the wooden floor, the sound too loud, too raw in the stillness of the house.

At the top of the staircase, I pause, my hands trembling as I release him. For a brief second, I think about stopping, about finding another way. But the sight of his face, bloodied, slack, and unrepentant drives the hesitation from my mind.

I give one final shove.

His body jerks and tumbles down the stairs, limbs twisting at unnatural angles as he descends. The sound of each impact is carnal, a wet crunch here, a dull thud there. When he lands at the bottom, the silence is absolute. I stare down at him, my mind blank, my body frozen.

CHAPTER

FIFTEEN

I called 911 that night after scrubbing my room spotless. I worked fast on my knees with a bucket and rags the sting of bleach still sharp in my nostrils. The walls were sprayed with crimson arches that I had to get clean. I stripped the sheets, bagged them up, something to bury first thing in the morning. I tipped his whiskey glass over on the nightstand, a thin stain soaking into the carpet. An old man, drunk and unsteady on his feet. I loosened the runner rug on top of the landing too, just enough that a foot could plausibly catch. I did all of this before picking up the phone. Then I went back to his body. Kneeling beside him, my hands trembled as I pressed them into the pool of blood beneath his head. The warm stickiness clung to my skin, and I smeared it up my arms, painting myself in desperation’s image.

The officer’s voice on the other end of the line was steady, asking questions, but I made sure mine was uneven, trembling, the perfect mix of shock and fear. “Please,” I gasped, forcing a sob to hitch my words. “He’s fallen… there’s so much blood… I don’t know what to do.”

When the police arrived, I was already on the porch, clutching my arms as if holding myself together. The night air bit at my damp clothes, and I made no move to go inside. I needed them to find me like this, fragile, grieving, a daughter shattered by tragedy.

“I don’t know what happened!” I sobbed the moment an officer approached. “He sent me to the church to grab some papers from his office, and when I got back, I went upstairs to shower. I heard a thud, but I thought he was moving furniture again. He does that sometimes. But then I came down, and, and…” My voice cracked, tears spilling freely as I gestured toward the house. “He was just… there. At the bottom of the stairs.” My voice broke on the words, a whisper trembling at the edge of panic. “I tried to help, I did, but…” I sucked in a shaky breath, pressed my hand to my chest. “There was so much blood. I didn’t know what to do.”

I dropped to my knees on the porch, letting the tears spill. Not too many, not a dramatic sobbing mess, just enough. Just enough to sell it.

A female officer crouched beside me, her uniform dark in the porch light, her voice soft, laced with sympathy. “Take a deep breath, honey,” she murmured, her hand firm but kind on my shoulder. “You’re okay now. We’re here.”

I let out a ragged gasp, burying my face in my hands, hands still tacky with his blood. Every tear I let fall was real, yanked up from the deepest parts of me, the places where his voice still scraped against my ribs like broken glass.

But to them, it looked like grief. Nothing more.

They didn’t question me.

Why would they?

I never gave them reason to think I would ever kill my father. The entire town would stand at my defense.

“I’ve got a pulse!” The voice carried from the house and hit me like a punch to the chest.

A pulse.

The world tilted and my stomach dropped hard. Panic surged like ice through my veins. He wasn’t supposed to be alive.

“No, no, no,” I whispered. Inside my mind spiraled into a wild, stuttering loop. What did I miss? How? I saw it again in my mind. The candlestick slamming down, the sickening crunch, the way his body crumpled and stilled. I was sure. God, I was so sure.