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At those words, he turns around, grabs Rachel by the hair, and brings her to the floor. She screams in pain when her chin hits the wooden floor. She’s face down, her head turned toward me, tears prickling at her eyes.
“Stop!” I shout at him. This time it’s an order without fear. I am raging so deeply it shakes my bones.
I go to stop him, to fight my battle in this violent war he’s starting between us, but he’s already got the gun from Lik. He points it at her from his standing position.
“Get on your knees,” he orders me.
His body is facing mine, his arm elongating toward Rachel and his eyes on me. I don’t move. I simply can’t. He shakes his head again.
And without looking at her, he shoots.
14
ROSE
Houdin– Layto
The scream that tears from my lungs resonates throughout the house. My eyes dart from Sam to his boyfriend. Refusing to look at the woman I love. A smile pulls at Lik’s lips, and I follow his gaze to the floor.
Rachel is crying, trembling so hard that her shoes are tapping against the floor. But she’s untouched. The bullet is lodged in the wood right next to her head. Splinters are covering her short, bleached hair—a sandalwood color mixing with the white instead of the blood that could have covered it.
My heart can’t calm down, my brain thinking a million thoughts simultaneously.
“Stop. Sam, stop this.” I put my shaking hands in front of me, palms toward him in an appeasing gesture. “I know you’re angry. I know you’re mad at me and hate me for what happened, but this has nothing to do with her. Stop…” It only takes one look at Rachel’s shaking form on the floor to say the word I hate the most in the entire dictionary. “Please,please, let her go.”
Defeat tastes bitter on my tongue. That’s what he wanted, wasn’t it? Me to plead for his mercy.
“Get. On. Your. Knees.” is his only response.
My legs are shaking, but I follow the command.
“Hands behind your head.”
I comply, my gaze on Rachel as I do so. How could I let it get this bad? My precious Sunshine is trapped in a world I have been trying to escape for as long as I can remember.
He walks toward me and puts the gun under my chin before forcing me to tilt my head up.
“Stop looking at her. Look at me. You look at me for orders. You look at me for your next move, for your next thought. You don’t take your next breath until I allow it.”
“Sam,” my voice trembles. “Don’t do this to me.”
That makes him chuckle. “Remember whenIsaid those words? Theexactsame ones. What did you say then?”
Memories of that day six months ago flood my brain. A dam breaking and forcing colors, sounds, and horrible words into my consciousness. I shake my head.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know. That’s what’s so magical about you. You remembereverything.”
“I…”
“What did you say, Rose?” he grits. My own gun goes from under my chin to my forehead.
I shake my head, ashamed of myself, of the words I said. I hated him, I still do, and I had my reasons, but I should not have left him to die as I did. Not if these were the consequences.
“Your life doesn’t matter to me anymore,” he repeats the exact words I spat at him then. With the same coldness as well. “That’s what you said.”
My eyes squeeze shut and open again. I catch Rachel’s disappointment, and it breaks me.
“They changed location after I found you. Where did they take you?”
