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To wit, there are some truths I have to accept.
I am a killer.
I have taken life.
I am irredeemable.
And I am undeserving of her.
Thetick tick tickfilters through the air, the trap crafted for me perfect in its design. I can still see the gleaming pewter of my pocket watch, suspended in the darkness.
Our mutual enemy that unites us.
If Grayson was any less sadistic, he would have simply killed me. Instead, he left me here, staring into the lovely sea green of her eyes, to witness her destruction as she makes the choice to bring us to an end.
A derisive laugh falls free from my lips. Helpless, resolute, I surrender my last wisp of hope.
Giving a person power over you to break you.
This is what I find to be the truest measure of love.
Utter surrender.
25
HUNT
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Devil’s Peak looks different in the daylight.
The dark canopy of trees I’ve only glimpsed at night, that felt so nefarious with their gnarled limbs vying to steal the stars from my view, catches the sun’s rays to send glittering shards across the pine straw-covered ground.
The forest is in full bloom. Bright greens and oranges mingle with the heavily wooded backdrop of brown, like a Bob Ross painting with his happy little trees. It’s a sight right out of Vanessa’s pastel drawing room. The scent of the forest even smells pastel.
Before me, the narrow river is gray, the river stones tinting the clear water as the stream moves at a peaceful pace, the current leisure and serene. A tranquil atmosphere that is in direct contrast to the horrors of my nightmares.
Alex belonged to the night.
He was a creature of the moon and shadows.
He was Devil’s Peak, and he couldn’t have chosen a better location for his sinister research lab, where he tortured his victims in the name of science. Oh, he believed—somewhere in his delusional brain—that he was fighting a just cause, but it was ultimately a selfish cause. One that gave his deceased, psychotic twin sister a chance to redeem her tarnished reputation.
She made her choices, though. And Alex made his.
For her crimes against her patients, Alex’s sister was murdered by a psychopathic vigilante serial killer. Instead of mourning her loss, accepting who his sister was, Alex picked up her torch and conducted cruel experiments on people in order to try to cure psychopathy.
We’re all products of our choices. Somehow mine led me to this place, and I’ve been trying to escape it ever since. My mind is trapped here, no matter how far away I run.
I pull my hoodie close and cross my arms over my chest as I stroll toward the river. I’m cautious of the riverbank, where the graveyard of Alex’s “expired” subjects lie. I discovered the partially dissolved remains the day I escaped, when I fell into the bones. I still have the scar on my palm.
A bird chirps in the distance, and I glance out over the mountain peaks, relieved my attention has been diverted. Only now, as my gaze tracks the bird’s path, the distinct splash of the waterfall pricks my ears. Chill bumps ripple across my skin.
An alarming flutter attacks my chest. I cover the ache with my hand, palm pressed to my breastplate. I despise that I have absolutely no control over these traitorous feelings—that just the thought of seeing the waterfall cascading down the cliff causes the beat of my heart to quicken.
My mind summons the sensation of the cool, rough stone under my back. I can feel the icy water biting into my skin and his heated touch chasing away the chill to ignite me from the inside as his hands discover my body. And his kiss…
My chest burns as I remember the feel of his lips, how he deepened the kiss, our breath exchanged and stolen, as I became lost to him.
