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“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” he cursed before his hands wrapped themselves around my upper arms, lifting me with ease, moving me away from Mikaela.
“Let go of me!” My voice was barely recognizable, sheer terror lacing every word. Terror that he would take her away from me, that he would make me go home and forget she ever existed.
But I couldn’t forget. I could never forget.
“She’s mine!”
My father turned me around, facing him. His eyes roamed over my face, over my body, my arms, the blood on my skin. The frown between his eyebrows deepened with every passing second before he bowed his head, staring at the floor. “You’re just like her,” he murmured, talking to himself more than me, and I knew who he was talking about. “I failed you,” he hiccuped, lifting his head to look at me. “I failed both of you.”
I didn’t want him here, with us, during this sacred moment. I didn’t want him to look at Mikaela. No one was allowed to look at her, except for me. No one.
He stepped to the side, looking down at her, and I tried extinguishing the familiar anger brewing in my veins. But I couldn’t hold it back as he knelt down next to her body, his shaky hands covering her eyes, closing them forever.
No, no, no, he was messing it up. He was messing everything up.
“Why did you do it, son?” he asked, still looking at the ice queen on the ground. “Why did you have to do this?”
“She was leaving me,” I answered truthfully. “She couldn’t leave. No one can ever leave.”
His head swiveled toward me, his bloodshot eyes staring at me, urging me to feel remorse just like he did. But I couldn’t. I had to think about the future with Mikaela, about all the things we were going to do in our little town.
“I need you to go home, Lazarus,” he instructed. “I will take care of this.”
No. Absolutely not. I allowed him to touch her, to greet her, to welcome her to the family, but I wasn’t leaving him alone with her. I couldn’t.
I knew him. I knew what he did. What he and Mr. Blackwood did in that old mansion on the West Side of Winworth.
My father turned toward Mikaela, mumbling something I couldn’t hear, thinking I would listen to him just like I did when he sent my mother away, locking her up like a fucking animal. He wasn’t going to do the same thing to me.
I wasn’t going to allow it.
My hand dipped into my back pocket, feeling the cold handle of the Swiss knife I'd brought with me tonight. I pulled it out, careful not to make any sounds. He couldn’t have her. He got everything else, but I wasn’t going to give him Mikaela.
I couldn’t.
It wasn’t allowed.
My father said something I couldn’t quite hear as I approached him slowly from the back, avoiding the old leaves and the branches that littered the ground. My heart thundered in my chest, threatening to erupt, to break through the cage my ribs created. My eyes zeroed in on the back of his head, the perfectly styled hair and backside of the sweater that cost more than some people’s mortgages.
“You can’t have her!” I roared, lifting the knife high, letting the blade pop-out from its hiding place. As he turned toward me, his eyes wide and face paling, I struck down, pushing the knife straight through his throat.
The crunching of his larynx under the knife was louder than my breathing. I pulled back, taking the knife with me, and I struck again, pushing the blade through the left side of his neck, hitting the artery.
His blood splattered over Mikaela’s body, irking me even more. He dirtied her, touched her, destroyed the purity I was trying to contain.
“Look what you’ve done now,” I spat out, pushing his body to the side, away from Mikaela and her white dress that was now soaked in both his and her blood. “She’s ruined!” I cried out, unable to touch her, to look at her.
My father gurgled on the ground, looking at me as if he was finally seeing me for the first time. “You ruined it, Father!”
His mouth opened, trying to speak, trying to say something, but I knew already that I'd hit his vocal cords, severing them, as I pulled out the knife.
“Now I will need to bury both of you,” I groaned, taking a step back from them. There were shovels in the pool house by the mansion, but I didn’t want to go all the way by myself. It would take way too long, and I didn’t have time.
If someone found them like this, they’d ask questions, and I didn’t want to deal with it. Not tonight.
Think, Lazarus. Think.
And then it dawned on me.
