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“Were you good for me while I was gone, Lydia?” My neighbor’s thin, creepy voice radiates sick glee as he approaches the bedroom door.
I tense, waiting for him to notice the broken sliding door. But there’s no sign that he has, and the door to the bedroom swings open, almost colliding with my face behind it.
“What the—?”
I gather up all of my anger and disgust over this horrible man and my need to protect Max, and leap out to take a swing at him with my sword. But instead of clocking him in the back of the head as I planned, he turns to look at me right as the tip of the blade, now a sharp, chipped point from prying the door open, hits his eye.
A scream of pain unlike anything I’ve ever heard pierces the air as he falls to his knees, blood pouring down his face.
“Oh fuck!” I cry out at the same time Max does.
I yank the blade back, turning away from the carnage as he continues to wail in pain. Grabbing Max’s hand, I pull him after me as we bypass the sliding doors and run out the front door. But when I go to open the door to my apartment, it’s locked like I told Lydia to do. “Shit, I don’t have the key!”
Max’s fists pound against the door. “Lydia, let us in. Now!”
“I c-can’t, he’s back!” she whimpers from the other side.
“I’m going to kill you for that, you stupid whore!” my neighbor screams as he stumbles through his apartment toward us. I tug the front door to hold it closed, but he’s too strong. I fall inwards into his apartment and collide with his chest as Max cries out, too weak to help me.
Rough hands crush my arms and wicked fangs gleam above me as my neighbor’s face twists in cruel delight, even as blood pours from his injured eye. I struggle, feebly fighting his bruising hold as his mouth descends toward my neck.
“Stop.” A command from behind me cuts through the night air. The monster about to kill me freezes in place just as his teeth are about to pierce my skin. “Let her go.”
I turn over my shoulder to see Blair, looking like an angel of vengeance with her tight red dress and blazing eyes.
My neighbor releases me and I stumble away into Max’s arms. He holds me as best he can as he leans against my still-locked front door and rains frantic kisses across my face.
“Go inside. Wait in there until I tell you to do anything else.” Blair joins us on the stoop, power radiating off of her as she compels my neighbor to do her bidding. He obeys with a blank look on his face as he heads inside, sits on his couch, and stares at the wall. When she’s certain he’s taken care of, Blair turns to look at me and raises an eyebrow. “Nice sword.”
I’m about to reply when I hear footsteps coming in our direction, followed by a sharp inhale. I turn away from Blair to see Grace staring at the three of us in horror.
“Shit. I told her to stay in the car,” Blair mutters. “We should go inside. All of us.”
43
It takes Blair’s resolute assurance of protection to get Lydia to unlock the door and let us into Mona’s apartment. We file inside in silence, and Mona offers me her arm to help me up the steep stairs. I’m grateful—there’s no way I’d make it up them on my own right now. Even with her help, I still wince in pain as we scale each step. Blair locks the door behind us, tugging a stunned Grace inside. Once upstairs, I collapse on the laminate floor of Mona’s kitchen, not wanting to bloody her furniture or carpet.
Lydia watches the four of us from the far side of the living room, a sheepish expression on her face. “Your place is nice,” she says, breaking the silence in the room. Acting like she didn’t almost get the woman I loved killed while she was trying to save us. Saveher.
Gnawing pain lances through me as I reach into my jeans pocket to see if I still have my phone on me. I pull it out and send a quick text to Lydia’s wife to let her know she’s safe. There. Now I wash my hands of anything involving those two.
Mona hovers a hand near my blood-soaked shirt. “He’s lost too much blood. We need to get him to the hospital.”
Blair shakes her head. “I can help him. The hospital will ask too many questions, and we still have to deal with your neighbor.”
Mona trembles beside me, her eyes blown wide as she comes down from the adrenaline. “I can’t believe I stabbed him in the eye…I broke into his place and stabbed him! Oh god, I’m going to jail, aren’t I?”
Grace breaks from her stunned trance. “You what?!”
“I didn’t mean to stab him. I was just trying to knock him out!”
That doesn’t calm Grace down at all. “What the hell is going on?! Blair gets a text while we’re out at a bar saying you’re in trouble and that meant you were about to break into that guy’s apartment and assault him?” Grace pauses and her eyes widen in horror as she looks at the blood on me. “Did you stab Max too?”
“No, her neighbor did,” I say as calmly as possible. It’s getting hard to think past the pain. Moving around was a bad idea.
“We can talk about this later. Blair, if you can help him, you need to do it now. Please.” Mona’s voice wavers and I reach up to swipe a tear off her cheek.
“You’re so damn brave. And beautiful,” I murmur to her, in awe of what she did for me tonight and more certain than ever in my love for her.
