Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 75616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
I didn’t even know where the speed came from, because I would swear I crossed the entire dining room in half a blink.
My arms were outstretched already as my gaze landed on Aurelio, his face pale and twisted up in pain.
Was he already shot?
Was I too late?
“No!” I screamed, shoving my full force into Warren, sending him flying.
But not before his finger could go to the trigger one more time.
Not before the bullet went soaring through the air, and lodging in Aurelio, the blood spurting out, impossibly red.
“No!” I cried out as this good, kind, amazing, strong man started to fall.
Right down to his knees.
Then onto his butt.
The light flickering out in his gorgeous eyes.
“No no no no no!” I screamed, watching Warren’s hand reach for his gun again.
I didn’t stop to think twice.
That fire that had ignited in my blood at seeing Warren in the safe house spread into a raging wildfire that burned through me as I yanked up my leg, then slammed down my foot with every bit of fear and rage and grief in my body.
A howl escaped Warren when the sounds of the bones crunching in his hand met my ears.
I wasn’t even aware of the pain that must have ricocheted up my foot and leg.
All I knew was the gun flew across the kitchen.
Too far to reach before Warren recovered.
And, damnit, I couldn’t allow that.
For him to get up.
Grab me.
Hit me.
Shoot me.
I couldn’t let it happen.
He couldn’t take a single more goddamn thing from me.
He’d already taken my pride.
My choice.
My freedom.
And now, worst of all, Aurelio.
He couldn’t have anything else.
I turned, gaze moving wildly across the counter until it landed on the knife block.
I reached for the butcher’s knife. One I’d seen Aurelio pull from the block and run a whetstone across before he used it every night. Knowing how deadly sharp it was.
It felt light in my hand then as I turned back toward Warren, finding him holding his crushed hand to his chest as he tried to use the other to gain his feet, but fell back on his ass, turning to face me.
Rage tinged the edges of my vision, made it tunnel as I surged forward.
I had a death grip on the handle of the knife as I threw my arm out with all my might, having no reference for how much force it would take to lodge something sharp inside of human flesh.
As it turned out, it didn’t seem to be much.
Because the blade slipped in like a hot knife through butter, going deeper than I anticipated, meeting resistance.
Bones?
Organs?
I didn’t know.
I didn’t care.
I yanked it backward, the sounds of Warren’s pain filling my ear, silencing everything else.
God, that was a good sound.
Good enough that I found I needed more of it.
So I stabbed the knife forward again.
And again.
And again.
I was aware of his cries, of his pleas, of his hot, sticky blood bathing my face, my neck, my arms.
Still, though, I couldn’t seem to make myself stop.
I’d never understood before when I heard people tell stories about how they lost themselves in rage, how they were almost watching the violence unfold as if they weren’t actually a part of it, but a spectator seeing it unfold.
But as I plunged the knife into my abuser over and over and over, my muscles screaming in pain, my arm getting harder and harder to lift as I kept stabbing, I could suddenly relate to them.
I could see how something could strip away your humanity and return you to your animalistic roots.
“Ahhh!”
The sound of a long, continuous scream filled my ears for a long time until I realized where it was coming from.
Me.
I’d been screaming as I stabbed Warren.
Over and over.
The sound, and realization, seemed to snap me out of the strange stupor I’d been in.
And I looked down, seeing my arms dripping in blood, the amount of it getting heavier the further down my arm my gaze went.
Until I saw my hands.
Completely saturated.
I wasn’t even sure how I was still holding onto the knife.
I stared at it, uncomprehending for a moment, until my eyes kept moving down.
And saw him.
Warren.
Or, rather, what used to be Warren.
Because there was no way he was still alive.
He looked like a horror movie.
Soaked in blood.
Bits of flesh spilling out of the gaping holes the knife had ripped through his shirt.
My stomach roiled as I saw his stomach. His intestines visible from where I was sitting.
A sick sound escaped me as I flung backward off of him.
I’d done that?
I’d stabbed him like that?
Enough to rip open his guts?
No.
No.
That wasn’t me.
Nothing could make me do that.
Nothing except…
My gaze shot up, eyes seeking him, sure I would see his body there, splayed on the floor. Unmoving.
But the space where I’d seen him fall was empty, save for a stain of blood on the floor.