His (25 page)

When I was dressed, he stood up and walked out of the room, the knife hanging loosely at his side. I followed him nervously. He had always had a hand on me before, and I wondered what he had decided to do with me.

Was he leading me to the kitchen? Was he going to hurt me? Had he decided, after all this, to kill me?

Before, he had put a hand on me to guide me. Now, he walked down the stairs. I paused at the statue before following him down the steps.

“Come on,” he said, calling up to me. “Don’t be afraid.”

Those words chilled me. I came down the stairs slowly and followed him across the living room, down the hallway to the front door. He opened the door.

“Go on,” he said.

I stepped past him with my breath held. When I was in front of him, he could stab me from behind. He could slit my throat. He could—

“Kat.”

I turned around to see him standing in the doorway, his knife hanging limply from one hand.

“Gavriel?”

“I’m sorry, kitten.” His eyes were sad, so sad. It was all I could do not to run back to him, to take him in my arms, to comfort him. “Go on, now.”

“What…” my voice trailed off as I realized that he wasn’t following me out onto the porch. “What are you doing?”

“I’m letting you go.”

The words buzzed around my ears, but I didn’t comprehend what he was saying.

“For a walk?”

“Forever. You’re free.”

“Wh—Why?” I stammered. Every muscle in my body felt like it was made of lead. I stood on the porch, dumbfounded. I was still convinced that if I turned around, he would raise the knife, fling it forward into my back.

“You’re right,” he said, gesturing outside with an expansive wave of the knife. “This. All this. It doesn’t matter. It’s not real. I can’t take your life away from you.”

You’ve given me back my life,
I wanted to say.
You’ve given me the only reason to live
. But my voice caught in my throat. Stupid, stupid. I should have turned to run before he could change his mind. Something told me that he wouldn’t change his mind.

It’s not real, he had said. What I had thought was something between us was nothing. And now he had pulled the rug out from under my feet. I had just accepted my fate, and now he was handing me another one. As ridiculous as it felt, I wanted nothing more than to run back inside, to stay with him.

“You’re really letting me go?” I croaked.

“Yes. Stupid, I know. Maybe I am a stupid person, after all.”

“That’s not it.” Why was I still there? Why was I not running away right now?

“It’s because I’m bored, kitten,” he said. His fingers tightened around the blade. “Bored with all of this. You have to go now.”

He opened his mouth to say something else, then closed it. Stepping forward, he reached up and cupped my cheek in his hand. His palm was hot against my skin.

Don’t do this
, I cried inside.
Keep me. Want me. I need you to want me.

But I said nothing.

He bent his head and brushed his lips against mine. The kiss was so light, and yet I felt electricity arc through my nerves at the barest touch.

I wanted him to stab me with the knife he held. I wanted to die in that moment, wanting something that I could never have. But he didn’t raise the knife at all. I believe he had forgotten it was there.

“Goodbye, kitten.”

“Goodbye.”

He stepped back and closed the door behind him. I could hear the snap of the lock.

I stood on the porch for another moment, my body shaking, unsure what it was that had just happened. Then I turned and began to walk down the driveway, the sun shining brightly overhead.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

     Gav    

The world closed in on me as the door swung shut behind her. Closed in - the walls disappeared into black. My body went numb.

She was gone.

Everything I’d worked to keep secret was out, the walls were broken. In my mind, I saw her running out to the road, sticking out her thumb. Catching a ride to the police station. They would come, they would knock down the door. What would they find?

As if underwater, I went to the bedroom. Pulled the arm chair around to the foot of the bed. Untied the rope from the bedposts.

The rope, useless. I would never tie her up again. Useless, useless, except for one thing. My hands moved automatically, looped the rope around itself. The knot tied itself, it seemed, and before I knew it the noose was finished, hanging limply from my hand.

Still in the bedroom, the rope slung over the high rafter, scraped the wood as I pulled it tight. Tied snug against the foot of the bed. The chair under my feet held steady, although my hands shook.

Me? I felt nothing. It wasn’t me who took the noose and draped it around my neck. Not my hands which tightened the knot fast. The rope scratched the skin at my collarbone, but the sensation came from a distance, not from my own nerve endings. I was watching myself commit suicide.

Before, in the tub, I’d held the knife to my skin and recoiled. Now, though, there was nothing for me to recoil from. Just an empty room.

I took my last breath and stepped forward into nothing.

     Kat    

At the end of the driveway, I caught the motion sensor. The iron gate rattled open in front of me. I stared out at the curving road.

I didn’t want to leave.

So ridiculous. Insane. But there was something at the back of my mind, something that was nagging at me. I didn’t know what it was.

The sound of a car engine came to my ears as though from a distance. I could hear it coming around a lower bend in the road. All I had to do was run out into the middle of the road, wave my arms. I was free. I could go home.

What was it he had said that troubled me so much?

The car’s engine grew louder, and I closed my eyes, my hands at my temples. Thinking back. He wanted to let me go. Surely he knew that I was going to go to the police. He hadn’t even asked me not to tell anyone.

Bored
.

The car came around the bend, but I was already running back up toward the house, the troubled feeling in my mind coalescing into something as clear and bright as words on a page. I knew what he meant.

Bored—that was the reason I’d tried to commit suicide. That was what I’d told him.

I ran up the porch and banged on the door, the feeling of dread growing inside of me.

“Gav!” I shouted. “Gav! Let me in!”

The door knob rattled in my hand, but the deadbolt was secure.

“Gav!”

No response.

I went to the window, banging on the pane. I tried to look in, but the glare of the sun reflected off of the glass, and I could see nothing inside. I raised my hand to break the windowpane, and then hesitated. But only for a second.

What is he going to do, kill me?

     Gav    

The darkness descended, but this time it was not the darkness of my shadow. Shadows need light to exist, and where I was going there was nothing, nothing at all.

Around my neck I felt a strange tug and tension cutting off my blood. My heart pounded loud, drowning out everything. My body kicked once, then again, and I only sensed the body kicking, could not feel it myself. I was already drifting away into the darkness.

This was a dark like fog, so thick it slid over my skin. A soft, enveloping darkness. A peaceful void that I fell into knowingly, longing to lose myself. It was the same thing you sink into halfway on your way to sleep - an ether, thick and palpable. The murmuring fog cradled me, turning me in its arms.

My breath stopped. My lungs were empty. I was empty, blissfully empty. The sound of my heartbeat faded, slowed to a dull murmur. The shadow of a heartbeat.

The sound of the fog - lord, how can I describe it? Pick up a shell and hold it to your ear. It’s not the ocean you hear, but rather a reverberation of static noise. That was the sound of the fog, a low roar coming from nowhere and filling everything. It was a dull roar, a noise that tickled at my senses without letting me hear anything else. The sound came through my body and filled me, too, a peaceful static.

The noose tightened on my neck, but it didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. I was weightless now, floating away into the dark fog, leaving my shadow and all shadows behind.

     Kat    

I broke through the window, stepping carefully inside so I wouldn’t cut myself.

“Gav!” I cried.

I checked the living room, the kitchen. He wasn’t there. I heard a noise from upstairs. The bedroom. I stumbled up the steps and raced down the hallway.

“Gav!”

I banged open the door and saw the rope, the chair, and his body, his beautiful body, hanging limp in the middle of the air. Like he was floating.

     Gav    

Perfect, this darkness. It was not the shadow at all. The shadow was gone, far away. All of my sins would be suffocated, drowned in the fog. I let myself drift, feeling calm. Peaceful.

Then, from away, far far in the distance, buried in the fog, I heard a scream.

     Kat    

My fingers fumbled at the knot, but it was too tight. His entire weight had pulled the knot, and I couldn’t undo it. His face was white, and his lips were beginning to turn blue-grey, the same color as his eyes.

“No, no, no,” I mumbled, casting my eyes around. There it was. The knife on the dresser. I grabbed it and swung the blade hard at the bedpost, cutting the rope right through the knot.

     Gav    

With a hard jolt, I was yanked back ungently into my body. All was dark, still, though my shadow had yet to reappear. There was still peace around me in this darkness. The tension around my neck loosened and gave way, but I clung to the dark fog.

A sharp pressure on my chest made me gasp, and I heard the blood in my body start to pump again. My pulse thudded in my ears.

A heartbeat. Sobbing. The peaceful fog began to recede. I clutched for it, and it slipped away uselessly through my fingers.
No! My chance to escape!

From the place I had already left, her voice was calling.

“Don’t go,” she cried. Her words faded in and out like a poorly tuned radio, becoming clearer as the darkness receded. “Don’t die. Oh god, don’t die.”

I wanted to tell her not to pray for me. God, if such a thing existed, wouldn’t intervene to save the life of a killer. Then again, He might have a sense of humor.

     Kat    

His body crumpled to the ground, lifeless. I slid my fingers under the noose at his neck and pulled it over his head, throwing it to the side.

“
No
,” I moaned. “No, please, no. Don’t die.”

He wasn’t breathing. I pressed my fingers to his wrist, feeling for a pulse. My own heart was pounding so hard that I couldn’t hear anything.

“Come on, Gav,” I whispered. I bent down and pressed my lips against his. My breath lifted his chest, filled his lungs. My hands pressed down on his chest, hard and fast, desperate to draw the life back into him. Lips to his, I breathed again.

Again.

I couldn’t lose him.

I couldn’t.

     Gav    

Slowly at first, the fog seeped away, then faster, drawing all of the nothingness away with it. Taking away with it my peace. Her voice was louder, clearer, right in my ear. Her hands beat at my chest, her sobs audible.

“Come back. Don’t leave me.
Please, Gavriel. Come back
.”

Clinging to the darkness, I felt her hand grasp at my fingers. I knew she was reaching for me. I could have tried to stay gone forever, but the ground was being pulled away from under my feet.

There was no fog anymore, only the darkness without peace, and I knew that this was not a place I could stay in. Somebody was calling.

I wasn’t sure if I was doing the right thing, but when has that ever stopped me?

She reached for me, and I could not wait forever. Scared, unsure, I took her hand and let her pull me back into the light.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

     Kat    

With a gasp, his eyes opened. I fell back, sobbing, as his lungs drew in ragged gasps of air. His skin pinkened, the color coming back to his lips.

“Gav,” I whispered, my hands holding his. The rope had left a mark around his neck, a deep red gouge. He coughed and rolled onto his side.

I waited for him to catch his breath. His fingers were splayed out on the floor, and I pulled back away from him. Now that he was back—

He was dangerous.

No.

He was a killer.

No.

What are you doing? Run. Run!

I shook the thoughts from my head. The muscles in my right arm ached, and I realized that I had strained myself when I swung the knife into the bedpost. I didn’t care. Nothing mattered except that he was alive.

Gav pulled himself up, slouching against the bed. He closed his eyes, drawing in a deep breath, then exhaled. I waited, scared, sitting on the floor.

Finally he opened his eyes. His voice was scratchy, hollow. He could barely speak.

“Why did you come back?” he whispered.

My heart beat fast in my chest.

“I realized what you were doing. I knew you wouldn’t let me go for any other reason. I figured out what you were going to do.”

He smiled, the motion making him wince in pain. He rubbed his neck with one hand.

“Kitten, that doesn’t answer my question. Why did you come back?”

The real answer slipped from my tongue before I could stop it.

“I love you.”

He looked at me, his eyes softening.