“Is that smoke?” Sawyer asks, crinkling her nose as I load the bullets, pocketing extra in my shorts.
“Yeah. He had me in the cellar. I had to get creative to get out.”
She wrinkles her nose. “Creative is one way to put it.”
“Let’s go. We need to get out of here before the fire traps us.”
Grabbing her hand, I quietly lead her back down the hallway and toward the stairs.
Thick plumes of black smoke begin to rise, stinging my eyes and burning my lungs.
“I’m going to need you to cover your mouth and take a really deep breath. Hold it in as long as you can and breathe in as little as possible.”
Without hesitation, she lifts the collar of her shirt, covering her nose and mouth, and nods at me, signaling that she’s ready to go.
I kiss her forehead, purely because I need to touch her, and then raise the shotgun, sucking in a deep breath before slowly making my way down the steps.
The smoke thickens as we descend, but the fire has been put out, which means either Sylvester is awake, or Kacey took care of it. I see a flash of movement cut across the kitchen and run toward the door, the sound of her chains unmistakable.
Another flash darts in my peripheral a second before Sylvester appears, a hammer in his hand and a battle cry on his lips as he goes to strike me.
“Enzo!” Sawyer screeches, grabbing my collar and yanking me back just as Sylvester swings the hammer right where my head had been.
He stumbles in front of me, and I use his momentum to push him all the way down with the barrel of the gun. He crashes into the floor, rolling onto his back with a grunt.
“Fucking bitch,” he spits on a cough, while I round him and grab the front of his shirt and drag him toward the middle of the kitchen. The cellar is still open, and Kacey isn’t visible through the density of the smoke.
The fury I kept simmering beneath the surface is now boiling over the edges. All I can think about is what he did to Sawyer—what he almost did to her. Attempting to kidnap her and then tying her up to his bed in hopes he’d keep her here forever. The image of Sawyer with her mouth sewn shut and sad, hollow eyes is charred into my brain as deeply as the burns in the wooden flooring.
I lower myself on top of him, inextinguishable fury polluting my chest and sinking deep into my bones.
His fists fly at me, but he’s nothing more than a weak, old man. He trades between sputtering colorful insults and hacking as soot fills his lungs.
Setting the gun down, I grab his wrists, quickly forcing them down and trapping them between my thighs. I squeeze hard as he wiggles beneath me like a worm on a hook, and deliver a succession of punches into his face. I feel the skin over my knuckles tearing and my bones colliding with his over and over.
Through my haze, I vaguely hear an odd, gurgled scream before I’m knocked to the side, and what feels like arms and legs being wrapped around my torso.
I’m disoriented long enough for Sylvester to get on his knees and grab the gun. Right as he lifts it, Sawyer appears behind him, the chain link between her cuffed wrists looping across his throat and pulling tight.
A war cry leaves her throat as she heaves him back with all her strength, a pained expression on her face as they fall backward together. The shotgun falls from his grip and slides a foot away from them.
“Kacey!” I growl, working on getting her off me. I don’t want to hurt her. She’s conflicted and has been brainwashed for years to protect her father above herself—and in the most brutal of ways. But I won’t let her stop me from killing the man who has inflicted pain and torture on innocent people for years. And especially not after touching my girl.
That will never go unpunished.
I manage to remove myself from Kacey’s grip and am horrified when I see her mouth is splitting open, the stitches ripping the flesh around her lips away. Blood is trailing down her chin, and broken screams are coming from her throat as her mouth widens, revealing blackened teeth and a severed tongue.
I grab her jaw, attempting to keep her from hurting herself any further.
“You don’t have to hurt for him,” I tell her vehemently, my stomach turning from the grotesque feel of her rotting flesh and bodily fluids that I don’t even want to think about, along with the pungent stench from it. “Not anymore.”
She’s both fighting for him and against him.
Love is funny that way. It persists even when you’ve done everything in your power to banish it. It demands its own voice and refuses to be a slave to anyone but its own desires. And despite the power of it, those selfish desires are what make love so weak.