“Tell me, baby.”
She sputtered on another sob before forcing one, two slow, controlled breaths. I couldn't see her from where I stood. That was a good thing, as far as Seth and his murderous intentions went. But I wished I could see her. I wished my eyes could find hers to show her the startling calm I felt. To show her I wasn't afraid, and if I wasn’t afraid, there was no reason for her to be.
“Rain.”
She pulled in a deep breath through her nose, and then she said, “I-I understand.”
“Okay.” I nodded to the darkness and held the doorknob in my hand, flicking the lock. “Remember, stay in here. No matter what you hear.”
I began to close the door behind me when she said, “Soldier, wait.”
“Yeah?”
A resounding bang came from the direction of the front door. The sound of splintering wood followed.
He was trying to get in.
It wouldn't be long now.
“I-I love you. I love you s-so much.”
My composure had been held; my guard had been up. But at the sound of her voice professing her feelings in the dark, the broken sound of her heart fracturing under the weight of her fear, it was almost enough to make me falter. To make me second-guess my decision to hold him off for as long as I could before the cops could reach us.
“I love you too,” I said as another loud crack broke through the night and the front door swung open.
I shut the door before she could say anything more.
Seth's heavy footsteps moved slowly through the dark living room as I made my way down the hallway, alerting him of my presence the moment I entered the open space between the kitchen and living room, where he stood.
Lightning flickered through the windows to illuminate his wicked smile. “Soldier.”
“Seth.”
It felt like a showdown from an old Western movie. The sides of good and evil facing off with only several feet of space between them. Neither of us moved from our positions as my grip tightened around the bat and his fingers flexed around the pistol in his hand.
“Where's my son and Rain?”
“Is that really who you came for?” I inquired doubtfully.
His chuckle was humorless as he tipped his head back to face the ceiling. “Well, yeah, I did come for them. But if you're asking if I'm here for you too”—he nodded, dropping his chin to look at me again—“then the answer is yes.”
My jaw pulsed. “Your beef is with me, not them.”
He nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, it is. And do you know why?”
“Tell me, please.”
He held the gun up, pointing it directly at my chest, and even as my heart sped up, I didn't let him know it.
“Because you have been a pain in my fucking ass your entire fucking life,” he said, raising his voice. “David—you know about him now, right? Diane told us you did. He was a goddamn idiot for getting involved with your whore of a mother, and when he knocked her up, he became so … so”—his jaw clenched, and his head shook—“consumed by the idea of getting you back and being a dad. But your fucking mom, man … she wouldn't give him that. She refused, but he sure as shit died trying. Did she tell you that too?”
She hadn’t mentioned that. The information was all news to me. News that I might've taken to heart under different circumstances.
“Why do you even care?” I asked, shrugging. “Why does it even matter to you?”
“Because he was my cousin!”
He dropped his gun-holding arm and shook his head, turning away. It was an opening. I could've rushed him, taken him down. But I didn't. I couldn't risk a slip of his finger on the trigger. I couldn't risk letting down my guard before the cops were at least within earshot.
“His parents raised me. He was like my fucking brother, and when he died, shit fell apart. My aunt and uncle lost their goddamn minds, and Levi was so fucking obsessed with getting back at your piece-of-shit mother. But he always wanted to keep your ass out of it. He always said you were just a kid, and I went along with that, even after they hauled your ass away, but …”
He turned back to me, shaking his head. “You just couldn't leave shit alone, could you? And you just kept coming back, over and over and over again, like a goddamn cockroach. No matter how many times we thought you were gone, there you were. And then you ruined everything.”
“How the hell did I ruin anything for you, Seth?”
He barked a bitter laugh, tapping the barrel of the gun against his thigh. “Are you serious? Come on, asshole! Of all places, you ended up here, next door to the bitch and my kid. Then, you just had to swoop in and get to them. You had to be the fucking hero.”
“As if you wanted them.” I snickered, shaking my head.
Seth lifted the gun and aimed it at me again. “Don't you fucking tell me what I did or did not want. That's not up to you to decide.
“And anyway, I got the fuck over that. I let it go. But you … you couldn't just stop. You had to go back to your little mommy. You had to ask questions, give her your fucking number—oh, she told us all about that. And we had a good thing going with her, too, Levi and me. She did her job, fucked us—”
“You fucked her too?” I couldn’t help but ask, my nose wrinkling with disgust.
“Yeah, and she didn’t fight it like that little bitch, wherever she is. Your mom, she was good for something—I’ll give her that. But then she saw you, and she lost that goddamn script, and we knew—we just knew you had it. We could only guess what you were gonna do with it or who you were gonna tell. She fucked up, so—”
“So you killed her.” My hands tensed around the bat, holding on so tight that they ached.
Seth nodded, an air of pride emanating from his apologetic grin. “Had to, man. Should've done it a long time ago, to be honest, but Levi kept finding reasons not to.” He shrugged, as if to say, What can ya do? “And the thing—the real kicker—is … we would've stopped there. You would’ve gotten the message, and that would've been the end of it. But …” He blew out a breath and shrugged before raising the gun once more. “You just had to go ahead and give the cops Levi's name.”
“You would've done the same thing,” I argued, shaking my head as I stared down the blackened barrel of the gun. “You can't blame me for that.”
Seth slowly nodded his head. “No, I guess not. I guess I should be more pissed that Levi gave me up—family shouldn’t stab each other in the back like that. But”—he shrugged again, this time with more nonchalance—“he's the one behind bars now, and … well, you're not.
“So, listen, this is what's going to happen. You're going to tell me where that little shit and his mother are,” he demanded, his eyes cold and devoid of any moral soul. “Then, you're going to watch me kill them before I kill you. Simple, right?”
“Or you could just kill me and be done with it,” I offered, desperate to buy more time.
Where the hell are the cops?
Did Noah even make it there?
“Tempting, but, no, sorry. Eye for an eye, man. You took everything away from me, so you’re gonna watch as I take everything from you. Now, let's go.” He took his first steps, moving toward me.