Vicious Minds: Part 3 (Children of Vice 6)

When I opened my eyes, I felt tears on my eyelids…my own tears.

I hadn’t cried when I was with them or when I had left. So why now?

I glanced down at my body, feeling the weight on top of me, to see not only Calliope but Gig

i curled up on either side of me.

When had she come in?

When had I gotten off the floor?

I didn’t know. But I didn’t care.

I preferred this, knowing they were close and all right. Knowing I could get up off this bed and still talk, walk, and hold them. That I still had time was the best feeling in the world. And it made me want to live more.

“Why are you up?” Calliope whispered as she sat up.

Before I could answer, she rushed to the bathroom. I moved to see what was wrong, but Gigi clung to my arm like a koala bear. And Calliope returned, slowly getting back into the bed and curling into a ball.

I watched them both before the sun began to peek through the window. And I watched it rise, chasing the darkness of the night away.

“If it’s boy, we name him Aiden,” I whispered to her, not thinking she’d hear me.

“Aiden?” she grumbled, opening only one day.

“It means of sun and fire,” I said.

“Aiden Liam Callahan is a mouthful,” she muttered, burying her head back into the pillow. “But it’s not bad.”

She dozed off, and I leaned back into the pillows too.

This was how the world worked. The sun would set for some and rise for others.

I’d lost family.

But the Callahans as a whole would make it.

I wouldn’t be the last.

I would do better than my own father. We’d go on and on until they killed every last one of us. There was no turning back, no giving up, there was nothing other than this.

Epilogue

“There are four kinds of homicide:

felonious, excusable, justifiable,

and praiseworthy.”

~ Ambrose Bierce

LIAM

“I think Wyatt was a little jealous of seeing his brother as a father, so we’ll be getting a third grandchild soon.”

She smiled beside me as she cleaned my hand, not that I could feel it. “What do you think Helen will let their daughter be named after me instead of her mom? Ethan already honored you, and I doubt Calliope will be getting pregnant again, so it’s only fair, right?”

I didn’t reply.