Her voice turns to a song, a lowly sung hum of words; I can’t make out what she’s saying as I stare at my chest, the bright red soaking through the crisp white shirt as I fall to the floor.
My arm doesn’t brace me, it merely hits the ground hard, followed by my back and it’s then that I feel the sharp twinges of pain.
I try to swallow, but blood comes up instead. A mouth full of it that spills from me as I try to say her name.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I think that I should have shot him when I first came in. I shouldn’t have concerned myself with Aria. I should have killed him without thinking twice.
A dizzy sensation comes over me as my head droops back but I force my neck up, I force myself to look at Aria, to command her to get behind me, but she’s not looking at me and I can’t speak. Every time I try, hot blood fills my mouth. It’s all I can taste; it’s all I can smell. I struggle to breathe, to move even and it’s not the pain. The pain is nothing. Something else is holding me down.
“No!” I hear Aria scream, but it sounds so far away.
“I’m sorry,” I try to tell her, but the words are muffled as I choke on my own blood. Hate fuels me to keep my eyes open as Aria yells something I can’t hear to her father. She’s right here, so close to me, but I can’t move my arms to hold her anymore. My body’s so numb, so heavy.
I’m sorry I put her in the middle of this. I’m sorry I put her in danger. I’m sorry I made her want to run again. I’m sorry I can’t protect her. That’s what my worst sin is.
As I see the darkness settle in, the sounds fade to nothing, and her touch wanes, I’m most sorry that I can’t protect her.
Fuck, no. I need to protect her still.
I don’t want to leave her. I don’t want to die.
“Aria,” I try to say her name, but I can’t.
I try to fight the heavy weight that’s holding me down. “I love you,” I say, but the words fail to be heard. Did I say them?
She must know them. She must.
“You can’t die, Carter,” I hear Aria whisper and she sounds so close but I can’t see her, I can’t feel her.
For the first time in so long, I’m scared. I’m terrified.
I couldn’t care less about life and death. But I don’t want to be without her. I need Aria. I need to protect her. And as the darkness takes over, I’m truly terrified that I’ll never see her again.
The last thought I have, is that if I die, she can’t die for me. Suddenly, the cold feels peaceful.
She didn’t die for me. If the price to change the course of fate was that I must die for her… so be it.
Chapter 21
Aria
The blood is everywhere. My hands are stained with it as I apply pressure to the bullet wound and scream at Carter to answer me.
“Look at you.” My father hasn’t stopped talking, hasn’t stopped shaming me for staying at Carter’s side. Hasn’t stopped shaming me for reaching for the gun.
I had to try. With a man on either side of me, both wanting to kill the other, I couldn’t stand by helplessly, doing nothing.
The blood isn’t nearly as hot as the tears that won’t stop. He’s not answering me; he isn’t responding to me no matter how loud I scream. His name tears up my throat as I scream his name. As I do, the pressure lifts just slightly on the wound nearly in the center of his chest and more blood pools around him.
Hold him tight, or else he’ll die.
Words from a man I’ve never met come back to me, and I shove my body down, clutching Carter and putting all of my weight on both of my hands, still compressing the wounds. “Don’t leave me,” I cry as my hair sticks to my wet face and the hot tears mix with his blood as I lay my cheek in the crook of his neck.
I can feel his heart.
It beats as the door to the office creaks open and my father yells at me to get up. To be a Talvery and to prove he made the right choice all those years ago. That I’m truly his daughter. His words mean nothing to me. They hang in the air. All I listen to is the faint beat of Carter’s heart and how slow it is. It’s slowing.
I only turn my head to look at my father when I hear him cock the gun again.
My throat is tight with emotion as I look from the barrel of the gun up to him. The pressure I have on Carter’s gunshot wounds doesn’t waver though.