Layla

“I’ve got it!” Layla yells back.

I’m picking up my shirt and pulling it back over my head when I hear a sound. It’s like a single-shot firecracker. Pop!

My blood chills—as if my veins would shatter like glass if I moved. But I do move. I run.

When I reach the bedroom door, I hear the sound again. Another pop!

I swing open the door, and everything I know and everything I love and everything I live for is in a heap on my living room floor. There’s blood pooling beneath her shoulder. In her hair. I immediately drop to my knees and lift her head.

“Layla,” I whisper, right before feeling a sting in my shoulder.

Everything after that is a blur.

A nightmare.

Everything stops.

It just stops.

It just . . .THE INTERVIEW

The man is quiet.

The whole house is quiet. Too quiet.

I need more bourbon. As if he knows this, he stands up and grabs the bottle. He brings it back to the table and slides it over to me. “What happened next?”

I shrug. Take a drink. “She survived.”

“Who shot her? Sable?”

My jaw is tense when I nod. “Yes. Over a fucking Instagram post.” My words are short and clipped. I’m sure the expression on my face shows just how done I wish I could be with this conversation.

“Was Sable arrested?”

I shake my head. “No.”

The man is looking at me like he wants me to elaborate even more on that night, and I will, but not right now. I’m still trying to swallow everything that’s led up to this point. I need to fully digest it before I spit it back out.

“I don’t really want to talk about that right now,” I say. “Not that it isn’t important. I just . . .” I push back from the table and stand up. “I need to check on Layla again.” My voice is dry from all the talking. He stops the recorder as I turn to walk up the stairs.

I pause halfway up the steps. I lean against the wall and close my eyes. It’s still hard to wrap my mind around what’s happening sometimes, even though I’ve been living it for weeks now.

I take a moment to separate everything I’m saying about Layla downstairs from what I need to say to her upstairs.

After a few long seconds, I push off the wall and head to our bedroom. I unlock the door and slowly open it, expecting Layla to be asleep. She isn’t. She is lying down, though.

“I’m thirsty,” she says flatly.

I pick up the glass of water by the bed and wait for her to sit up. I’ve given the rope plenty of slack so she can move around a bit, but she still winces when the rope rubs against her wrists. She leans forward until the glass meets her lips. She takes several sips before dropping against the headboard, exhausted.

“You should eat,” I tell her. “What do you want me to bring you?”

She looks at me with disgust. “I don’t know, Leeds. It’s hard to see what’s in the fridge when I’m tied to a bed.”

Her anger slips into my skin with the ease of a sharpened scalpel. It mixes with the guilt I feel for keeping her here, but Layla’s anger and my guilt combined still lack the capability to breach my conscience.

“I can make you a sandwich.”

“How about you untie me and I can make it myself?”

I leave her while I go downstairs to make her a sandwich. Turkey and cheddar, no onions, double the tomato. I don’t speak to the man while I make Layla her sandwich. I do have questions for him, but I’ll get to those later. I just want to tell him everything I know first. I want to get it over with.

When I’m back upstairs, I set the sandwich and the bag of Cheetos I brought Layla on the bed. I also made her a glass of wine, so I place that on the nightstand.

“I’ll untie you so you can eat, but don’t try to run this time,” I warn her. “You know it won’t work.”

She nods, and I can tell by the fear in her eyes that she doesn’t want to experience that again. In fact, I can probably trust that she was so terrified by what happened the last time she tried to leave that she doesn’t even need to be tied up. I doubt she’d even leave this bedroom willingly.

Unfortunately, I just can’t risk it. I need her here.

When the rope is off her wrists, she pulls her arms down and massages her shoulder. I feel bad that she’s sore, so I make room between her and the bed and I sit behind her. I rub her shoulders while she eats, wanting to ease some of her tension. She takes a small bite of her sandwich, then picks up a piece of tomato and lettuce that fell out onto the plate. She pops them both into her mouth and licks her fingers. Maybe she’s just hungry, but she looks like she’s actually enjoying this sandwich. It reminds me of how she used to tease me about my sandwich-making abilities.