My fingers curl around the rock, gripping to the point of pain. I pitch the river stone at the clock and smash the glass, watching as the pendulum crashes to the floor. The room fades darker.
One rock left.
I pick it up and note the weight in my hand before I stalk toward Blakely.
No longer playing the victim, she slides up against the wall to stand before me. The thin shirt is still damp and clings to her body. She wraps her arms around her waist as she watches me cautiously.
We’re shrouded by darkness, nearly all light sources have gone extinct. I tap the bare bulb as I pass underneath, and the light swings back and forth. As I near Blakely, her face illuminates and then fades into shadow. Light, dark. Light, dark.
The still quiet of the room is eerie, the constant ticking has gone silent, all except the faint tick tick tick of her clock in the background.
When the light swings away, leaving her in the pitch-black of the room, I hear her scramble off the wall. She makes for the door, and I circle my arm around her waist to halt her escape.
“This is what you wanted,” I tell her. “No more lies. Just the harsh, candid truth between us.”
I thrust her back against the wall and grip her shoulder, my forearm pressed to her chest to prevent her from moving. Breaths ragged, she stares down at the rock in my hand before meeting my eyes with a spark of defiance.
“That’s my rock,” she says, needing me to confirm it.
Arm braced across her chest, I bring the stone up so she can see it.
“What time is it, Alex?” Her throat dips with a forced swallow. “What time do I get before you eliminate me?”
I keep the rock held aloft. “Since I broke my watch, time no longer has meaning here.”
Her eyes flare, and I wonder what my confession means to her. That I’ve lost all rational sense, that this really is the end…for the both of us?
I lower the stone and watch as her eyes seal closed in anticipation for the strike. I allow myself one greedy moment where I inhale her addictive scent, memorize her beautiful features, before I place the rock in her delicate palm. “There’s only one timekeeper left.”
I feel her chest collapse as she releases a pent-up breath. Her confused gaze shifts to the lone clock hung on the black wall and then tracks to me.
A tight smile rims my mouth. “You know what you have to do.”
Understanding alights in her eyes, her features strained with a mocking imitation of sentiment. “Alex…you’re insane.”
“That’s been established.”
“I can’t—”
“I’m not like you,” I confess. “The moment the secondhand stops, I’ll be forced to confront what I’ve done, and the guilt will destroy me. I’m not sure what I’ll do then…what I’ll be capable of. You have no choice.”
She shakes her head. “I’m not a killer.?
?
Her teeth catch her bottom lip, and the sight sets my blood on fire. An act I once deemed she did to assert control over the opposite sex, I now realize, with sullen remorse, is an impulse of her uncertainty.
She’s not committed to her words.
Instinct is impulse, and I reach out to touch her. My hand is sure as I caress the strands of her blond hair, dragging my fingers down the side of her face to tilt her chin up. The hunger to taste her one last time burns through me, voracious.
The room feels as if it exhales a leaden breath as I rest my forehead against hers. “This is exactly what you’re designed to do.”
She releases the rock and I catch it before it hits the floor.
“That’s not true,” she whispers, her breath unsteady.
With every vicious craving, I place a tender kiss to her forehead, then take I aim at the clock. The loud crash reverberates through the room. Glass clatters to the floor. The silver pendulum lies motionless in the dark.