28

Kevin

My apartment feels empty without Skye. Like I had a part of me excised from my body. She’s been gone for three days, and I’m worried sick about her. What’s happening to her? What if she’s hurt? My stomach twists at the thought of bruises on her skin. I worked so hard to protect her, to let her heal.

I text her without a response for the fifth time today and stare at a picture of her—my phone’s background and a constant reminder of what I lost. I’m a glutton for pain.

Fuck you, Mr. Andrews. Fuck you and your stupid, bright ideas. Seeing your mother will help you. You need that support system. Again, a double fuck you to that suggestion.

I shouldn’t blame him, I know. It was stupid of me to think my mom would be different. I should have kept the distance. We’d all be better for it. Skye would be beside me. I could focus on our progress. I felt like we’d finally broken through the barrier that kept her from opening up to me. She said she loved me. Now it’s all fucking gone. I wish I’d never met her. It would be better than feeling the pain of losing her, no matter how much she helped me grow.

With a groan, I grab my keys and head for the door. The need for alcohol—the desire to stifle my feelings with drinks—rushes through me. I want to stop feeling. I want to stop worrying.

I think about driving by Emily’s place. I’m frustrated because it’s all her fault.

No it’s not. The blame is mine. Even out of control, I’m responsible. I should have gotten help sooner. It felt like weakness, like I was giving in to the label. That I was broken.

We all suffered from my actions that night, and this proves I can’t run from my past, no matter how much I try to drink it away. I sucked Skye down into darkness and probably left her worse off than before.

I was once a person she didn’t fear, one of the few people she didn’t shrink from. Now, she can’t stomach me. I would never hurt her. I can guarantee that. I’ve never been so sure about anything. The only thing I’m more sure about is that I fucking love her.

I get in the car and drive toward the store. The short journey feels longer because of the anticipation of getting alcohol. Stifling the beast inside me sounds real good right about now.

My phone rings. Skye’s name comes across the screen, which makes me panic more than it excites me. I fumble to answer it, but it stops ringing. Fuck. It starts blaring again, which makes my heart trip over its own beat. I answer it, putting it up to my ear with no regard for the law.

“Skye?”

Incoherent screaming pours from the phone. Yelled words I can’t understand. I don’t need to hear them, though. I make a U-turn and take off toward Skye’s parents’ house.

“I’m coming, Skye. Just hold on, okay?”

I have no idea what I’ll walk into, but I know it’s bad if she’s willing to call me because of it.

She sobs into the line, and I keep it pressed to my ear so I can hear her presence. As long as she’s screaming, she’s still alive.

I drive past the shitty sign welcoming me to their dreamy neighborhood and prepare to walk into a nightmare. I pull into her driveway. Lights gleam from the living room windows. The phone goes silent. I get out of my car and bust down the fancy door to their idyllic fucking house. My body isn’t prepared for what I walk in on.

The smell of blood assaults my nose, nearly knocking me back into the doorway. I force myself past the wall separating the living room from the hallway.

“Skye?” I walk into the room and drop my phone to the floor.

Skye holds a gun in her shaky grasp. Her father’s blood-soaked form sits in the armchair. I risk a quick glance at the TV behind her. A war movie plays on the screen. Of course.

An alarm sounds through the television speakers, stopping my heart mid-beat. It’s the same alarm that blared before the C-RAM would go off to stop a mortar. I’m mentally transported back to camp, cowering behind a shitty concrete T-wall that won’t do much of anything to halt the explosion and subsequent shrapnel from killing or maiming me. I smell blood—a scent my nose recognizes so well.

Incoming. Incoming.

Skye’s voice tries to break through my panic, but I’m frozen. Sweat drips down the small of my back, and that’s the only thing I can feel. I can’t feel my hands or my face. But I need to help her.

I suck in a ragged breath and try to focus on the sound of her cries. I try to remember what happened in the cabin, how she felt against my body. How much I love her. I have to be strong. I have to be the soldier she needs right now. I was trained to handle trauma. Handle it.

Handle it!

My eyes water, and I shake away the tears I didn’t call on.

She comes into my view again. She’s still holding the gun in her limp hand as she presses against her mouth with the other. I force my feet forward as I walk toward her, guiding my hand down her arm and taking the pistol from her with the sleeve of my sweater.

I tune out the alarm. The explosions. The blood.

“Skye, what happened?” My mind goes to the worst scenario possible. That she killed her father. Deservedly so.

She moves her hand from her mouth, smearing blood on her cheek.

“You need to tell me what happened!” I grab her shoulder and shake her.

She looks up at me like an animal in shock before the words rush from her mouth. “He shot himself.”

“He did? Why?” Someone like her father wouldn’t just—

“He put my mom in the hospital yesterday. The cops came to talk to him. They took all report.” She backs away until she hits the wall and slides down. She’s trembling. “It’s his worst nightmare. He fought so hard to keep it a secret. He said he’d lose his job. That’s when he grabbed the gun.” Tears slip down her cheeks, washing a path through the blood. “I told him to do it. I told him to do it.” Her hands grab the hair at her temples and squeeze.

I walk to her dad and look at his body. The side of his head is blown away, brain matter and blood painting the wall beside him. I don’t need to check his pulse to know he’s very dead. I put the gun into his flaccid hand.

“Why the hell did you pick up his gun?” I turn toward her.

“It fell on the floor. I don’t know why I grabbed it.”

I want to believe her. I do. But I also know Skye—a girl who stabbed her dad because he pushed her just a little too far. I’m going to believe her, though, because I don’t think she’d be this hysterical if she did it herself. She’d be cool and confident like she is when she needs to be brave. Right now, I just care about making this suicide look like . . . well, like a suicide.

Because that’s what it was.

“Go wash the blood off your face,” I tell her as I roll up the sleeves of my sweater. “I have to call the police.”

* * *

Tags: Lauren Biel The Stars Duet Dark
Source: readsnovelonline.net