Page 152 of Saved By My Buyers

“You’re on your own, kid,” he grunts.

Dropping to her feet, Dahlia walks quickly toward me, the knife hidden in the folds of her dress as Adamson dramatically drops onto his side, his throat a ruined mess. Gareth’s eyes shift wildly between everything happening before settling on Dahlia.

“Are you sure you don’t want me instead?” she asks, swallowing thickly to hold back her revulsion. I can see her fingers trembling, but I stay still. I can tell she’s up to something.

“You know I do, but I need the money more,” he mutters. Dahlia presses her knife into my hand before he shoves her aside and tosses me over his shoulder to run outside.

“Bee!” Dahlia screams, trying to follow me out.

“Poor, little bitch lost everything, huh?” Is all I hear before Gareth kicks the door behind him, making Dahlia have to jump back. He forces a chair underneath it, making sure it can’t be moved before he’s running.

“Gareth. You bastard!” I scream, holding tightly to the knife as I struggle.

I can vaguely hear people moving around us, the falling snow somehow muting everything. I can’t tell how close anyone is as he runs away from the shed with long strides.

The snow is really coming down, and I shiver, knowing I need to make a move so I won’t freeze. I can’t let him take me into the woods.

“Let go!” I scream again, partly to lead help toward us.

“Shut up, woman,” Gareth hisses, running faster. I can feel every bounce, every movement, and I’m trying to find a good place to stab him, since his overcoat covers his body.

So, I try to make him drop me. My body is screaming with discomfort and pain, and I’m sure something is broken. I’ll gladly take Jack and Dahlia loving on me as I heal. I just need to be able to get to that point.

Rolling, twisting, kicking my feet, I force Gareth to overbalance and fall. The snow is so fucking cold as it covers my body, and he curses at me, wrapping his hands around my throat.

“Remember you asked for this,” he hisses. “I’ll write your name in blood, as long as it means there’s DNA evidence on the paperwork that you touched it. Stupid fucking girl!”

When I fell, my hand with the knife got stuck underneath me, and is now caught in the thick material of my dress. Gareth’s weight is digging the blade into my skin now, so all I can do is kick and buck my weight upward to try to get the fucking knife free.

I’m not going out like this. Absolutely fucking not. Screaming in my head in frustration, I feel my lungs begging for oxygen. I punch, scratch, and poke my fingers into Gareth’s eyes, finding my reward when he turns and throws me away from him.

Gasping in air as I fly through the air until I land tumbling into the snow, I get onto my hands and knees, cutting my feet loose. It’s really fucking cold, but I’m running on adrenaline as I stand.

My body is weak, but I will stay upright.

“Aww, a knife. I don’t think you’re capable of hurting me,” he snarls, seeing it in my hand. “I’m your dad.”

“You’re no such thing. Not anymore,” I tell him, running toward him. While I’m not usually great on the offensive, I have no doubt he’ll put me in another position to fight him off.

Let’s just hope he dies this time.

Dahlia

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I whisper, shoving against the door. “Help! Jack!”

“We’re surrounded by dead bodies,” Arina mumbles, sliding down the side of the shed, staying as far away from her father’s spreading blood as she can. “It smells, and we’re going to freeze. What if the police find us first? I’m going to tell them you did it! Maybe you’ll finally leave me alone.”

“Little girl, I don’t want anything to do with you,” I complain, looking around for a window. “There you are.”

It’s small, but I’ll probably fit through it. While I’ve gained some weight back, I have malnutrition over several years working against me as I struggle to get healthy again. I only have muscles from dancing, which help as I climb the shelves against the wall.

“Wait, you can’t leave me,” Arina says. I swear there’s a screw loose as I shove open the window and try to wiggle through it. Arina knocks over the shelving unit to try to get me to fall, but I’m already too far through for it to matter.

Snow is soft enough to break my fall, right?

When I was leaving the stage, I saw Arina whispering to Ivan furiously, and he kept shaking his head. I needed to find Jack and Bee, but couldn’t see anything other than people outside of the ballroom rushing around.

Arina saw me and laughed, saying I looked like a lost puppy. I should’ve stayed in one place, and not followed. Unfortunately, I hate the bitch so much. My gut told me she was hiding something, so I followed, even when Ivan shouted my name.

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