Dead.
Kit could be dead.
If she’s dead, I’m going to kill Grant and then myself. There’s no fucking reason to be alive if she’s dead. We crash through the trees and I don’t see anything for far too fucking long in the dark until a flash of lightning shows me what I want to see the most.
Kit.
Chapter Fifty
KIT
Itake off after my mother without a second thought. I almost go for the door before I see the open window in front of me. Of course she went through the window. I wince and drag myself over the edge of the windowsill. I raise a hand to shield my face from the rain and manage to hop out without getting caught on the ledge but all it takes is one wrong step before I go sprawling into the mud. I slip twice trying to get up before I manage it eventually. I have no idea where my mother took Alana so I pick a direction and start jogging.
I take in a deep breath and then another. The cold rain in my face helps keep my nausea at bay and I feel a little better the longer I’m moving.
“You can do this,” I tell myself. “You have to fucking do this.”
The this being taking my evil bitch of a mother down and saving my friend. God, how is this my life? Everything was almost normal for me before she showed back up to ruin it. Whatever happens tonight, I’m going to make sure that she never bothers me again. Whatever it takes to protect my peace and the people I love.
Thunder booms and a second later the sky lights up so bright that I have to shield my eyes against it. It’s in the bright light that I see Alana and my mother. They’re up ahead of me, through the trees and going towards the dock. Why are they going that way? There’s no way off the dock or even anywhere to hide, just a few chairs and a small table. What the fuck is my mother planning?
I pick up speed and keep running. I should wait for Rafe and Grant but there’s no time. By the time I get to the trees they haven’t made it to the dock yet. My mother is slowed down and fighting to drag Alana after her. I watch as Alana trips and lands on the ground. My mother kicks her in the side a second later when Alana doesn’t immediately get up. She kicks her again and I pick up a rock. It’s about the size of a brick and it feels good in my hand. I’m going to bash my mother’s head in for hurting Alana. I should be angry that she’s here and hurting me but that feels normal, something I’ve endured for years. Something I expect my mother to do.
But Alana?
Rafe and Grant?
They’re off-limits.
I squeeze the rock and take a deep breath before I go after my mother. I’m a few feet away when my mother shoots. The sound is muted out here in the storm. Like a soft muffled pop that barely registers above the raging of the thunder and rain.
“Get up!” she screams at Alana, firing again into the trees. The bullet must come close to me because it’s louder this time and I feel splinters of bark hitting my face. Alana tries to get up but she can’t, not when my mother keeps kicking her. I know how she feels trying to get up from under the constant blows from my mother. She used to do it to me when I was younger and didn’t move fast enough. Once, when she thought I took too long in the shower, she waited to knock me down when I got out of the tub and wouldn’t stop hitting me with the pair of slingbacks she’d worn that day. I was only ten. My hand clenches around the rock. The edges of it cut into my palm as I rise from where I’m crouched. I run through the trees and it’s only when I’m a few feet from my mother that she realizes she isn’t alone. She’s too late by then, I’ve already cocked my arm and thrown the rock as hard as I can. The rock smashes into her face and she staggers from the hit, arms flying out at her sides. I grab her by her hair and slam her facedown into the ground. When she tries to get up I kick her in the back of the head. The blow is enough to stun her but I can’t let her get up. I can’t let her walk away from this because she’s never going to stop.
I drop to my knees and straddle her back while she struggles to rise. “You should have stayed gone!” I grab her arm and rip my bracelet off of her. “This is mine. Mine. You don’t deserve it! You should have left me alone but you couldn’t let me have a life, could you?” I wrap my hands around her neck and squeeze as I scream at her. “You had to try and take my life, didn’t you?” I keep squeezing and she chokes. She bucks and twists her head from side to side but I move with her, bashing her head against the ground as she thrashes. She only does the move twice before she stops but she keeps kicking and clawing at the ground. I tighten my grip and my hands aches from how hard I’m choking her. My own vision has spots of black dancing in it when Alana throws her arms around my shoulders and pulls me back.
“Kit, Kit, I’m safe. I’m safe!”
She thinks this is about her being safe. That I’m doing this to my mother to defend her. It’s not. I want to kill my mother. I don’t stop squeezing. My world narrows and narrows until it’s nothing but the feel of my mother dying in my hands. I want her to stop breathing with my hands around her neck. I want to feel the fucking second her heart stops beating. I want to know she’s never getting back up again.
I want-
“Shy girl.”
Rafe drops down in front of me and the world opens back up again. I let go of my mother’s neck with a sob and fall back into Alana’s arms.
“Oh god,” I whisper, burying my face in my hands. “I almost killed her. I almost-” I hiccup and the words won’t come because there’s no way I can say it. My anger is gone as quickly as it came and now I feel hollow. Bereft. Like a puppet with its strings cut. My arms feel like noodles and I can’t sit up without Alana holding me.
“I know.” Rafe brushes my hair away from my face. He’s got a bruise on his cheek and a busted lip but other than that, he’s fine. My mother moans and moves and my eyes go to her.
“But she’s going to come back.”
He shakes his head. “She won’t. We’ll take care of it.”
I know what he means. I know what’s going to happen to my mother and that’s enough for me. The rain isn’t coming down so hard now. The gentle pitter-patter of rain on trees feels comforting now that my men are here. Grant stands behind Rafe and he looks a little worse. There’s blood on his face but I don’t think it’s his. He stretches his arms over his head and smiles at me like it’s a normal day and I didn’t just try to kill my mother.
“She’s never coming back, sweetheart,” he says.
I believe him.