Page 89 of Vengeful Rotten Casualties

Thomas Kincaid, my father, shouts and drops to the floor as an alarm starts to blare and red and white lights flash on the upper wall behind us. Blinking, shocked, I reach back and grasp at my own gun, but no … it’s still there. Barely. Which means … I turn and look back. Micki steps up closer and aims the gun back at my father.

“I told you to stop,” she says quietly.

Tasting blood on my tongue, I reach up and wipe a bit of it from a cut on my lower lip. My side is on fire.

“You fucking bitch!” my father screams.

He curses a bit more as wind and rain pour into the room from the now broken glass pane. It’s big and wide—enough that if he slipped just once … over the edge he’d go, into the cold dark night.

I turn back to Micki and freeze. My heartbeat comes to a slow stop in my chest, either out of shock or because we’re mimicking the one who holds its reins. Because, for the first time in my life, as I look at Micki, I don’t see something human. Her eyes are lifeless, the glint of moonlight and the red and white lights of the alarm flash across them, but it’s almost entirely swallowed by the darkness there.

No pupil. No color. Only pitch-black emptiness. Cold. Distant.

“Micki?” I call her name again.

If she hears me, she doesn’t respond. There’s no acknowledgement. Not even joy in her expression. No relief. Just … nothing.

“Micki!” I scream her name.

No answer.

I open my mouth, but my father speaks, interrupting me as he groans. “You fucking cunt,” he grumbles as he gets to his feet. “You damn near shot me.”

Micki’s head tilts to the side. “Yes,” she agrees. “That was the point.”

My eyes flash between them and my father wavers on his feet, staggering as fresh blood wells up from his arm. Was he shot? Or maybe he was stabbed by a piece of glass? Something is very wrong. This is getting out of control. First me and now Micki. I shake my head. We’re on a train barreling straight into a volcano and there’s no stopping it. All we can do is jump off.

“Micki…” I take a step towards her, wincing as each breath makes my side pound with agony and my lungs deflate.

“I didn’t want to kill you,” Micki says as if I’m not there. Her entire focus remains on my father. “I wanted you to admit what you did to the public.” She looks down and then lifts her free hand. She’s holding a flash drive I realize. “I wanted you to do it because I know that would hurt worse than anything.” She’s right. It would destroy his pride to be the one to end his own reputation and career.

All the shit he’s pulled, all of the sins he’s committed are catching up to him, but at the end of the day, he could never pull the trigger himself. He could never ask for forgiveness. It’s not in him. He doesn’t want forgiveness. To him, it was all his for the taking anyway.

“Maybe that was too melodramatic for me.” Micki’s voice turns contemplative. “Maybe I was too hopeful.”

What the hell is she talking about?

My father stands before her, panting and bleeding, glaring between the both of us. His attention is diverted. But hers isn’t. Another step and glass skitters across the hard floor as she moves.

“I didn’t know I’d want it this badly,” she says, her words sounding like an admission of something. Guilt? “But I do.” She swallows, her throat moving as a brief spot of humanity comes back to her. “Iwantto kill you.”

“You’d regret it,” my father shoots back. “You’re no killer.”

“No?” Micki tilts her head to the side and it’s like a doll being pulled on a string—the movement jerky and uneven. “I killed Eric Truman and Andrew Bennington. What makes you think I can’t kill you?”

“Did you kill them or did you hire someone else to do the final deed?”

“Oh, I killed them,” Micki says, her lips twitching as she smiles. Again, it’s like the movement of her head. Awkward and not completely right. My heart begins beating again, picking up the pace as it races in my chest. I take a step towards her, and another and another until I’m right behind her.

“Micki.” I touch her shoulder. She doesn’t move—neither into me nor away. That’s a start at least. “Remember your plan.”

“My plan…” She chuckles, shaking her head. “Plans can be thrown away. Plans can change. Maybe it’s better this way. Maybe I really should kill him. If I kill him, there’s no coming back.”

I don’t disagree. Hell, I don’t care if she truly wants to kill him, but there’s a small part of me that wonders if she will regret it. If it’ll be enough. If watching him die will give her the relief she so painfully desires.

“You wanted him to suffer,” I remind her. If she pushes again, though, I won’t stop her. I can’t. All I can do is let her follow through. Whatever she wants … whatever will give her the second chance she needs. If it’s killing my father, then so be it.

“I can make it hurt,” she replies. I move around to her side and look down at her face.

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