Page 6 of Luka

“That’s him,” Piper says, twisted in her seat as she peers behind her. “Stay down.”

A car rumbles as it passes us, and although it’s only the anger of a boyfriend at stake, the sound still has me holding my breath.

Piper opens her center console to retrieve the ultrasound photos then gets out of the car while I press my head against the back of her seat and wait.

It isn’t a hard guess to imagine what thisconversationis about. The ultrasound photos plus her flat stomach plus the tension that formed when the photos came up.

She must be telling him about her pregnancy.

A couple minutes pass before a masculine yell comes from outside the car, the boyfriend’s words fast, clipped,angry. I tense and cover my hands over my ears to keep myself from listening. But then something breaks through. His voice, it doesn’t just sound angry. It soundsviolent.

A chill runs through me as I lower my hands from my ears, and I raise onto my knees to peek at the couple through the windshield. They’re far enough in front of me that I’m certain he won’t see. Plus, his back is facing me.

Boyfriend’s hands are raised as they argue, while Piper’s are crossed over her chest. She shakes her head, backpedaling. He follows, his long legs swallowing the distance between them in only a couple strides. My shoulder’s hunch, but I don’t take my eyes off the couple.

Piper’s mouth opens in speech, and as soon as it shuts, Boyfriend’s hand wraps around her throat.

Her eyes bulge at the same time mine do, and I shoot up, my hands slapping against the seat. She claws at her boyfriend as he lifts her into the air, her legs flailing uselessly. When her eyes seek out her car, imploring me to help, I lunge toward the door but hesitate like a coward.

A whimper exits my mouth as my hand starts to shake.

By the time I look back at Piper, I’m too late. The plea leaves her eyes as life drains. Her legs dangle limply, her head hanging against Boyfriend’s brutal grasp.

Her boyfriend drops her to the ground carelessly. Coldly. Not an ounce of remorse in his posture as she crumples in a heap at his feet. He leans over her and spits before snarling something incomprehensible.

I’m an icy statue watching him. My mind takes me to three years ago when I watched my father panic over a glitch in our security system. Everything went down for about an hour which left the tall, iron gate leading to our home compromised. My sisters and I were rushed to the safe room—a ten-by-ten-foot steel box in our basement.

That was the day I started to see him beyond the man I trusted with my whole heart, taking every word he said of fact. I began to see him as controlling. Insecure. A man living with constant fear clutching his throat, his demons imagined. I questioned if the world could really be as dark as Papá claimed.

Now, as I gape in horror at the sight before me, I wish I’d never doubted him.

It isn’t until the back door of Boyfriend’s car opens to reveal another man that I snap from my catatonic state and duck as low as I can.

Rustling sounds outside Piper’s car as the men walk by, talking in a language I don’t understand. I clench my eyes shut and pray they don’t see me. When one opens the driver side car door, I hold my breath.

He says something over the beeping that indicates the keys are in the ignition, but it’s impossible to tell whether or not to feel fear from his words because I can’t understand what they mean. What is this language?

I jump at the sound of the trunk popping and then again when the door slams shut. They load something—Piper, presumably—into the trunk, chatting while they do. At one point they even laugh. Boyfriend no longer sounds angry by tone alone, and that’s more unsettling than if he were furious.

Leave.

Please leave.

The driver door opens again. Boyfriend’s voice booms in the tiny space, halting my lungs. But I still don’t think he’s speaking to me. He waits for the other man to reply before shutting the door.

He starts up the car and pulls away while I shake on the floor of the backseat, wondering one thing, the only thing that matters.

What is he going to do when he finds me?

2

LUKA

Why the fuck did I let him drive my car?

Making our way to the lake, Arseni veers slightly in the other lane as if he’s drunk instead of simply an idiot. He speeds up, my car’s engine roaring, only to slam on the brake right in front of me.

I grind my teeth as my grip on the wheel tightens, my body lurching as I shove my foot on the whore’s brake.

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