Page 92 of Monster
Essa’s face begins to turn red, and her eyes widen in fear. The chains clank loudly as she struggles to get free of them and it only makes me laugh. She’ll never get out of those. I’ve gotten pretty fucking good at making people immobile over the years.
“Itwasyour fault, baby doll…” I purr as I watch her struggle. “All of it is your fault,” I sigh as I lean my head back to stare up at the bits of sky peeking through the tree branches overhead. “And to think, I fucking loved you. Goddamn, I fucking did,” I say as I tilt my head back down to stare at her again. Her face is now a bright red and the veins in her forehead are protruding as she continues to struggle.
The clanking of the chains sounds almost musical in the quietness of the woods, and it makes me smile.
Such a beautiful moment.
“I loved you. I would have done anything for you—Ididdo anything for you. But then you had to go and kill my fucking baby. If it even wasmy fucking baby,” I snarl the words as images of Dominik flash through my mind.
Essa’s body struggles harder, and I feel the strain in my muscles as I squeeze harder to counteract her movement. Why did she do it? Why did she have to ruin everything? Did she really hate me so much, she would kill the one good thing we ever did together?
If it was mine.
I keep circling back to the fact the baby could have been Dominik’s and not knowing makes it so much fucking worse. The file Mike sent me didn’t have any fucking dates on it—only the hospital, which was in Le Grande, so I have no clue when it happened.
So many fucking questions and she won’t answer any of them.
Why won’t she answer me?
It feels like the earth is spinning at my feet when I glance down. My brows draw together as I continue to stare at the ground. My skin feels so fucking hot one second, but in the next, I feel as if I’m bathing in an ice bath.
“Answer me, Essa,” I plead. I feel breathless, like my lungs won’t fill even though I feel my chest moving in and out as if I’m taking a breath. I try to move, but my body doesn’t listen and remains planted in the same spot. My arms feel like dead weight, and I want nothing more than to drop them, but I can’t.
Something is wrong—so fucking wrong.
Silence rings out brutally loud around me and it confuses me even more as I keep my stare locked on the spinning earth. Why does the silence bother me? There is something not right about it, but I can’t focus on it when everything around me is distorted.
Somehow, I manage to drag my gaze off of the ground, but when I look up, I don’t see anything.
All I see is blackness.
Darkness.
Nothing.
My arms remain locked in the same spot. In fact, my entire body remains trapped in one position. I fling my head around in all directions as I begin to panic.
What the fuck is going on? Why can’t I see anything? Why am I stuck like this?
What happened? Where the hell is Essa?
Essa.
My baby doll.
My baby.
Essa and my baby, yes. A sense of comfort washes over me and I let it seep into my bones. My body relaxes and I finally drop down onto my knees. They hit something hard, and it confuses me for a second, but I don’t dwell on it. I’m happy. Essa and my baby—the two best things in my life and now I have them. We will all be happy as long as we have each other.
I hear a muffled sound in the distance, and it reminds me of a baby’s cry.
Our baby is crying.
Our baby is alive and crying which means Essa and the baby are okay. Everything will be okay now.
Just the three of us living happily ever after.
I never thought those actually existed, but I am so fucking happy to be proven wrong.
I close my eyes as I let my happiness consume me, the feeling utterly fucking euphoric.
