Page 64 of The Birthday Girl
Danielle pushed her daughter’s stroller forward another inch. “If they’re watching us from heaven right now, I want them to know one thing—” She turned her face toward the portraits, her tears catching the candlelight. “I never abandoned you, and I never will. Also, I’m so sorry if what I’m about to do will embarrass you, but I’m about to whoop your daughter’s ass!”
Danielle barreled up the aisle like she had nothing left to lose. Her heels slapped the tile in a complex, angry rhythm. People scrambled out of her way. The stroller bumped a pew, sent a woman’s hymnbook flying, and a man in the second pew swore under his breath as Danielle shoved past him.
“Move, goddammit!” she shouted.
She reached the podium and shoved her palm against the wood. Tahlia’s smile snapped off like glass, and she stepped down from the dais before anyone could stop her. Her hand flew through the air and connected with Danielle’s flesh, the sound ricocheting off the stained glass. Five fingerprints bloomed instantly on Danielle's cheek, and her head snapped to the side from the impact.
Danielle grabbed Tahlia’s neck and swung back, her nails scraping her sister’s skin. Tahlia shoved her, and Danielle stumbled into the podium. She threw a right that clipped Danielle’s jaw, and Danielle answered with a left that connected with Tahlia’s ribs. The sisters went at each other with everything they had. Hair twisted around fists, and their breath came in ragged bursts as they fought for their lives.
An usher stepped forward and got shoved back so hard he hit his knee on a pew. A man in the front row stood up, a shout building in his throat, and another hand gripped the railing like it might be the only thing steady in a world tipping over. All the while, the cameras kept rolling.
Tahlia’s fingers closed around Danielle’s throat, and she slammed her onto the floor. Her grip was sudden and brutal, the way someone clamps down when there is no other option. Danielle gagged, her legs kicking and scrabbling against the polished floor. People stood frozen, phones aloft, their faces open with horror.
Tahlia's face transformed. Her upper lip curled back, exposing her canines, and a low sound vibrated from somewhere deep in her chest. The whites of her eyes bloomed with spidery red lines as her pupils shrank to black needles, rage dilating in the whites of her eyes. She hunched forward, shoulders rising to her ears, fingers digging deeper into flesh until Danielle's windpipe compressed with an audible creak. Danielle's legs kicked, thenstuttered as her eyes bulged and her tongue protruded between blue-tinged lips.
Ezra locked his arms around Tahlia's waist and wrenched her backward. Her heels scraped across wood, leaving black streaks as she collided with his chest, her spine arching against him, mouth opening in a silent gasp. Her eyes darted left to right as if searching for solid ground while her hands hung suspended in the air, fingers still curled into the memory of her sister's throat.
A deacon in a charcoal suit lifted Danielle by her elbow while Miracle swept Tyricka into her arms, the baby's face pressed against her neck as her eyes burned with fury. Danielle sagged against the man’s grip, her throat convulsing with each ragged cough. She could feel the sting of Tahlia’s nails etched into her skin. They were deep grooves raking across her throat like claw marks. Blood slid warm from the corner of her mouth where Tahlia’s diamond ring had split her lip, and the taste of metal was sharp against her tongue.
“You’re—” Danielle tried to speak, but couldn’t finish.
The cameras were recording everything as the church rang with noise. Ushers shouted, women screamed, and children cried as the preacher bellowed for silence. Tahlia’s hand flew to her throat like she could feel the cameras through her skin. She remembered the lenses in an awful, electric rush. The realization hit her full in the face that every inch of what just happened was already immortalized. Horror cracked her expression wide open.
She pushed past Ezra with a speed that startled him and ran without looking back. Moments later, the doors slammed closed behind her, and the people standing outside craned their necks, watching her disappear into the sea of reporters waiting outside.
Ezra stood in the aisle a moment longer, chest heaving, nerves rawer than they’d ever been. He watched Tahlia’s back vanish into the crush of cameras and men in dark suits. He had pulledher away, and he had saved her from life in jail, but he felt anything but relief.
The preacher’s voice floated over the noise. “Lord, have mercy. Order, please. Let us pray.” He lifted his hands, palms toward the ceiling, but the congregation was too fired up to follow along.
Danielle sank to her knees at the base of the pulpit, hands on the wood, chest heaving, blood drying at the corner of her mouth. Miracle tightened her hold on Tyricka and met Danielle’s eyes. She wanted to apologize, or maybe to confess, but there was nothing left that words could repair. Her body shuddered from the adrenaline, her hands shaking as she wiped her mouth on her sleeve.
The memorial was over, and all that remained was the wreckage.
23- Confessions
Tahlia tore through her penthouse like fire racing through dry brush, devouring everything in its path. She yanked her necklace from her neck, and her pearls skittered across the marble like hailstones, the broken strand leaving white trails wherever the beads rolled.
“I hate them! I hate them all!” Tahlia screamed as she ripped the frame holding her parents’ anniversary photo off the wall, their faces frozen mid-laugh at a charity gala she’d paid for.
The glass splintered as it hit the floor, her mother’s smile now bisected by an uneven crack. Chest heaving, she stepped barefoot over the wreckage, the shards biting deep into her instep, but she didn’t mind. The pain lit up her nerves, but she welcomed it because it erased the duller ache of humiliation.
Leaving a bloody trail of footsteps behind, Tahlia made her way to the bar. Her hands shook violently, so much so that she knocked over a crystal decanter trying to pour herself a drink.Whiskey bled across the counter, and she smeared her palms through it, leaving smudged fingerprints behind.
Tahlia’s eyes flicked to the television she’d left running hours ago. Now it was replaying the clip of her hands locked around Danielle’s throat, frozen mid-frame while anchors dissected her rage. The chyron at the bottom read,The Devil Wears Pearls,followed by hashtags mocking her grief.
A scream ripped from her chest, and she hurled the remote across the room. The image stuttered, broke, then came back again. Danielle’s face, blotched and bruised, stared back at her as her words replayed,“You killed our parents! Just like you killed Tyriq and my friends!”
Tahlia clutched her temples, pacing, pacing, pacing. She hadn’t slept since the memorial. Coffee and champagne buzzed through her veins, keeping her on the knife’s edge between brilliance and collapse. Every shadow looked like Danielle, and in the silence, she heard her laughing at her expense.
Finally, with her mascara running down her cheeks and her curls knotted from restless hands, she snatched her coat from the back of a chair. She slid her bloody feet into a pair of slippers and headed into the garage to get in one of her many cars. No driver was needed today. Tahlia wanted to be alone.
The garage lights buzzed overhead, sterile against the gleam of her fleet. She bypassed the Range Rover, the Rolls, and the Maybach and pressed the fob for the black Genesis G80 coupe tucked in the corner with the illegal tint. The vehicle was subtle, almost discreet, but she liked that about it. Tonight, she needed something that didn’t announce her presence.
The engine roared to life, swallowing the echo of her ragged breaths. Tahlia gripped the wheel tight enough that her nails dug crescents into her palms. Tires screeched as she shot down the ramp, blood seeping from the cuts in her feet.
Tahlia blurred past stoplights, pedestrians, and horns, all of it melting into streaks of sounds and color that didn’t matter. She wasn’t driving. She was fleeing. She didn’t remember the turns, didn’t register the streets, only the endless forward motion.
When the car finally slowed, her body sagged against the seat. She blinked at the lot surrounding her, headlights catching the muted gold letters etched above the building’s glass doors that read: HALBROOK & FARRELL PSYCHOLOGICAL SERVICES.
