Page 77 of Anathema Codex

It hasn't even been a whole day with him yet and I've already seen my father stomp an old guy's face in and wrestle that priestess chick into the back of the SUV after the sun went down. Honestly, if I was smart, I would have just walked away right then. Right into the middle of the fucking desert where at least I wouldn't have to think about the psycho bitch in the backseat gutting an old woman to get to her heart… or the way she'd shoved that knife into Willa.

Willa.

Every time I think about her being gone,reallygone, it makes my stomach twist and my throat go stiff and then it's impossible to keep my goddamn eyes from leaking.

But how am I not supposed to think about her?

We're inhercar. I've got her fucking hair tie around my wrist and I'm sitting where she was this morning. Still alive, and beautiful, and completely pissed at me because I killed her charity case. If I could fix it, I would. I'd do whatever it takes just to have her sitting next to me, glaring at me, furious and ready to drive a knife into someone else because she could never bring herself to really hurt me.

That's just how Willa is.Was.

A painful lump catches in my throat and it won't go back down no matter how hard I try to swallow, but when it finally reaches my mouth it bursts over my lips in the strangest groan I've ever made. Some mix between pain and rage—and I feel both.

"Put your damn seatbelt on, and if you throw up in here, I'm gonna smack you again," Lakyn says casually, the smoke drifting out of the corner of his mouth. A fragment of it swirls around the dash of the SUV before the wind eventually rips it out his window, and I wonder if a cigarette will help this intense pressure in my chest.

Leaning forward, I grab the carton of cigarettes Lakyn brought with him and take out a fresh pack. My hands are shaking as I tear the plastic off, and I rip the cardboard trying to get the top flipped up, but eventually I manage to get one between my teeth. It takes five or six flicks of the lighter to finally get it to light and then I take the longest drag I can, trying to pull in as much nicotine as possible in an effort to hold back whatever feeling is rising inside me.

I don't know what it is, but I know it's bad, and I don't want to feel it.

Fuck, I don't want to feelanything.

I crack the window to let some of the smoke escape and the increased roar of the wind rushing past the car manages to muffle the whimpers of the priestess in the back and whatever shit Daphne keeps saying to her. The white noise, along with the tease of nicotine in my veins, seems to be helping a little—or it could be the fact that I'm bent forward over my legs, practically in the fetal position as all the insane shit Lakyn said keeps spinning through my head.

That pretty blonde with the blue eyes in the picture, the same one he buried his goddamn hatchet in, was apparently his partner in crime for a while. Just like Willa was for me. Only Trixie used Lakyn to complete some weird satanic shit, while Willa did everythingforme.

Even though I tried so hard to hide it, she'd always known what a raging bitch my mother was. She'd seen right through my act, but she hadn't seen me as weak. Instead, she'd seen the potential inside me, the violence waiting just under the surface for someone to unlock it—and Willa was my key. She was the one who told me it was okay to want the bitch dead, that it was okay to do it. She was the one who helped me, who gave me a place to live afterward, who kept me fed and my clothes washed.

She was… everything.

And now she's gone.

But Lakyn's blonde demon is still alive somewhere out in this fucking desert, waiting for Lakyn to bring her another party favor for another round of sex and murder and drinking his cum, or whatever the fuck he was rambling about.

How isthatfair? Why does he let Trixie live, but take Willa away from me? Why does he get to keep his partner in crime while telling the bitch in the backseat to murder mine?

Fuck me.They even look alike. His demon and my Willa.

Am I that much like him? Am I going to turn out the same way? Will I just grow old filling my time with casual violence because my life is so goddamn empty that the only thing I can fill it with is blood?

Maybe.

Without Willa anything is possible.

She was the only thing keeping me whole. Keeping me human. Keeping me functioning on the day to day and I never even fucking recognized it. I didn't even see just how central she'd become until Lakyn snuffed out her light with a flick of his hand. When I saw her on the floor… my whole damn universe went dark, and it's hard to believe it was only this afternoon. How many hours? Eight, nine? No time at all, but without a center everything is just spinning out of control. My feet aren't on the ground anymore because she was gravity, and air, and light.

I don't think I can live without her here.

But she's gone.

She's actually fucking gone.

"FUCK!" I shout, pain rocketing up my arm as I realize I just punched the goddamn dash hard enough to split the skin over the knuckle of my ring finger, but the bright flash of red on my skin just makes me remember Willa at the end. Dead. Throat slit, belly torn open, and covered in blood. So much red, and for once it didn't bring me any excitement. There had just been an emptiness, and now that's what I am. I'm empty.

I'm so fucking empty that I think my chest is going to cave in.

"Kid, you need to calm down." Lakyn turns the music down enough that I can hear the wheezing breaths grating in and out of my lungs over the rush of wind outside the truck. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"You took Willa from me!" My voice cracks as I yell over the fucking music and the road noise and everything else that suddenly feels like it's pressing in on me, crushing me.

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