Page 54 of Violent Reign (Violent Kingdom)

A shadow near the front of the safe house gets darker, and I pry my eyes off Nathan for just long enough to see that it’s Elliot.

Crouched down low, a bulletproof vest on, gun drawn.

He meets my eyes. There are only seconds left to do something. Precious moments that are sliding away. If Nathan gets her into the car, fuck knows what will happen to her. To the babies. I can’t begin to imagine it. The thought is too horrifying. I’d live in that basement cell for a thousand years before I let anything happen to them.

Elliot slowly, slowly, nods his head toward Nathan, and then taps his own chest.

It’s a sunny, beautiful day, and that means I see everything. I see every leaf rustling in the wind. The crack in the concrete driveway that the FBI hasn’t gotten around to repairing yet. Avery’s pink toenails, grasping uselessly for the ground. Her shoes came off at some point. The harsh drag of her breath comes again and again, and then an animalistic groan. A red car trundles by on the road, cruising through the residential neighborhood.

Elliot stands up.

“Drop the gun, Nathan.” His voice is clear and steady and for a minute a sweet relief sweeps over me. I won’t have to kill another person. I can walk away from this. But then Nathan turns, his eyes lighting up. He looks like he’s been handed a Christmas present, or let out of a basement after several long long years. Nathan turns, and Avery is on his side now. She’s on the side close to Elliot. I have the shot.

It’s me. I have the shot.

The gun goes off in my hands. I must have pulled the trigger, but I don’t remember it. A sunbeam cuts down across my vision, glittering and golden, and when it clears I see the splash of blood on Nathan’s chest, just under his arm. Over his heart.

He falls, knees going out from under him. His gun skids under the car and Avery grabs for the door. I rush towards her, the concrete hot on my bare feet. This time, the howl she lets out is pain and grief and release all at once. Another contraction. She’s having contractions while Nathan coughs blood onto the concrete, then loses balance, his head smacking against the hard, blood-soaked ground.

He rests his head in his own blood and curls up onto his side. With his eyes wide and blood gushing from his mouth, he looks pathetic. Small. Like a little kid locked in a basement. A little kid who’s become an animal. Only lying like this, he looks more like a deer than a wolf. Avery crumples down beside him, on her knees, her eyes searching Nathan’s for - what? Redemption? Regret?

I get a hand on Avery’s shoulder just to convince myself that she’s still alive. Elliot’s footsteps approach, but I can’t look away from this. I won’t. This is the final sacrifice of the Capulet and Montague vendetta. Nathan, his hands reaching up to Avery, choking on his own blood.

His eye turns up toward me, toward Avery. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Something—” More blood, more gurgling. “—wrong. Something is wrong inside me.” A final convulsion in his body and the crazed light in Nathan’s eyes goes out.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

AVERY

The screamthat tears out of me feels like a thousand knives, or maybe that’s the contraction. No, no. The contraction is pressure. It’s such an intense pressure, like a vise. Like my entire life. It has the force of my entire existence with it, like my own body is trying to squeeze my soul out with it. My own strength isn’t enough to hold me up and Rome steadies me. My palms land in warm blood. Nathan’s blood. I suck in another breath to scream again—I felt him get shot, I felt him get shot while he was holding me, I felt the bullet go in, I felt his body rock back, I watched him die, it’s over—but the scream gets choked off by another contraction. I can only breathe out hard and sharp. Is this the way they meant in the childbirth videos? Doesn’t matter now. Too late, too late. I can’t let go of Nathan, and I don’t know why. I should hate him with every fiber of my being. But what he said -something is wrong inside of me- and his anguish at losing the babies he thought were his, it claws at me. He looks young now that his eyes are closed, now that he’s pale and still and unmoving. He looks like the twelve-year-old boy I met with the scars all along his back, the boy who was kept by monsters, in the dark, for almost a decade of his childhood.

“Avery.”

Elliot’s here. I see him in the hazy corner of one eye, his gun still trained on Nathan’s body. The pool of blood gets wider and wider. It’s going to taint everything. It’s going to rise up until it covers the whole safe house. It could drown the world.

“—woman in labor,” I hear him saying. “Send backup. Nathan Capulet is down.”

The pressure intensifies beyond anything I can name, beyond everything, and then down low there’s a new pressure. An insistence. It has the same insistence as throwing up. I can’t stop it. These babies want out, now.

Someone is making the most ungodly howling sound. It’s unearthly, like a witch being killed or an animal struggling to get out of the trap. The sound comes into focus. Oh, fuck, it’s me. I’m the one doing it. Rome puts a hand under my chin and pulls my face up to his but I can’t focus on his eyes.

“We can’t wait for the paramedics,” he says, his voice coming from deep down underwater. “They won’t get here in time.”

They make some hurried agreement and then my arms are thrown over their shoulders. “Where are we going?” Going turns into another howl, but I choke it back, I swallow it down. I scream on the inside.

Elliot’s police car. Warm leather seats. They haul me into the front seat and I get onto my knees, gripping the headrest with all my strength. I can’t turn around. The thought of putting on a seat belt is unimaginable. The thought of wearing pants is unimaginable but I can’t get my leggings off by myself.

“Rome,” I gasp. “My leggings.” But Rome’s not here. A flash of metal outside catches my attention—keys changing hands. Rome throws himself into the driver’s seat a moment later. The smell of him, still warm from sleep, makes me feel better until another contraction hits. I keep my eyes open through this one. We’re moving, we’re moving, we’re pulling away from the curb. Elliot stays behind in his vest. He walks with deliberate steps back to Nathan’s body and crouches down. He looks like he’s praying.

And then the crushing pinnacle hits and I try unsuccessfully to press my belly against the seat. A hand comes down onto my shoulder, holding tight.

“That thing you said about not being able to give birth in danger?” I know the calm in Rome’s voice is just for me. There is no possible way he feels this calm while he’s driving a woman in labor to the hospital. “I don’t think it’s true, Avery.”

I’m not in danger anymore,I want to tell him, but I can’t find the words.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

ROME

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