32. Olive

32

OLIVE

A ll I see is red.

Hot, red blood gushing into the room, like lava from a volcano. The three men’s conversation sounds far away even though I know they must still be in the room. I catch their silhouettes moving, the briefest glimpse of an arm flailing, smearing the blood like a windshield wiper.

“I think we should kill her,” Fish says, sounding nervous. He’s been nervous for a while now, since around the time I started seeing visions. “It’s too dangerous keeping her with the Russian assassin out there. He could be looking for her.”

“He isn’t looking for her,” Creeper says. “I’ve been watching. They haven’t seen each other in a month. They’re through.”

“Still,” Onion Breath pipes up. “The bitch is weird.”

My mouth opens on a laugh, my chest rumbling with it, although I’m not sure where it comes from. I don’t know what’s funny. Maybe the fact that Onion Breath sounds as nervous as Fish. Maybe the fact that I know deep in my heart that Alik will cause these men more pain than they could ever dream of causing me.

The photos my father showed me of Alik’s victims creep into my mind, and I laugh harder, doubling over on the kitchen floor with my hands cuffed behind my back, my knees to my chest.

“What the fuck is so funny, bitch?!” Onion breath yells, his faraway voice suddenly right in my face as my scalp burns and head yanks back.

When I smile, cool air touches my teeth, sticky with blood. “You better hope Alik finds you before she does.”

“Who is she?!” He shakes my head as rage distorts his features. My hands pull against the cuffs. They’re raw beyond belief, the large cuffs going up to the knuckle of my thumb. Just a little bit more wiggle room, and they’d give.

“No one,” Creeper says. “Olive is just losing it… Give her a rest. She’ll be fine.”

“You knew this bitch was crazy?” Fish asks, his voice low with disbelief.

“Not to this extent, no, but like I said, she?—”

“We have to kill her,” Onion Breath interrupts. I watch him slosh through the blood to retrieve a paring knife from a drawer.

“Are you afraid ?” Creeper laughs. “She isn’t a murderer. She’s just a weak girl. And handcuffed for god sakes”

Weak?

Did he just call me weak?

I pull harder on the cuffs.

“Yeah, well she can be a dead girl.” Onion Breath stalks my way with the paring knife.

“Stop,” Creeper commands. I watch with a smile as he appears in my vision, blocking Onion Breath’s way.

“Get out of my way. “

“You’re not killing her.”

“Are you not hearing this loony bitch?”

“I want her.”

He wants me. The way he says it, his voice heavy with emotion, almost makes me wonder if Creeper meant to say he loves me.

But that isn’t possible, of course. You can’t love someone you feel you own. You can’t love someone you enjoy hurting.

Before Alik, I didn’t understand that. Before Alik, I didn’t know what love was.

He’s a man capable of inflicting pain far greater than Creeper ever could, but he would never harm me. And although it’s been difficult for me to admit, I too am a person capable of inflicting pain far greater than Creeper ever could, but I would never harm Alik.

I don’t think Alik is coming to save the day. Alik may never come.

But he loves me. I think he’ll always love me, even if I die today, the same way I’ll always love him.

When Onion Breath shoves Creeper, Creeper goes for the knife, and Fish jumps in to tackle my unlikely protector. Creeper tries to fight them off, but when Fish locks his neck in a chokehold, he waves his arms as he falls to the ground.

Panic rises inside me, and I raise onto my knees as I watch the fight leave him. The blood in the room parts like the Red Sea to clear my vision, and I widen my eyes at the sight.

No .

No, they can’t kill him.

“Stop!” I scream, my voice full of the desperation I feel.

Because if they kill Creeper… How will she ever get her chance? Or Alik?

I don’t want suffocation.

I want his pain .

I dart my eyes around the room, my teeth grinding. I’ve spent all this time waiting to see if she’ll show up. Waiting for her to take over. Waiting to see if she’ll save me.

Maybe it’s time we worked as a team.

I tug the cuffs against my knuckles then close my eyes, accepting what I have to do.

I take my left thumb into my right hand and pull it back, my eyelids reflexively clenching at the pain.

The last thing I feel before the world blackens is the explosive release of my thumb’s ligaments.

And the cuff sliding free.