Chapter 81

81

Eva

More people are on the street. More cars are on the road. My world is ending but this world could swallow me up.

I stop at the end of the pavement.

I feel my phone in my hand, my eyes on the screen, before I realize what I am about to do. I was about to call Sherri—Laura. Instinctively, my hand went to my phone. My mind went to her. Like I haven't quite caught up with everything I've lost in the past few days. With everything I'm still losing.

I can't believe Jonathan chose to stay, except that I can actually, totally understand it. Because I'm here now with nothing. No way forward. My past is the only open road, drawing me like a magnet to the only home I've ever known: to the house where death lives.

I lost my family. I lost my best friend. Now I am walking away from the man who could be the love of my life. I'm starting to notice a pattern. It's as if I'm programmed to repeat the trauma from my youth again and again. I can't tell if the world is conspiring or if I'm conspiring against me.

But I know that I don't want to be stuck in this loop forever. I don't want this to be who I am. I want to take the good things I've learned: I want to be brave and strong and dangerous. But I don't want to be abandoned anymore. I don't want to be too late.

I know that Jonathan's plan won't end well. I know that if he keeps killing, then somehow, someday soon, he'll wind up dead. I don't want to lose him. I can't. I have to break the cycle now or I'll never ever leave it.

I look at Laura's alias on my phone screen. I feel the tears before I even know I'm crying. What would she say, if I could speak to her? What would she tell me to do?

She would tell me she believed in me. She would tell me to avenge her death. She would tell me to break the glass ceiling with a bullet to that monster's chest.

I don't care what Jonathan wants. I want that fucker dead. I don't need anyone's permission. I don't need to ask nicely. I'm my own handler now and this is the biggest job of my life and I am going to murder this cycle of death.

My eyes fall on the trash can where I dropped my Glock. I once believed that all I really needed was a Glock and a prayer. Maybe I still believe that.

And suddenly, the gun is in my hand.

And suddenly, I'm running back.

I don't know what I'm going to do when I get there, but I always work better when I trust my gut.