“I told you, Princess. You will always be mine. Stop fighting me. I have waited a long time for our family to be together.” His words make me want to vomit. My stomach churns, and I take a few steps back trying to put as much distance between us as I can.
Each step backward I take, he takes another step in my direction until my feet hit the branch. Fucking trapped again. I run through my mind; how can I get through to him? What kind of weakness can I play on that will make him leave me be? Leave me unharmed?
“Blue, if you ever cared about me, even the tiniest bit… you won’t do this. You won’t hurt me.” My voice shakes just as much as my body. I grip my purse tight against my chest. Holding it as if it is going to protect me from him.
“I would never hurt you, Princess. You’re my everything.”
I don’t know why but his words snap something inside of me. I should be upset or sad. But I am fucking pissed. Rage floods through my body like fucking Niagara Falls. He would never hurt me?
“You would never fucking hurt me? Never hurt me? All you have done my entire life is hurt me! You ruined me! You took everything from me! I was a fucking child, Blue! A little girl!” My chest heaves, and I clench my bag tighter.
“You raped me! You took my fucking virginity by force! You don’t care about me! You never fucking did! You would have never done that if you cared. You don’t know what it means to care about another person. You take what you want and toss away the rest like fucking garbage!” My hand balls into a fist. I want to punch him. I want to hit him with the branch he is holding in his hands.
“I never hurt you, Star. You wanted it!”
The fucking balls on him. The fucking absolute audacity! I stand there in disbelief. Does he really fucking believe what he is saying?
My hands loosen and I remember the moments before I left Chrome at his house this morning. The fucking gun held safely inside my purse. I won’t hurt him. I won’t turn into a monster like he is. Maybe if I scare him, though, he will back up and leave me alone. Let me go unharmed.
But his words continue to repeat through my mind. You wanted it. I was an eight-year-old child. I was a sixteen-year-old virgin. I didn’t want anything. I said no. I said stop. I screamed for help, but nobody came to my rescue. Nobody helped me!
“I didn’t want it. I begged you to stop, but you ignored me. You ignored me! You hurt me! You ruined me! You ruined my entire fucking life!”
I slide my hand inside the purse, gripping the gun and letting the bag fall to the gravel at my feet.
“You took everything from me. You broke me,” I mumble. His bright blue eyes open wide with fear as he drops the branch to the ground and holds his hands up into the air.
“Star, Princess. Put the gun down.” He tries to walk toward me but I point it right at him. My hands are shaking and my eyes are flooded with tears. I can barely see, but I don’t back down. I can’t back down. It’s what he wants. It is what he knows I will do, because I have crumbled to his commands my entire life.
“Back the fuck away from me. Don’t take another fucking step or I will kill you the way I have been fucking dreaming about for years. Years! Do you fucking hear me? Years! I have wanted you dead as long as I can remember!” I release the safety on the gun.
“The only way I will ever fucking be free from you is if you are gone. I have asked you to leave me the fuck alone for years. But no. You are just a selfish sack of shit! You are a fucking shitty person! You raped me! You couldn’t take fucking NO for an answer! You treated me like a fucking possession, not a person! I thought I cared about you and maybe, for a point in time, I did. But I hate you. I fucking hate you. I hate everything about you. You don’t fucking deserve to live. You will only do this again and again. To unsuspecting girl after girl. You are a fucking monster. I’ll see you in Hell.” My hand shakes, but I channel everything I have in me to steady it.
“Don’t do this, Star. What happens when you find Willow? How do you explain this to her?”
How do I explain it? I can’t even fathom what he would do to her if he met her. I was practically his little sister, yet he thought it was okay to stick his fucking face in my cunt when he wanted.
“When I find my daughter, I will rest easy knowing her monster of a father will never hurt her the way he hurt me.”
With every last bit of strength I have left in me, I pull the trigger of the gun. Life moves in slow motion as the gun bucks back and falls to the ground. A scream rips through my weak body and a car skids behind me, but I can’t move. I am stuck in the same place, the same position. The only difference is my hands cover my mouth in absolute shock that I just shot Blue.
His hands clutch his chest as a sea of red pours through the dirty brown jacket he’s wearing. Blue’s eyes are wide, and he is struggling to stand. I watch as the life slowly drains from his face, and I don’t feel an ounce of remorse for what I just did. It feels good. I should feel like a horrible person, but I don’t.
“Star! Get in my fucking truck now!” Chrome’s voice snaps me out of my shock. I turn to see Chrome’s face plastered with disbelief as he runs up the driveway toward me. He jumps right over the branch blocking my car’s path and pulls me into his arms, throwing me over his shoulder.
Blue falls to the ground still holding onto his bloody chest, and I start laughing. As Chrome climbs over the branch, my manic laughter gets louder. I can’t control it. The blood rushes to my head and my face burns. Tears pour from my eyes as I continue to laugh uncontrollably. I wonder if he’s actually dead. Or if he is going to jump from the ground and haunt my life for another couple decades. My body meets the seat of Chrome’s truck as he pulls his phone out.
“The old cabin, now.” I don’t know who’s on the other end, but I am not thinking straight at all. My hands are shaking and the laughing is turning into a full blown sob. I killed a person. I am a horrible person. Does it matter that he was going to hurt me again? Does it matter that he was a bad person? What gave me that right?
“Star, baby, listen to me now. I need you to be strong, back my truck down this driveway, drive to my house, go inside, and lock the door. Go in my bathroom and take a long shower. Do not go anywhere. Stay put until I get back. I will call River and he will help you. Can you do that, baby? Can you do that for me?”
I can hear Chrome’s words and instructions, but they aren’t registering. I try to block everything out the best I can. I really fucking try, but the only thing I can’t block out are the coughing and gurgling noises I continue to hear coming from Blue.
“Baby, please. Take my truck and go to my house. Quick.”
I start backing the huge black pickup truck down the driveway. Slowly, careful to stay on the overgrown path. A pack of motorcycles rips past the truck, weaving up the driveway followed by an identical pickup truck. I don’t want to know.
I cut the wheel and start the short journey to Chrome’s house. When I pull into the driveway, River is standing in the doorway but quickly sprints toward the truck. He opens the door and kills the engine while I stare blankly at the steering wheel. I can’t move. I can’t speak. I can only think about the monster I am.
His arms slip under my body and pull me from the truck. He kicks the door closed as he carries me into the house. He only stops once we are safely inside Chrome’s bathroom. My body starts to convulse and River’s arms leave me. I feel worse. I shouldn’t feel comfortable or safe in his arms, but I do. I do because I know his brother is risking his entire life for me right now. To clean up the mess I made. I should go to jail for life. I deserve it. Instead, he is risking his life, his daughter, and everything to do God knows what.