He stumbles again, dazed and bleeding, and the whole room feels wrapped in a sudden, breathless fog where nothing else exists except waiting for him to fall. To die.
For a moment, I think it’s over.
He looks ready to crash to the floor, but he doesn’t. His eyes cross, then find focus again, and he roars back to life. He rushes forward and grabs Mom by her collar, tossing her to the floor.
She lands with a dull thud, curling up on herself. She cries out, winces, breathes. I’m just grateful she’s still alive.
“Mom!” I scream, scrambling to reach her—but EJ stops me. He grabs my wrist and twists it so hard I hear a pop. I yelp, and Taylor shouts.
“Stay back!” I warn her.The police should be here. Where are the police?
I spot the gun on the floor under the chair, but I can’t reach it. It’s too far away, too hidden. If I tell Taylor to grab it, EJ might get there first. I can’t say a word.
“Taylor, run!” I shout, begging. It’s her only chance to save herself. “Please.”
Both his hands wrap around my neck, squeezing, and my knees give out. My back hits the floor so hard it knocks the breath from my lungs. The room spins, my vision blurs.
“You’re just like the rest of them,” he hisses, lowering his face to mine. He’s covered in his own blood, yet still just as strong. “You stupid bitch.” He lifts my head off the floor, slamming me back down. The yelp that escapes my lips is involuntary. “You stupidwitch. This house will burn to the ground before I let you keep it.”
He lifts my head again, his facial muscles tense and twitching with rage as he prepares to slam me down once more. I won’t survive this. I can’t breathe, can’t think.
My hand—desperate, fumbling—slaps the floorboard beside me.Please,I beg. To whom, I don’t know. The universe, maybe. Myself. Foxglove. Grandma.Please.
There. A give. A space. A floorboard, bowed and loose. It shifts beneath my palm. I grasp the board, preparing to strike him, but he’s too quick.
He sees what I’m doing, releases me with one hand, and rips the board from my grasp, hurling it across the room.
Taylor screams, and I realize she didn’t run. She didn’t go. He’ll kill her if I don’t kill him first. He’ll kill us all.
I search, begging. Begging Foxglove and my ancestors and myself. The woods and my mother and the women who came before. The meadow and every single piece of folklore and magic that has been passed down through whispers and tears. Daughter to daughter. Blood to blood. I think of my grandma. Of Hazel Wilde.Dust to dust.
And then—cold. My fingers connect with something cold and hard.
I don’t think, don’t question, I just trust. As his hand returns to my throat, as I feel him squeeze, feel him lift, as my vision blurs, I look at my daughter. She’s crying over her father—terrified and alone.
My eyes fall to my ex-husband—the man I once loved, the man I once hated—bleeding out, probably dead. And then to my mom—eyes closed, curled up in pain.
Then, in one fell swoop, with every ounce of strength I have left, I swing.
The old, rusty knife comes into view for me moments before EJ sees it. He turns his head, terror splashing onto his expression, and I connect the blade to his eye. The metal slices straight into his flesh, piercing the empty black pupil without resistance.
He falls back against the floor. His scream rips through the room, white-hot and full of terror—a pure, animal sound. He covers his face with trembling fingers, unsure what to do, how to stop the pain. Curses fly from his lips, bellowing as he tries but fails to pull the weapon from his eye.
Blood spurts, and his skin swells.
His face is almost unrecognizable in an instant.
My hands find my throat, and the breath that floods in feels like mercy, the sweetest balm on a terrible wound.
I don’t need to watch him die to know that he will.
The blood pouring down his face tells me no one could survive this.
Still sticking out of his eye, the knife’s blade is long and rusted, the handle made of blue stone. It’s simple and beautiful, probably centuries old.
From where I sit, gasping for breath, I stare at it and wonder how it got there—and why. Buried beneath a loose floorboardall this time, waiting for me to find it right when and where I needed it.
As if Foxglove knew I would.
