Living in agony was the whole point.
“One more thing.” Mehar crouched down and pressed the hot barrel against his cheek. He whimpered like a dog. “If you tell ANYONE who did this to you—the cops, your friends, your mama, ANYONE—I will come back. And I will visit your mother’s house first. Then your grandmother’s house. Theneveryone you’ve ever loved will get exactly what you got today.” She tilted her head. “Do you understand me?”
He managed a weak nod.
“Say it out loud. I want to hear it.”
“I… I won’t tell…” His voice was barely there. “I promise… I won’t tell anyone…”
“Good boy.” She stood up and looked at me. “The ashes. He has them somewhere.”
Oh shit. The ashes. Zahara.
“Where are they?” I demanded, my voice harder than I’d ever heard it. “My sister. The ashes you thought were mine. WHERE?”
“Closet—” He gasped out. “Hall closet—top shelf—please—just take them and go?—”
I was already moving. Found the closet. Reached up to the top shelf. And there she was—a simple brass urn, shoved behind old blankets and forgotten junk like she was nothing.
Zahara.
My twin. My other half. Reduced to ashes and hidden in a monster’s closet.
I pulled the urn down and held it against my chest. It was heavier than I expected. Or maybe that was just the weight of everything it meant. Everything I’d lost. Everything I’d done to survive.
“I got her,” I said, my voice cracking.
Mehar nodded. Gave Ahmad one last look.
“Remember what I said. I keep my promises. And I know where your family lives.”
She turned and walked out. Prime followed without a word. I was last, still holding my sister’s remains, stepping over Ahmad’s broken body without looking down.
The man was still breathing. Still alive.
But everything he’d used to hurt my sister? Gone. Forever.
We were in the car and three blocks away before anyone spoke.
“You good?” Prime asked, glancing at Mehar in the rearview.
She was staring out the window, her face peaceful. Calm. Like she’d just finished a spa day instead of shooting a man five times.
“I’ve never been better.”
And THAT’S what scared me.
I looked at my sister—this woman I’d thought I knew, this sheltered girl who’d never tasted freedom—and I saw something new in her eyes. Something that hadn’t been there before the car chase. Before the bullets. Before Ahmad.
She’d gotten a taste of power. Of violence. Of vengeance.
And she’d LIKED it.
I wanted her free. I wanted her to fight back. I’d wanted so much for her to find her strength, to stop being a victim, to take control of her life.
But sitting in that car, holding my dead sister’s ashes, watching my living sister smile like she’d just discovered her new favorite hobby was shooting men in the dick…
I wasn’t sure if I’d helped save her.
