Pierce holds his arm out to her. “Come here, Skye.” She looks around the room nervously before reluctantly going to his side. “Now, Skye. I have to ask you a crucial question. I need you to answer honestly.”
She bites her lip and looks down at her pink Converse. “Okay,” she mumbles.
“Which one of these fine people would you like to see die today?” Pierce asks, his voice full of mirth as he makes eye contact with each of us. Capri cries harder, shaking her head furiously. Lee and Lochlan are both yelling through their gags.
Skye shakes her head. “I don’t want anyone to die.” The tremor in her voice breaks my heart, but seeing Capri fall apart before my eyes is just as painful.
I look at my friends, and I realize I’ll do anything for them, even if it kills me.
Chapter thirty-eight
“Just kill me,” Teagan sobs. “Don’t make her do this! She’s just a child!” Her gaze meets mine as I shake my head in protest.
He can’t kill Teagan, he just can’t. We've barely gotten each other back. I’m not ready to lose her again. I shout obscenities through my gag at Pierce.
Pierce narrows his eyes at me before turning on his heel to face Teagan again. “And which weapon would you like me to use? Maybe I should get the rifle you lot murdered my brother with? I admit, I had my own issues with him. Yet, he was still family, and somebody needs to pay for his death. You would haveallbeen welcome to stay here at Windermere as my staff, but you’ve gone and thrown that opportunity away with your hysterics and rash actions.” He shoots a look of loathing at Lee. “What to do, what to do,” Pierce muses while he paces in a circle around us, tapping his chin. “Oh! I know! Let’s make this a game! You all know how I adore games.”
Pierce stands behind me and taps me firmly on the top of my head before moving on to Capri, then Lee, and so on. “Duck, duck, duck, duck,” he sings, bopping us each on the head while Skye stands in the center of the room watching with eyes wide with terror.
She looks so much like Capri. I’ve never been maternal, but I would kill to have the chance to scoop her up and get her far away from this horror.
“Goose. I chooseher.”
The psychopath that Pierce is points directly at Skye. The whole room ceases to breathe before we all start screaming through our gags. She wasn’t even part of his circle of headbops! How can he willingly murder a child? Isn’t she his niece? This man is more deranged than I initially thought. Somehow, he outdoes himself at every turn.
He looks at each of us. “You only have yourselves to blame for this. We need more staff to keep Windermere standing now that you’ve gotten so many of the others killed. I can’t risk losing any more of you. Now her?” He gestures toward Skye, who is standing there shaking in place. “She’ll take more effort than she’s worth now that Rebecca has perished.”
Noises I’ve never heard from another human being, or any animal for that matter, escape from my best friend next to me. Capri tries to stand in her chair, then slams it down to the ground. Repeating this over and over again, as we can do nothing but watch.
Pierce grabs Skye by the arm and tugs her along with him. “Come, my dear. But they need to be punished. I know you don’t understand, and for that I am sorry.” He digs through his bag and comes up with a small black case. He unzips it, and the air leaves my lungs when I see the syringes inside. “This will only sting for a moment. Then you’ll go straight to sleep.”
He doesn’t have to say that she’ll never wake up again.
Lochlan and Lee both struggle to stand, both of them fighting to yell through their gags.
All I can do is sit here frozen in shock.
They always say you find out if you have the fight or flight instinct when something truly horrible happens around you, but they never warn you that some of us have a full-on shutdown mode.
I’ve become completely immobilized as the adrenaline and fear fight for dominance in my system. There is no fight or flight in me; there is only numb, crippling, uselessness.
Skye fights against him—her screams of panic nearly rival Capri’s. But no one in this room fights as Capri does. How someone so tiny can erupt with so much rage is almost magical to watch. She’s gone completely and entirely feral, slamming her chair over and over again until it finally breaks apart under her weight. She falls to the ground next to me in a heap of wood and velvet.
I watch awestruck as she gets to her feet and untangles herself from the rope, her breathing rapid and her eyes glazed over with a primal fury unlike any I’ve ever known.
“What—how?” Pierce proclaims loudly. For once, he looks shocked, something I didn’t know any of us could do to him and his perfect, uncrackable demeanor.
If I could smile under this tape, I would. It’s not often you see a man look as terrified as he does while looking at my tiny, rage-filled best friend.
Capri savagely rips the tape from her mouth. “Don’t youdaretouch my daughter.”
Pierce drops the case holding the syringes and rushes toward the wall behind Teagan, releasing his grip on Skye in the process.
Skye’s eyes widen before a small, hopeful smile sneaks through her mask of terror, and then she runs to her mom. Capri scoops her into a bear-crushing hug and kisses her head. “Go help Lochlan get free, okay? I promise he's a friend.” Skye nods and takes off toward Lochlan.
Capri watches her for a moment to ensure Skye’s safety, then she picks up the butcher knife and inspects it the same way Pierce did. His features turn ashen as he cowers away, hitting a bookshelf as he steps further from her.
“Now, Mr. Pierce,” she coos. “Which weapon would you like me to kill you with?” Capri cocks her head, looking more insane than I’ve ever seen her.
