“MaybeMoby-Dickwasn’t the most inspirational choice for an infant,” James says.
Quill’s eyes darken into inkwells. “Our house caught fire when I was twenty-six, and they both died.”
The gun tilts toward James now, but not precisely at him. If he can dart out of the line of fire, he might be able to escape.
“Before I made Nellie, I had stopped writing novels. I had enough money to last a lifetime, and I’d never been so miserable. I’dlostwhatI loved the most in this world. So ... I crafted a fictional daughter. On paper.”
A mahogany grandfather clock stands in the corner of the room, ticking toward twelve o’clock.
“But for twenty-one years, she’s taught me more about myself than I thought possible. Nellie is my little miracle. My baby. Don’t you get it?”
“Get what?” James’s anger slips out—only a hiss, not the whole boiling pot—through his gritted teeth.
“That she’smine.” Quill stands and stretches to his full height. A tall, harrowing man.
James can’t combat the instinct to shrink into his chair.
“And as long as you’re around, you’re a threat to her.” Quill cocks the glinting pistol.
The grandfather clock in the corner of the room strikes midnight, clanging out a harsh tune. It shakes the floor, the walls, James’s very bones.
Quill recoils at the sudden sound, and while he’s distracted, James bounds toward the door. He swings it open and warm air hits him, treetops waving like fingers. But a hand from behind snags his shirt collar, yanking him back like a fishing rod. James doesn’t hesitate. He balls his fist up and swings around, as hard as he can, and his knuckles explode as they collide with Quill’s face.
The older man staggers, stunned.
James cradles his forearm, pain shooting from his elbow to his fingers.
“You little shit.” Quill’s pistol hand goes limp as he sleeve-swipes his bloody nose.
James darts past him, praying that any bullets miss their mark. He blurs through the living room, into the kitchen, to the front door, dodging the dining table.
Crack!The gun goes off like a cannon, and the window above the kitchen sink shatters.
James reaches the front door, cold knob in his grasp, and pauses. Now is the perfect chance to escape—to run away and never return—but he can’t. Not without Nelle.
He spins around. The kitchen is empty.
Quill isn’t following him.
Nelle glues the side of her face to her bedroom door. Feet scuffle, and a man yells out, but is it Father or James? A gun goes off and she winces. James, as far as she knows, doesn’t own a firearm. Running footsteps, closer, closer ...
The door opens into her chest, and she stumbles back into the bed’s iron footboard.
Father barges in like a storm cloud, more animal than man now.
“You ungrateful little bitch.”
Nelle jumps into his face. “He’ll come back. He’ll save me, and he’ll killyou—”
Father’s nostrils flare, and he strikes like a viper, his hand cracking her cheek.
Nelle drops to her knees, shaky fingers fumbling for the stinging hive on her face. Bile fills her throat, hot and sour, but she forces herself to stand. To shove aside the fear that makes her shrink, and to meet him eye to eye. His uncombed hair, his beard, his sallow cheeks—they all trigger her gag reflex.
“I hate you,” she spits.
His face is impassive, fracturing her. Does he truly not care that she despises him? He has never shown her parental love like James described growing up with, but she always thought, somewhere in the caverns of his soul, that he cared about her.
It doesn’t matter, because she still can’t leave.
