They came.
The realization blooms inside me like wildfire, but I force my expression to remain blank. My eyes flick back to Becky's face, praying she hasn't noticed my momentary distraction, the flash of hope that must have crossed my features.
She hasn't. She's too consumed by her own hatred, her own twisted narrative of revenge.
"Any last words?" she asks, the gun steady in her hand.
I need to keep her attention on me. Just a little longer. Every second I can buy is another second for them to get closer.
"He wouldn't want this, Becky," I say, my voice steadier than I feel. "Your father..."
"Don't you dare speak about what he would want!" she snarls, taking a step closer. Perfect. That's it. Keep your focus on me.
"You took everything from him! Everything!"
Behind her, Ethan moves like a shadow, soundless and precise. Declan shifts to the left, a hulking silhouette against the deepening twilight. Mateo edges right, completing the triangle around her.
My heart hammers against my ribs. They came for me despite everything I said, everything I did to push them away. The cruelty I forced myself to inflict to protect them, from this very moment, this exact danger, was for nothing.
Relief and terror war inside me, relief that I'm not alone, terror that I've drawn them into the violence I tried to spare them from.
I catch Ethan's eye for the briefest of moments. His gaze is steady, focused, a silent promise.We're here. We know. We understand.
The air around us seems to vibrate with tension, with the unspoken words between us all. I want to scream at them to run, to leave me, that Becky is unpredictable, dangerous. But the words stick in my throat.
"Drop the weapon." Ethan's voice cuts through the night, calm and authoritative. "Now."
Becky freezes. For a heartbeat, she doesn't move, doesn't breathe. Then slowly, she turns her head just enough to see Ethan in her peripheral vision, gun still trainedon me.
"Well," she says, her voice eerily calm, "isn't this touching. The knights in shining armor, come to rescue their damsel."
"It's over, Becky," Ethan says, taking a careful step forward. "You're outnumbered. Put down the gun."
She laughs, the sound sharp and brittle like ice cracking. "Outnumbered? Is that supposed to scare me?" Her finger tightens on the trigger. "I've got nothing to lose."
The pool water laps gently against the edges behind me, a soft, rhythmic sound at odds with the jagged tension of the moment. I'm acutely aware of its presence, the depth, the darkness, the memories of panic and helplessness. One step backward, and I'd fall in. Part of me wonders if that might be safer than standing here with a gun pointed at my heart.
"We don't want to hurt you," Mateo says, his voice tight with controlled fear. His golden eyes gleam in the fading light, fixed on Becky but somehow communicating with me. I see his fear, not for himself, but for me. "But we will if you don't drop that gun right now."
My eyes lock with his for the briefest moment. A silent communication passes between us, love, fear, determination. I see in his face how my phone call worked, how he understood. How they all understood.
"Look at this," Becky says, glancing between us. "So sweet. You really think they love you, don't you, Jade? Just like my father loved you?" Her smile is savage. "We both know how that ended."
"This isn't going to end the way you think," Declan rumbles, his massive frame tense as a coiled spring. I can read the subtle shifts in his stance, the slight bend in his knees, the way his weight has moved to the balls of his feet. He's preparing to move. "Put down the gun."
Becky's eyes dart between the three men, her breathing quickening. I can see the calculation in her expression, the desperate search for a way out, the dawning realization that there isn't one.
A breeze ripples across the pool's surface, sending tiny waves lapping against the edge behind my heels. The water glows an eerie blue from the underwater lights, casting strange, shifting shadows across all our faces.
"You know what my father told me once?" Becky asks, her voice taking on a strange, nostalgic quality. "He said some people are just born to be sacrificed for the greatness of others. I didn't understand what he meant then."
I see the change in her eyes before anyone else does, the moment when desperation hardens into resolve. The moment when she decides there's no way out.
"Fine," she says, something shifting in her eyes. Something cold. Dead. "I'll go. But I'm taking what I came for."
Time slows.
She swivels back toward me, arm extending, aim steadying.
