“What?” he asks innocently, staring between us both. “I’ve drunk five bottles of water because the troublemaker kept giving them to me. I needed to pee.”
Harkin struggles in his restraints, uncaring about how much blood he’s lost. I don’t stop him. Instead, I yank the front leg of the chair so it falls backwards and his head slams off the sharp wooden edge with a crack. Daigon stops at the other end of the table then forces Harkin’s mouth open as he slowly pours the full bottle of piss into his mouth.
“Human toilets,” he says to the spluttering dickhead. “That’s what you called the subjects.” When he’s done, he steps back, gesturing to Delilah and me. “I said you could kill him.”
As much as he manipulated my life, fucking sentenced me to hell, his death belongs to Delilah, so I kiss her cheek before stepping back. “Take whatever you need, pretty girl.”
“I had a plan, you know?” She holds her hand out for Daigon to pass her a knife without looking away from Harkin. “I was going to make you feel the pain of your body being violated while you couldn’t move. But you’ve all stolen too much time from us when you’re not fucking worth it. You,Harkin,are not fucking worthmytime.”
We both know she doesn’t need me as she stands by his head, but when she looks at me, I smile, urging her to do whatever she wants. There won’t be any judgment or recoil on my part. I love this woman more than anything in existence, enough to endure the hell we’ve been through. Enough to know she could shit in his mouth, and I’d applaud her for it.
My crazy, beautiful wife laughs, tapping the flat of the knife against her father’s cheek as she says, “Knock, knock?”
He mumbles something.
“Who’s there?” Delilah says softly, smiling wider. “Delilah.”
The next mumble is weaker as she coats the knife in the piss, salty liquor, and his sweat.
“Delilah, who’s going to ruin your life.” She impales the knife in the center of his throat.
The weak pleas for his life are replaced with gurgling and my wife’s radiant smile despite the tears in her eyes. It doesn’t take long for her to lose her joy as she stares down at her lifeless father. Tears slowly drip over her lashes, skimming her skin, then splashing up from his dull cheek as she croaks, “I only wanted my dad to love me.” Her chest shudders as she looks at her dead mother. “Both of you to love me.” I quickly pull her into my chest while she sobs, “I didn’t deserve to be hurt. None of us did.”
Pressing my lips to her crown, I listen to her cry when she’s spent her entire life ignoring her pain to such an extent she convinced herself it didn’t exist, accepted the shitty hand life dealt her to evade being lonely, yet she’s still fucking kindbeneath it. Kind enough to be here with me, kind enough not to prolong the death of the person who hurt her the most.
A shadow falls over us as Daigon stops in front of me. I look up, seeing him hold his phone out with Ruby’s name in the center. Her voice is stronger than I’ve ever heard it as she says, “I am so proud of you, Dilly.”
Delilah painfully wraps her arms around me like she’s afraid of the praise while Ruby continues, “You’re so smart. You knew what you needed to do to survive in that house and you did it so well. I love you, Dilly. Everyone who matters does and we’ll never let you go a day without feeling it, because you’re the only one out of the three of us who’s strong enough to do this. No matter what happens, we’re here. We will never let you hurt again.”
Those should be promises I make, but she needs to hear it from her sisters. So when Scarlet joins in, I lean back to prevent their voices being muffled.
“None of us asked for any of this,” Scarlet says gently. “They did. Everything they ever did to us has led them to this moment. No one else could do it. Only you, Delilah.”
She whimpers, pushing her face harder into my chest at the sound of her own name. I’ve never heard her sisters call her anything other than Dilly. Especially Scarlet, who would tease her, saying her breath smells like vinegar so she’s a pickle. But the self-titled bitch is full of warmth as her voice cracks. “I wish I was more like you.”
Ruby takes over, repeating how Delilah’s not weak, how their parents deserve the worst death, how none of it is their fault. How they’re innocent, forced to live in a world they had no choice in as Delilah slowly loosens her arms around me.
And then she looks up at me. Eyes red, cheeks tear-stricken with a wide smile on her face. “I did it.” She laughs. “Stupid,silly, insolent Delilah, who’s not good at anything, did something right.”
84
DELILAH
Ikilled him. I can’t stop laughing, even if it took us twice the amount of time to dismember and bag his body than it took Daigon to get rid of my mother. But they’re actually gone.
I lean into Kane’s side as we drive away from my childhood home with blood in the air. “We got it.” My lips brush his neck.
“You did.” He pulls me onto his thigh, cupping my cheek. “I’m so fucking proud of you, koukla mou.”
I kiss him with tears burning the back of my eyes. We’re so close to being free now that we know where the island is. We’ll get our baby away from Helene then we’ll be safe. As soon as we’re safe, I’m giving the hard drive to whoever wants it. They can deal with everyone else so Rowan is too busy to chase us.
For the first time in our lives, we won’t be the ones who are scared, looking over our shoulders. We won’t have to hide or think about them. The brakes squeal as we abruptly stop, but there’s nothing in front of us other than the open back roads. I lean forward to ask what’s happening, but Daigon gets out of the car, slamming the door behind him with his phone in his hand. The door rocks back, staying open a crack for his complaining to filter through as he holds his phone to his ear.
“Come and pick me up. Now. They keep touching each other.” He walks further ahead as he continues complaining then drags his feet on the way back to the car. Pulling the door open with more force than required, he pushes his arm into the car and Ruby’s laugh comes through the speaker.
“Kane, can you put Delilah down, please? Maybe one of you could sit in the front?”
“You better keep your hands to yourself if you sit near me,” Daigon whines. This huge man is actually throwing a tantrum.
