He didn’t get back up.
My nurse’s brain, which had been sluggish and smoke-addled moments ago, suddenly snapped into horrible clarity.
The smoke inhalation had introduced carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide into both our systems. Our oxygen-carrying capacity was compromised. Our cells were starving. Even if we survived the next few minutes, the damage to our lungs and brains could be permanent.
And Knox …
The blow to his head had rendered him unconscious instantly. That wasn’t just a knockout. That kind of immediate loss of consciousness could indicate a subdural hematoma. A brain bleed beneath his skull. If blood was pooling between his brain and the protective membrane, pressure would build. Silently. Invisibly.
He could be dying right now.
Every second I wasted was a second closer to losing him.
“Knox,” I cried, my voice barely more than a rasp.
Silas dropped the rock.
It landed on the grass with a soft thump, the sound obscene in its casualness. Like he hadn’t just potentially murdered someone.
Then he stood above me, looking down with an expression I knew too well.
Disgust. Possession. Triumph. The holy trinity of abusers everywhere.
“Why?” I managed.
He looked at me like I was a complete idiot. Like the answer was so obvious, it pained him to explain.
“Did you really think I would just let you leave me?”
He didn’t raise his voice. That’s what made him so terrifying. The calm. The control. The way he could say the most horrific things in the same tone someone might use to discuss the weather.
Silas reached down and gripped me under the arms, dragging me a few feet from where I’d been lying. Dragging me farther from Knox.
I tried to fight back, but my muscles were weak from toxins. The ground scraped against my back.
Think, Harper. Think.
My body had failed me. My strength was gone. But I still had my mind. And after two years with this man, I knew exactly how his worked.
Silas needed to be the victim. He needed to believe that everything that had happened was someone else’s fault. That he was the wronged party. The wounded hero in his own twisted narrative.
If I could feed that delusion, I could buy time.
It wasn’t surrender. It was strategy.
The same way a hostage negotiator mirrors a captor. The same way a trauma nurse talks down a patient in psychosis. You meet them where they are. You speak their language. And you survive.
“It didn’t work out between us,” I said, testing the waters. Watching his face for the reaction.
He dropped his hands.
Walked around to my other side.
Looked down at my body like I was garbage that had invaded his life.
“We were meant to be together.” He dropped to his knees beside me, his face inches from mine. “We were meant to be together, and you ruined that.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
