“You came into my garden. Where my son will play. Where she walks. Where we’re supposed to be safe.”
Something in his skull gives way with a wet crunch, and still I keep hitting him.
For every moment of terror in her eyes. For every scream that tore from her throat. For the way she fought Paulo trying to get to me because she thought I was going to die.
For ruining everything.
The bat is slippery with blood. My blood, his blood, I don’t know anymore. My arms are shaking. The sky is spinning.
I let the bat fall from my grip.
Silence crashes down over the garden like a wave.
Four bodies sprawled across the grass. Blood soaking into the soil around the roses. The white blooms I cut for Mina are splattered red, the stems scattered where I dropped them.
I straighten slowly, my whole body screaming in protest. There’s a ringing in my ears that won’t stop. My shirt is drenched and sticking to my skin.
That’s when I see her.
Mina is standing at the edge of the garden once more. She’s broken free from Paulo and Nico somehow and come back out here.
Despite the danger. Despite the bodies. Despite everything.
She came back.
For me.
Paulo and Nico tumble out the door behind her. They take me in, standing there amid the carnage, four dead bodies littered around me, and they see it’s over. They don’t try and grab hold of Mina again.
But Mina’s not running to me. She’s not fighting to get to the man she loves anymore. She’s just standing there with one handpressed to her mouth, tears streaming down her face, as she takes in the corpses. The blood all over me. She stares at me like I’m someone she’s never seen before.
Like she’s finally seeing what I really am.
A man who beats men to death with a baseball bat, who keeps hitting long after they’re dead because they dared to threaten what’s mine.
I take a step toward her. My bloodied hand reaches out to her.
She takes a step back.
That single step destroys me more completely than any weapon could.
“Mina. Go back in the house. Mina, please, just go inside and lock the door behind you. Everything’s all right.”
“Your face was so cold as you—as you—” She stops, and swallows like she’s trying not to be sick.
My face was so cold as I beat a man to a pulp.
Her voice is shaking so badly I can barely understand the words. “Do you feel anything? Any remorse?”
I open my mouth to lie. To tell her what she wants to hear. That I’m sorry. That it was self-defense. That I hated every second of it.
But she’ll hear the lie. She always finds me out.
“This is what I have to do to keep you and Leon safe.”
“Safe?” Her laugh is high and hysterical. “You call this safe? There are dead men in the garden. Our son is upstairs. They could have—” She makes a wounded noise that cuts deeper than any blade.
“How can you feel nothing? How?” she cries.
