Page 35 of Ripple Effect, Vol. 4

“Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me,” he whispers, taunting me. “Fuck me, Dylan.” His raspy chuckle grates on my spine. “I’ll put you in a cage … and show you the creature you are. You’ll be my most … sadistic act yet. Just like your moth—”

On reflex, I pull the trigger and blood spatters out the back of Dorian’s head. A gaping hole sits at his forehead and the scent of gun smoke chokes my next breath. It’s the most gruesome and violent death that I could’ve given someone, and the way he slumps to the side, lifeless, makes it all the more disturbing. Everything is quiet, except the swishing of blood in my ears.

Through panting breaths, I try to make sense of what I’ve just done.

The phone in my lap rattles, and I lift it to my ear. “He’s alive.” Harsh breathing and a jostling sound tell me Jörgen is in transit. “We’re on our way back,” he says in a thick accent, but I’m too focused on trying to breathe to take in his words. I drop the phone, hearing Jörgen yell my name as it falls away.

The walls of the car close in on me, suffocating me when I exit, stumbling out of the back seat, panting for air. Dorian remains slumped in the seat. I killed him. I killed someone.

My hands are shaking. My whole body is under siege.

I killed someone. Put a hole right in his skull. Not just anyone, but the man who claimed to have bought me as a child. The man who killed my mother.

The woods off in the distance call to my desire for cover. I need to hide somewhere, to find a safe place and think.

A thunderous boom shatters my contemplation, shaking the earth and rattling my teeth.

With a gasp, I spin around, dropping to the ground to see the car I’d sat in just seconds ago is now completely engulfed in flames. Smoke and debris cloud my view with a blinding plume that invades my lungs, and smothers my breath. In a fit of coughing, I push to my feet. The ringing in my ear intensifies until all sound fades away.

Through the smoke, a figure runs toward me. A kid? He’s holding a gun. Is it a gun?

Whatever it is, it’s pointed at me.

I can’t hear what he’s yelling over the silence, but I spin on my heel and run in the opposite direction. Through the woods. Sprinting over brush, the skinny branches reach out for my ankles tripping me up, as if trying to keep me from escaping.

The canopy of trees loom overhead, shrouding me, while everything around me turns to a bone chilling cold and darkness.

I don’t even realize I’m rubbing the butterfly tattoo until I look down to see I’ve created long streaks of blood from scratching.

Words float aimlessly in my head. Monarch. Butterfly. Suicide. Broken.

I reach up to scratch my head, noticing my forehead is doused in sweat. My clothes are clinging to my body in spite of the cold air. Sound returns with the rush of a breeze that feathers my ear like whispers, haunting me.

I killed someone.

I’ve stabbed someone. Shot at someone. Even held a knife to a man’s throat, but never have I taken life.

Not even telling myself that he was already grave-bound makes a difference.

That reality sinks in when I look up and see the bright neon sign of a gas station. I look around, realizing I’ve walked miles from the car.

And I can’t go back. Aside from the fact that someone shot at me, I don’t know what to think about anything at the moment. I set the gun still clutched in my hand beside a tree, cover it with the surrounding brush and stumble across the lot.

I enter the gas station and approach the clerk, who sits behind the counter with her face buried in her phone. She lifts her gaze, eyeing me up and down.

For the first time, I glance at myself, noticing blood on my dress and that I’d lost my shoes somewhere along the way. “I um. I had an accident. Back up the road. Can I … call someone?” My voice sounds spacey even to me. “Do you have a phone?”

I’m sure I look like a crack addict who wandered into her store, but she hands me her phone, anyway.

I can’t call Jörgen. I can’t go back to Ripley. If he knew the truth, he’d never forgive me. I didn’t use him. Everything that happened between us was real. The closest I’ll ever get to love. But I can’t deny that I had my reasons for staying the moment I found out whom Ripley worked for.

If what Dorian says is true, staying with Ripley puts both our lives in danger. There is no happy ending for me.

Emily’s words from before chime inside my head, Ripley can’t save you from everything. I didn’t understand then. I do now. He can’t leave the Agency and keep both of us safe.

There is no going back.

I stare down at the phone in my hand and pass it back to her, blinking to hold back the rush of tears itching to escape.