“Stop lying!” I scream.
“Alania, please. I am begging you. Please give me the gun. I can help you, baby. I swear to God, I’ll…”
“Where was God in that shed?” I cry. “Where was he when I was being raped?Again!Where was God when I needed him? I prayed to him every goddamn night to take me away, but he didn’t. He didn’t care. No one cares!”
“Nia,” Brent says softly from the doorway.
“No,” I cry. He ignores that I still have the gun to my head and walks over to me. I panic and turn it to him. I am sobbing when he steps into it and presses his chest against the barrel.
“Pull the trigger, Nia, because I’m not living in this world without you,” Brent says softly. “You are my whole fucking world, so if you die, then so do I.”
“You left me,” I cry.
“I’m right here, sweetheart,” he says. “Let me make it up to you. Okay?”
“No. I can’t. I can’t do this,” I say, shaking my head. “I won’t choose you over Adrian. Or him over you. I’d rather die. I won’t pick. Why won’t you leave me alone?!”
“Mark was killed. Because of me,” I say tearfully. “You betrayed him… because of me.” He called him. He wanted me to die.
“Nothing you say will make me love you any less, Alania,” Brent says. “I’m sorry.”
“For…”
I start to ask what he is sorry for, but he suddenly grabs the barrel of the gun and rips it out of my hand. I immediately try to hit him, but he grabs my wrists and pulls them behind my back so he can push me against the wall. My sobs are like screams, and I’m begging him to just let me go. To let me die. He doesn’t speak, and Adrian is quiet as well. Over time, I go from screaming and crying to whimpering and sniffling. When I stop fighting him, he scoops me into his arms and carries me to the bed. He lays me down, but lies beside me so that he can pull me to his chest. Adrian lays behind me, and I am squished betweenthem, silently crying. They let me roll to my belly after a minute and move closer as they rub my back.
“What happened today?” Adrian asks softly.
“Uhm,” I sniff and roll to my back to look at the ceiling. “It’s going to make you sad.”
“Don’t worry about us,” Adrian says. “This is about you.”
“I just… I was sad about Brent. I went to that shed to hide so you couldn’t find me. I didn’t want you to leave me, too, and you couldn’t if someone else got to me first… I expected Fredrico to be the one to find me, but then Mark came in. He tried to be helpful, but I didn’t want help. I told him what happened in the cage, and he called Fredrico. I told him he was an idiot if he thought that Fredrico wasn’t going to kill him. I don’t know how I knew, but the second he walked in, he shot him. Fredrico said, basically, that he enjoyed seeing everyone else understand what was happening, but not me. He started raping me, but I was just so fucking numb that it didn’t faze me. I just lay there. He kept going harder, but I didn’t react. That’s when he started choking me. I realized fast that he was going to kill me and… I just gave up. No one could leave me if I was dead. I would never have to feel that loss again. I thought if I was alive, I would hurt everyone around me. It’s like all of the bad things that Dad… Edward… said were true. I was so fucking angry when you saved me. I didn’t want to be alive.”
“Edward paid Fredrico to kill you during the Hunt,” Brent says. “My mistake was assuming Mark was true to his word.”
“He’d been working with Fredrico for a while, apparently,” I say.
“Yeah… I don’t even know what to say about that,” Brent says with a sigh. “I had been pulling away from him for a while. Something felt off. Once he found out you knew about us, he was always asking questions about you. I thought maybe he had feelings, but something about it just made me uncomfortable. If it was simple feelings, that would be one thing, but it was just… creepy…”
“Why did you leave?” I ask him.
“Sit up,” Brent says, nudging me. When I do, he grabs my hips and pulls me over to straddle his lap. “You aren’t allowed to panic, because I am okay. Alright?”
“Okay,” I say, narrowing my eyes at him. Brent pulls up his shirt, and I see a bandage on his side. I gently touch the bandage before meeting his gaze. “Who hurt you?”
“Edward,” he says. When you two left the club last week, he showed up at my apartment when I got there. He told me I was no son of his for choosing you. I told him I was going to kill him for what he put you through. And he just… shot me… I stumbled back and fell, but had the wherewithal not to get back up. I was in pain, but I didn’t think it was bad. I just laid there and covered the spot with my hand. He said he’d tell you that I said goodbye when you were coming for him. I wanted to fucking kill him, but I was so damn stunned. When he left, I panicked. I packed my shit and ran. It was just a graze, and glue closed it just fine, but… the ‘what if’ tore me apart. I thought I was putting you in danger.”
“You’re okay?” I ask, gently touching the bandage again.
“Yes, Nia. I am okay. It took me a second to get out of my head, but I’m okay. I’m sorry I abandoned you. I should have never done that. I caused you pain, and I’ll do anything to make that up to you.”
“You both lied to me,” I say. “What else do I not know?”
“My father used to run The Society,” Adrian says. “Your father is the one who runs things now after Charles tried to kill my father.”
“Charles?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Adrian says. “I thought he was a decent guy trying to support his son but not get killed… he was best friends with my dad… but now with Mark… I don’t know what to think.”
