laugh.
Should. What does that word even mean?
I should have had a better childhood, but I didn’t.
The people who signed up to protect me—first, by bringing me into this world, then by taking me into their home—should have done a better job, but they didn’t.
Maybe the idea of cold-blooded murder should terrify me, but it doesn’t. It calms me. Warms me. Gives me a sense of purpose—one without hope, only action. One where I control the outcome.
At the end of the cot, there’s a table, still set up with various potions, ingredients, and a few other implements. I pick up a silver athame, twisting it before her eyes.
“This one’s nice, don’t you think?” I ask.
“Your… your brother…” she stammers, but this just makes me laugh again.
“My brother murdered a mage in cold blood. Tortured him. Burned him alive. None of that was my fault. Yet you were more than happy to let me believe it was.”
“He will suffer…”
I press the tip of the blade to her throat and lean in close, so close I can count the crow’s feet tracking around her eyes. “I. Don’t. Care.”
As soon as the words are out, I know they’re true.
For so long, I’ve carried the weight of my brother’s sins, the guilt over his punishment. I let that guilt fester into nightmares, into punishment, into a lifetime of victimhood.
But it’s over now. It’s done. The Ford I once loved died long ago, and it’s time I accept that.
Which means there’s not a single thing Janelle can hold over my head anymore.
“But he’s your family,” she whines.
“No, Janelle. He isn’t. My parents aren’t. And you sure as hell didn’t earn the right to call yourself a mother either. My family? My real family?” I point the blade at the ceiling. “They’re upstairs trying to figure out how to break down the goddess-damned door so I don’t do something crazy, like slit your throat. But you know something? I have a feeling that even if I do go crazy down here, they won’t turn their backs on me. I’m not saying they’ll give me an award or anything, but they won’t bail. Because unlike you and everyone who came before you, my real family knows the meaning of that word. On second thought? I don’t need this.” I set the athame back on the table and gaze down at my hands. “Call me a purist, Janelle, but I’d rather feel the life leaving your body.”
I lean forward and wrap my hands around her throat, just testing it out. She smacks at my arms, but she’s so weak and groggy, it’s like a gnat going up against an elephant.
Closing my eyes, I take a moment to soak it all in. The warm pulse, rapidly thrumming beneath my grip. Her paper-thin skin, soft and wrinkly. Her scrawny neck, as breakable as a bird’s bone.
“Baz, please… don’t do this.”
“Give me a reason.” I release her throat and open my eyes, watching the tears leak down her cheeks, waiting to hear the words I’ve waited to hear since I was a scared fucking kid trapped in her house of horrors.
Because I was wrong to hurt you.
Because I was the sick one, not you.
Because I’m sorry, Baz. I’m so sorry for what I did to you.
Hell, at this point, I’d even take one word if I believed she meant it. One shit-ass little “sorry,” and I’d walk away from this moment, letting her keep whatever pathetic life she thinks she’s got left.
But when Janelle finally finds her words, the ones that spill out are as twisted and ugly as her soul.
“You’ve always been an ungrateful bastard,” she says, doing her best to put some fire behind it. “Your parents were right to abandon you. And that spirit-blessed bitch you call your girlfriend? She’ll abandon you too.”
She narrows her eyes, her lips twitching into a smirk, as though she’s waiting for me to crumble, to fall at her feet, to beg her forgiveness.
But all I can do is shake my head.
“You have no power over me, Janelle Kirkpatrick. You are nothing. I could end you, or I could walk away right now, and your life would still be over. Because then you’d have to spend the rest of your wretched existence knowing that the boy you tried to control, to manipulate, to crush… That he grew up to be a man. That he found love and friendship and acceptance. That he was never broken. That he never needed you. That no one needs