The Vows We Break - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,5

sounds of the dying man’s choked rattle, and the screams from the girl, I lose myself.

My sanity shatters like a stone tossed into a window, the glass rupturing into a thousand pieces that are impossible to fix.

This girl is the first, but she will not be the last.

They will use the innocent to get to me. To make me bow to their demands.

They will carry on until they are stopped, and this time, I pray to Allah, because my God isn’t hearing me, and plead with him to let the Islamic Salvation Front best these monsters.

“You will rot in hell,” I snarl, as the girl’s screams seem to reverberate around the compound. “The Devil will fuck you in the ass, he will stick his cock in every orifice and make you weep blood. You will rue the day you did this, you will rue the day you allowed this abomination to happen. He will fuck you, make you his sluts, and—”

The fist to my face comes as a welcome relief.

But even then, I can’t stop myself.

I headbutt the man opposite me, relishing the gush of blood as his nose breaks.

And when another approaches? I knee him in the balls, hoping to fuck that I do him some damage.

When Ishmael takes his gun and pistol-whips me, I embrace the darkness that overtakes me.

But with the force of the move, he destroys the shattered web of my sanity forever.

The Savio Martin of before is no more.

The creature standing in his place?

I know not his name.

Nor do I wish to.

And if you were smart, you wouldn’t ask it either.

Two

Andrea

Two years later

“I think you should move in with me.”

I give Diana a look, just to monitor her.

As expected, she flinches.

“I couldn’t afford the rent,” she tells me softly, which is like everything else about her.

Soft.

Not in a bad way, but just, I don’t know, a way that makes me want to protect her.

I happened upon her by chance outside of my creative writing class one day. She was on the phone, standing with her shoulders hunched, head bowed, and her attention on the person she was talking to.

I wasn’t sure if she realized it then, or if she knows it now, but she was trembling.

Like a leaf.

Her terror was palpable.

Well, at least, it had been to me.

Everyone else in the vicinity?

Nope.

Just, nope.

They walked around her like she wasn’t there. But to me? She was all I could see. All I could think of.

It was like tunnel vision, but on a different scale. I know, during a panic attack, that the field of sight can narrow as oxygen levels deplete in the bloodstream, but I wasn’t having trouble breathing.

I was fine.

Absolutely zip-a-dee-doo-dah fine.

Now—the same as back then on that fateful day I found her on the campus—I love college, and it loves me. I’m popular, have a gazillion friends, and the classes are a breeze.

For Diana?

Not so much.

She’s like the exact opposite of popular. Not nerdy, not even weird. Just nobody likes her, and I don’t get it. When we’re together, we get looks because that’s how disliked she is.

I mean, you’d think she had halitosis or something for the way everyone avoids her.

Of course, that was until I met her father, and when I did, suddenly everything began to make sense. But that moment, when I’d seen her being ignored, her evident distress just tossed aside like she was trash?

I had no choice but to take her under my wing.

She’s been there ever since. Three months later.

“You should,” I repeat. “The rent is cheap, and you can always come and work at the coffee store with me.” I mean, technically, there were no openings, but Rachel, the owner, is just as much of a sucker for a sob story as I am.

Not that Diana has a sob story. Well, she has one, but she’s never mentioned it to me.

Not once.

I get it though, I really do. She’s terrified of her dad. He’s a massive bastard, and to make it worse, the small college town is pretty much his. He’s the mayor, and he’s a prick. So far, I haven’t gotten on his bad side, but he doesn’t like me.

I don’t think he likes anyone who could help give Diana a backbone.

Whatever he’s doing to her, I don’t know, but it’s there. Wriggling beneath the surface. I feel like I’m going fly-fishing for the first time and I’m trying to pluck that story out of the water.

I’ve always sucked at fishing, so I guess that’s