Page 120 of Beautiful Scars

I’ve not even ended the call when the front door swings open behind me, flooding the pavement with light from the hall.

“Kill, come quick!” Meisie calls.

I’m about to turn around and tell her that’s my fucking line, but as soon as I do, I see the panic written across her face.

My heart thuds in my chest. But she’s fine. Why am I getting worked up? She’s standing right in front of me.

“What’s wrong?”

But she’s already running down the hall.

I catch her halfway up the stairs.

Someone’s screaming.

Banging.

Shouting.

“It’s locked,” Meisie says, hugging herself as she stands outside Cole and Sarah’s room.

Jesus. There’s been a few times anyone would have heard those same noises if they’d walked past our bedroom. But I know my brother.

“Out the way, darlin’.”

She scoots aside and I kick right beside the handle. The wooden frame splinters as the door swings open and I’m already walking through it.

I blink twice, trying to make sense of what I’m seeing.

But this isn’t fucking.

Cole’s kneeling over Sarah, hands around her neck, while she’s trying to press her thumbs into his eyeballs. Cole rears his head back, looking up, and her fingers slip. He shoots me a look of pure hatred, and that’s my dad right there. Looking straight back at me.

It almost stops me in my tracks. Almost. “Here he fucking comes,” Cole spits out.

I’m over there in two steps, grabbing him by the neck and pulling him off her.

He comes back with me, but doesn’t let go of Sarah’s neck.

I take a step back and slam my fist into his face.

That makes him drop her, and she starts coughing and gasping for air before she’s even hit the carpet.

Meisie is already there, taking her under the shoulders and trying to pull her away from us. Trying to get her out from under Cole.

I’m so preoccupied with making sure they’re alright that I don’t even see the blow until it lands.

Right in the fucking balls.

I double over. It’s an instinct, like pulling your hand out of boiling water. “Fucking cunt,” I groan.

Cole’s not concerned with Sarah anymore.

Apparently this is about me now.

He pulls his hand back to punch my jaw but this time I’m ready. I grab his wrist while I straighten out of the way, and push him over with his hook.

Cole lies there for a second, and I take a step back to let him up.