Page 8 of Depraved

“Not happening. We’re not leaving without the girl.”

“Last warning, prospect.” The one with the gun moved closer.

“Onyx, don’t!”

There were so many voices, so many unfamiliar people around me, my mind could no longer distinguish between who was who.

I glanced from the man in the dark, to the one holding the gun pointed at us. His fingers moved, tightening his grip on the trigger. Our eyes met, and he winked. “Don’t worry, sweetheart, I never miss.”

“Onyx, don’t!”

I closed my eyes the instant I heard the loud crack of a gunshot. My body went rigid, bracing itself for impact. Within a split second, my life flashed before my eyes.

My mom.

My dad.

Red.

The tattoo.

Each and every recital I’d ever danced in.

My mom’s face of disapproval.

The fights.

The tears.

The pain.

My pink ballet slippers hanging behind my bedroom door.

It felt like I was drifting from one memory to the other, then got pulled back to reality as my body slammed into the ground.

Blurry. Hazy. My ears ringing and body aching, I pushed myself up on all fours. I heard men scream in the background, but I only looked down at the dry, brown leaves beneath my hands. Unable to comprehend what had just happened, I closed my fist around a handful of leaves, crunching and breaking them in my palm. When I opened my fist, everything around me faded to gray…everything but the crimson red covering my hand.

A sudden coldness hit me in my core. Shocked. Disorientated. Breathless.

I turned my head to the side and looked right into the eyes of…a dead man. Blood oozed out of his head, his wide-open eyes glazed over and mouth gaping. It was the man who had the gun against my head only three seconds ago.

The bloody scene in front of me was grotesque—surreal and distorted in a way I couldn’t explain.

I couldn’t move. No matter how much I told myself to look away, to get up and run…I couldn’t. A man was dead, and I was staring at the corpse.

Two strong hands grabbed me and hoisted me up. If I had any fight left in me, I would have squirmed to get free. But my mind just didn’t allow me to look away from the dead man, and I didn’t care that I was being carried away by a strange man.

It was like a movie, and this was the part where they carried the woman away from a bloody scene on mute and in slow motion.

I was slid off the broad shoulder that carried me, and for a second, I managed to tear my gaze away from the bloody body. As I looked up at the man who carried me, I sucked in a breath. “You.”

Intense green eyes with specks of strength stared at me, and I lost myself.

“It’s you,” I whispered. “You came for me.”

“It’s time, ballerina girl.”

A wet cloth pressed against my face, the sharp scent of chloroform taking over all my senses…right before it went dark.