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He collapsed onto his ass, clutching his hand as tears streamed from his eyes, screaming so loud it was echoing down the street.

I turned and sprinted away, heart pounding as adrenaline coursed through me.

Shit. I shouldn’t have done that.

The screaming grew fainter the farther I ran, and then it cut off abruptly. That sudden silence was so unnerving that I stopped running and turned around.

The man was gone. I was alone.

I panted, frantically scanning the entire area for any sign of him, but he was just…gone.

An unsettling sensation crawled up my spine, and the backs of my knees started tingling. Every fine hair on my body stood on end, and when an audible crack—accompanied by a shrill scream—sounded from the vicinity of where the man had been, I flinched and took a step back.

There was another crack, another scream, and then another and another. And then silence blanketed the night, the only sound the distant hum of cicadas.

My gut was telling me to run, to get the fuck out of there, that whatever had settled over these streets was far, far worse than a drunk asshole.

I took a few more steps, my eyes still glued to that spot, then paused.

It felt like someone was watching me. It was a prickling along my shoulders, a soft current of something electric that crackled just beneath my skin.

It was terrifying.

That sensation came a lot these days. And nights. Especially nights, always when I was walking from my bus stop to the motel. That unnerving, eerie feeling that I wasn’t alone, that something dangerous was lurking in the shadows.

I turned and ran the rest of the way back to the motel, that feeling of being watched never leaving me.

I shouldered the door closed, turned the lock, and slid the chain in place. Pulled one of the chairs from the table and propped it under the knob, just for good measure.

When I was satisfied I’d created a sufficient blockade in case whoever was watching me decided to take our relationship to the next level, I set my bag on the bed and pulled out clothes to sleep in. Headed for the bathroom and started the shower up, barely glancing in the mirror.

I wasn’t much to look at, and I tried not to look too long when faced with my reflection. I was a little too thin these days, which only made my eyes seem bigger and bluer, with dark circles underneath them. I kept my hair somewhat short, just past my shoulders. It was wavy in some parts and straight in others, a brown so dark it bordered on black.

I definitely hadn’t gotten my looks from my mom, who’d had bright red hair and a million and one freckles all over her body. If I looked like my dad, I had no idea because I’d never met him. The only thing my mom had ever told me about him was that he’d killed somebody right in front of her and was rotting in prison for it.

What she hadn’t told me—and what I’d figured out years later, after her death and I was with a foster family that had an internet connection—was that he’d racked up all sorts of charges in the twenty eight years he’d spent outside of prison, including running a prostitution ring.

All in all, I had some solid genealogy.

With the way I was, I was pretty sure I got more than just my dad’s looks. I knew my anger didn’t come from her, that was clear. She’d always been docile as a lamb, never talked back to anybody, always ready to please in some way or another—particularly men. She never yelled at me or raised a hand to me when I lashed out or threw a tantrum. Broke something or screamed my little head off. She barely paid any attention to me. She was always high on something or entertaining one of her customers, too busy to be bothered with the daughter she never wanted.

My memories of her and my brother lived like a ghost in my head, barely there and completely intangible. Those years leading up to when I was nine might as well have all been a dream.

Well, except for the day they died. I’d never forget that day.

It had been burned behind my retinas, branded into my being, an eternal flame that blazed deep in my soul. It was the day I learned that no place was safe from monsters. They crawled inside your home wearing the skin of kindness, cloaked in a false warmth that drew in the ignorant and innocent.

But the burn of that memory was the only thing that kept me safe. Keeping it alive meant I stayed alive.

It was the only light I carried amidst all this darkness, as twisted as that was.

After a can of tuna with some crackers, I slipped underneath the covers and turned on the TV, finding something in black and white and letting the stilted, clipped voices and tinny music soothe me. I got out my knitting needles and yarn, which helped keep my hands calm as much as my mind.

I didn’t really need to keep much still tonight because I was exhausted beyond belief. I was always tired these days, right down to my bones. I was tired of running, tired of looking over my shoulder. Tired of living in a world that wasn’t very kind to people who had to go it alone.

But I didn’t really know any other way, and as much as I might want to change my circumstances, I wasn’t sure on the how part of it all. Not when I tried to blend into the wallpaper everywhere I went because I was still afraid that, somehow, Angelo Rossi would find me.

I’d never stop looking for the person who put my daughter in a coma, either, if I were him.