Page 160 of Like A Moth To A Flame

Struggling, I rolled myself onto all fours and then to my feet, ignoring the screaming pain in my back and hips. I tossed myself into the living room just as I heard the sound of the door slamming closed and the lock clicking into place. My heart was racing, my thoughts empty and numb, and I focused on one singular goal—get my dad’s service pistol.

With a surge of adrenaline, I stumbled towards the coffee table, my body throbbing.

It wasn’t there.

Eyes wide, I searched the coffee table, the side table beside the couch, and even the floor.

The gun was gone.

My nose was throbbing, and I could feel the cold drip from my nostrils, telling me it was broken. I heard a scream of pain from behind me, and a cold chill rocketed up my spine.

“Call off the dog!” Barrett’s screaming voice echoed behind me, and I twisted, my fingers trembling. “Call him off, or I kill him.”

I could see Barrett standing in the foyer, a gun in his hand, and pointed straight at Duke, who had wrapped his iron jaws around his forearm with no intention of letting go. I watched as Duke pulled back, and with a single shake of his massive head, I heard Barrett’s forearm snap, and his pain erupted in an ear-splitting scream.

It wasn’t until I heard him cock the gun that time suddenly sped up until it seemed like someone had hit fast forward.

“No!” I screamed, my voice shaking. “Duke! Duke, release!”

He pulled away, jumping back as he had been taught, and released his target. He kept all four paws on the ground but now began the ceaseless barking, a single tone that echoed in the empty house. It was an alert—I’ve found someone, and he’s here.

Barrett stumbled back, the sleeve of his denim jacket quickly bleeding crimson in front of my eyes. The Stetson on his head was askew, hanging low in front of his eyes.

Duke went quiet and slowly dropped to the ground, lying against the bottom of the stairs, his black ears twitching as he waited for his next command. His lip lifted in a snarl.

He knew something was wrong.

Barrett stomped towards me, his green eyes flashing red like a wildfire in a pine forest, and I forced myself to look away—to look down—and that’s when I saw it.

The front of my grey yoga pants were stained red, trickling down my thighs and pooling around the fabric bunched across my knees. The air left my lungs in one low, shaking sob, and tears sprang to my eyes as I felt Barrett wrap his thick fingers around my wrist and pull me forward. I stumbled along after him, my thighs tacky and sticking together with every step.

My lungs were burning as he pulled me forward, stumbling and almost falling as he dragged me after him, pulling me into the kitchen and forcing me down hard on one of the wooden kitchen chairs.

Still, I couldn’t force my eyes away from the blood smearing across my thighs.

It happened when I fell. When he hit me, and I fell.

As I fought to suck in air that just wouldn’t come, my mind was focused on one single thought.

I was losing the baby.

“Who’s the father?” he asked, lowering himself down in a chair across from me. I forced myself to look up at him.

His cheeks were hollow, skeletally thin, and sunken beneath the dark skin around his green eyes. Once full of life, the forests of green that I had once found so calming were now dull and emotionless. His skin had a gross, grey pallor to it, not unlike corpses laid in their coffins. He hadn’t shaved in quite some time, and a shadow of patchy, wispy stubble dotted his jawline. He was a gaunt,cavernous shell of what he used to be, and I could see the madness in the darkest pits of his eyes.

I stayed quiet until he slammed his hand down on the table and I jumped, another pain rocketing through my core.

“I said,” he ground out. “Who’s the father?”

“Tommy,” I said, and he reached over and slapped me across the face, hard. I tasted blood.

“Whore,” he spat, looking at me with disgust. “You’ll spread your legs for just about anyone.”

“What do you want?” I asked, my voice shaking and breathy from the sob I barely held back.

“I just wanna talk,” he said. That’s when I noticed the gun. He still had the gun in his hand, but now he pointed it directly at my stomach.

“Where’s Tommy?” I said, my eyes flicking from the dark hole in the barrel to the dark hole in his eyes—a hole that drilled all the way back to his psyche.

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