Page 41 of Blood Ties
“That’s right.” His hand still rests on my shoulder. “That’s the way it’s always been, ever since granddaddy built that farmhouse. Our own place, where we can’t be chased out or hunted. Where we can all do the things we need to do.” His hand tightens. “And if one of us goes down, we all do.”
I barely feel his bruising grip, still staring numbly at my own hands. But it’s not a deer carcass I’m seeing in front of me, not an animal’s blood staining me up to the elbows. It’s Felix, Caleb, May. The latest in a long line of corpses I’ve hacked up and fed to the pigs. My hands are just as dirty as the rest of them.
“I know,” I say. “I’m not going anywhere, Dad.”
As if I could. As if Ievercould. Even without Momma and Riley to tie me to the house, without the threat of my dad and uncle and brother to stop me from leaving, there’s no place for me outside of that house. Nowhere I’ll ever be free from the things that I’ve done.
My Dad chuckles. “Course you ain’t.” He finally lets go of me. Then, and only then, does he shoulder his gun, satisfied by my submission. “Now haul that deer back to the truck for us.”
?Chapter Twenty-One
Riley
I’m not sure how longI spend curled up on my mattress, unmoving.
After that shower, I’m the cleanest I’ve been since I was first locked in this basement, even after my escape attempt. But I feel filthier than ever in the wake of what happened in the butcher room. Knox’s fingerprints are etched into my hips in the form of bruises; I can’t get the stink of blood out of my nose.
And Kai isn’t here. He was gone all day while his brother played with me, and he was gone all night while I lay here afterward. I try to tell myself I don’t care, especially after what Knox told me about him butchering my friends. I don’t want to believe that’s true, but his words held the harsh bite of truth behind them.
Kai chopped up my friends’ bodies and fed them to the pigs.
I shouldn’t be missing him right now. I shouldn’t be thinking about his lanky body pressed against mine, or the way he gasped my name when he came.
I should hate him. Idohate him. Maybe not as much as I hate Knox and the others. His brother, his father, his uncle... they’re worse than Kai, I’m sure of that. But I’d still gladly sink a knife into his gut if I had the chance.
Yet I can’t deny my relief when he comes through the door.
I know him from the sound of his shoes, so soft-footed in comparison to the rest of his family, like he’s trying to avoid attention.
He stops at the foot of the stairs and looks at me. Weariness paints shadows beneath his eyes and in the hollows of his cheeks, but his expression sharpens as he takes in my scrapes and bruises. All the marks left by Knox when he chased me and bent me over that table.
Kai’s guilt is good. It’s something I can use.
I hold out my hands for him, a silent request. He falls to his knees on the edge of the mattress. I put my arms around him, and he rests his head on my shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs into the crook of my neck.
