Page 146 of Buried in Blood
I walk the perimeter twice before I let myself sit. Pulling back the curtain an inch at a time. Peeking out. Just in case.
No SUV.
No black sedan.
No flicker of Damien’s eyes watching from a distance.
Not yet.
I cross the room and check the bathroom. No windows. Just cracked tile and a flickering bulb above the mirror. My reflection stares back at me—blood still dried in the crease beneath my jaw. Mascara smudged like bruises beneath my eyes. I don’t recognize the girl looking back.
I shut the light off.
I check the front door again. Then the windows. Then the side door that leads to nowhere.
Every creak in the hallway outside makes my chest seize.
Every engine rumble makes me reach for the knife Dante tucked into my bag.
I crawl into the bed without undressing, wrapping the motel blanket around me like armor. The television stays off. I can’t handle the noise. Can’t handle thenews.If they’re covering the bombing already, I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see what I did. Who I killed. Who I failed to save.
My body hurts.
Everywhere.
But it’s not the bruises that ache.
It’s the empty space.
Where trust used to live.
Where Reese’s words still echo.
“You’ll know when the time is right.”
I knew. And I acted. And now…
Now Damien’s probably watching every frame of surveillance he managed to tap into, making a list of every sin I’ve committed.
He’ll come.
Eventually.
But not tonight.
Tonight, I’m just a ghost in a roadside motel, too broken to run and too guilty to sleep.
And even now—wrapped in silence, alone in this nowhere town—I swear I still hear him breathing.
* * *
The knock is soft.
Too soft.
I freeze, breath held like a noose is around my throat, one hand gripping the curtain where I’d been peeking outside for the past hour. I don’t move. I don’t breathe. Ilisten.
Another knock. Then silence.
