Page 73 of Psychotic Faith
"That's why," I manage, though I have to pause between words, my throat screaming. I hold up my hands, miming protection, then point at myself. "Why you kill threats."
He nods, still not looking at me, his body trembling harder now. "I can't fail again. When I saw you not breathing…" His hands shake so violently he has to grip the table edge until his knuckles go white. "It was my father all over again. Every failure. But worse because you make me…"
"Human," I finish, the word barely audible. "I make you human."
He laughs, the sound like breaking glass. "Human. Is that what this feeling is? This terror? This need to keep you breathing?"
"How touching," Neumann interjects, shattering the moment with his casual cruelty. "Two broken children playing house. Tell me, does he make you call him daddy when he fucks you?"
I turn to him, something cold and final settling in my chest. Not the hot rage that's driven me until now. Something quieter. Deadlier. The morphine is wearing off now, everything sharpening into crystal focus. Every nerve ending alive with pain and purpose.
"You killed…" I start, but my voice fails. I have to stop, hand at my throat, fighting through the agony to finish. "My mother."
"She rejected me," he corrects with a shrug, the chains rattling like accent marks to his indifference. "Just like you did. Just like they all do. Frigid bitches who think they're too good for what I offer."
No remorse in his voice. No recognition of the life he stole, the child he orphaned, the years of nightmares he created. I realize with perfect clarity that he'll never feel guilt. Never understand what he took from me.
"You smiled," I force out, each word agony. I have to stop, catching my breath, tasting copper in my mouth. "While strangling her." Another pause, fighting to continue. "You smiled."
"She was beautiful when she died. That moment when the light goes out, when they finally stop fighting and accept what's happening. Your mother had such lovely eyes. They went so still."
The words land casual as discussing weather, and I understand finally, completely, that the law will never touch him. He owns judges, owns prosecutors, has enough money to buy his way out of any consequences. Prison wouldn't reform him. Nothing would. He'll always be exactly this. A man who finds beauty in murdering women who reject him.
"Show me," I tell Luca, though I have to point at the tools when my voice fails again. "I need… to be here. To see this."
Luca moves closer to me, and I feel his breath disturb my hair, smell blood and exhaustion and that dark cologne that makes my ribs tighten. His chest nearly touches my back as he reaches around me to the table, and I have to fight not to lean back into his warmth.
"You don't have to…" he starts, his voice rough with concern.
"Yes." The word comes out stronger than any so far. I move to his table of tools, studying the precise arrangement. Scalpels in ascending size, things I don't recognize but can guess at.
My hand hovers over them, trembling. Could I? Should I?
Every movement makes Luca shift behind me, his breath catching when our bodies almost touch.
I look at the tools, then at Luca. He's waiting. Just like he's been waiting—for me to decide what I need, who I'll become.
I wait for revulsion, for my mother's ghost to appear and shame me for what I'm about to do. Instead, I feel her presence like a hand on my shoulder, steady and approving. She foughtback too, just not hard enough. Not with the right weapons. I'll finish what she started.
"You're making a mistake," Neumann says, but I hear the first thread of real fear in his voice now. "Your father's a judge. You're a good girl. This isn't who you are."
"No," I manage to rasp. "My choice."
I think of all the ways I imagined this moment. In my darkest dreams, I was violent, uncontrolled, savage. But standing here, feeling Luca's presence behind me like a dark guardian angel, I realize something.
I don't have to become a monster to choose one.
My hand hovers over the tools on Luca's table. My fingers brush the scalpel handle—cold metal, sharp enough to end this. For a moment, I imagine it. The weight in my hand. The satisfaction of being the one to make him pay.
But then I see my mother's face. Not as she died, purple and struggling. As she lived. Smiling. Kind. The woman who taught me that some lines, once crossed, change you forever.
I pick up the scalpel. Turn it in my hand, watching it catch the fluorescent light.
Then I hold it out to Luca.
"I'm not a monster," I tell Neumann, my voice rough but clear. "I'm your consequence. But I won't become you to destroy you."
Luca's fingers close around the handle, accepting what I'm offering. Not just the blade. Permission. Partnership. Trust.
