Page 106 of The Viper
My throat tightened. “Then let me help you. We’ll go back to Dominion Hall. We’ll tell Lucas, and Noah, and?—”
“No!” she cried, stumbling back. “You can’t tell them. You can’t tell him.”
Her panic sliced through me. “Hannah? Talk to me.”
But she wasn’t listening anymore. She was crying in that small, contained way she used to when we were kids—no sobs, no noise, just shaking shoulders and silent tears.
“Please,” I said, softer now. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out. Together. I’m your sister.”
She lifted her head slowly, and what I saw in her eyes made my stomach drop. Guilt. Fear. Resignation.
“You were always the strong one,” she said. “The one who made it look easy. But you don’t know what it’s like being the one in the shadow. The one who gets left behind. I was the better actress but you were prettier, better at getting your own way.”
“Hannah, that’s not?—”
“You think you saved me,” she said, her voice trembling, “but you just put me in their hands.”
My pulse roared in my ears. “Who?”
She backed away another step, toward the open window. The breeze caught her hair, lifting strands around her face like a halo.
“Hannah, stop.”
“I didn’t mean for it to go this far,” she whispered.
I took a step toward her. “Then we’ll go together. We’ll?—”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s too late for me.”
The look in her eyes was something I’d never seen before—something final.
“Hannah, please,” I said, my voice cracking. “We can fix this. Just tell me who they are.”
She smiled faintly, heartbreakingly.
And then?—
She turned.
For a split second, time stopped. Her body pivoted, one hand catching the window frame, and then she was gone—her sweater flashing against the sunlight as she fell.
“HANNAH!”
The scream tore out of me raw, feral. I ran to the window, the world tilting as I leaned out. Two stories below, chaos erupted—crew members shouting, someone sprinting toward her. She’d landed on a patch of mulch beside the loading ramp, motionless.
I flew down the stairs, my bare feet slipping on the tile, my heart slamming against my ribs. By the time I reached the ground, a small crowd had formed—security, medics, Franklin barking orders.
“Move!” I shoved through them, dropping to my knees beside her. “Hannah! Oh, God—Hannah!”
Her eyes were half-open, unfocused, her lips trembling. She was breathing, barely.
“Don’t move her,” one of the medics said, kneeling opposite me. “We’ve got it.”
I couldn’t let go of her hand. “It’s okay,” I whispered. “You’re going to be okay.”
She tried to speak, her voice a rasp. “Lexi …”
“I’m here.”
