Page 93 of EverGreene
“Stay away, Ever!” Loche shouted at me when I ran over to him.
Travis had been able to gain the high ground, climbing over Loche. But Loche had the advantage in the brute-strength department and was able to throw him off and jump back up to his feet.
Like a scene fromMortal Kombat, the two stood facing each other, sizing the other up as much as they could before Travis struck first, swinging the knife at Loche, who was able to land a punch to his chin, knocking Travis back a few steps. A normal human would have folded after taking a hit from Loche, and it wasn’t as though Travis was anything extraordinary. His adrenaline and sociopathic tendencies were just working overtime to keep him on his feet.
Fueled by rage, Travis lunged at Loche again, and they fought for the knife, with Loche twisting Travis’s wrist until he dropped the blade. Both of them scrambled to try to retrieve it, trading punches, until Loche grabbed Travis around the waist and they wrestled each other to the ground.
I moved to take a step when my foot kicked something partially hidden in the snow, and, looking down, I noticed the edge of a blade. My recliner knife. Body burning from frostbite and my stab wound, I bent down and picked up the blade between my numb fingers, wrapping themaround the handle. In the yard, Travis and Loche continued wrestling. Travis had gained the advantage over Loche, gripping his body between his legs like he had mine as he retrieved the knife from the snow.
Oh, shit!
My breathing had become even more shallow, and my legs wouldn’t allow me to run as I hobbled across the yard, nearly falling to my knees when Travis plunged the knife into Loche’s side. Loche let out a groan in pain when the knife was ripped from his flesh, and Travis held it up to strike once more. Pure adrenaline kicked in, my legs became mobile, and I ran, eyes trained on the knife in Travis’s hand. Loche’s hands were wrapped around Travis’s wrist, but it was clear his strength was being depleted.
When watching true crime shows where the victim is stabbed to death dozens of times, I’d wondered how much rage and strength it must have taken for the person doing the stabbing to commit it. What could consume someone to attack another person so violently? I now knew both of those answers, watching the knife in Travis’s hand inching closer and closer to Loche. My vision blurred, and all I could see was my own rage while my arm seemingly regained its strength, rose into the air, and plunged my knife into Travis’s back. One. Two. Three. Four…I lost count after four, and the only reason I stopped was because Loche’s hand grabbed my wrist while he spoke my name.
“Ever, you can stop now. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
His words flipped a switch, and I fell to my knees in a pool of blood that could be either Travis’s or Loche’s—or hell, even mine—wiping away tears not because I’d just killed a man but because I was finally free. Travis’s death had released me from my own prison. There would be no more running, no more hiding, no more looking over my shoulder.
Loche moved to try to push Travis’s body off of him, but his blood loss had made him weak, so I helped push my ex’s limp body from my—boyfriend? Stalker? Friend with incredible benefits? From my front yard, dark figures emerged, rushing to where we lay. “Either help has arrived or one of the agents of death wears skinny jeans.”
“Just be happy they’re wearing any pants at all,” Loche said, his voice already growing as weak as his body.
“Call an ambulance,” I yelled out to the figures. “He’s been stabbed.”
“So has she,” Loche called out to them.
The figures ran over to us as I moved to cradle Loche’s head in my lap. “Hang in there, you bastard. Please.” My hand moved down to his abdomen, finding a deep stab wound to his flank that was bleeding profusely. “I need one of you to get a towel from inside,” I called out to the men, all of whom were now in the light and close enough for me to recognize as being Nix, Cole, and Malachi. Cole broke off from the group and ran toward my house.
“Ever, I’m sorry,” Loche said softly.
“Don’t say that. You can be sorry if you want to, but don’t say it because you don’t expect to live. You, Loche Greene, are going to get through this. Because if anyone is going to kill you, it’s going to be me.”
“All the same, I should have told you who I was. It was selfish of me to sleep with you, but I wanted you, Nevermore. I loved you. I still do.”
A tear slid down my cheek, falling onto Loche as I held his head, running my fingers through his hair. In the distance, sirens approached. “Don’t say goodbye to me. Especially not now that I finally know who you are. I need more time with you, and I’m getting that time whether you like it or not.” I bent down and touched my lips to his, tastingblood that could have been either of ours as snow fell lightly around us.
Cole returned with the towel as the sound of sirens grew louder in the distance. I took it from him and applied pressure to Loche’s wound, hoping nothing vital had been severed and he hadn’t lost too much blood.
Malachi bent down and took Loche’s hand. Cole and Nix crouched down on the opposite side. “We should have gotten here sooner.”
“It’s not like you could have known what was happening. Wait, did Loche know Travis was here?”
“Travis hacked your surveillance system,” Cole said. “Loche saw something suspicious on your camera and called me.”
“Wait. You had access to my camera,” I looked down at Loche, who, despite slowly bleeding out, had the wherewithal to give Cole a look as if to say,Shut up, man.
“We’ll revisit that after you recover.” I looked down at Loche, noticing even in the limited light that his face was practically as white as the snow.
“I tried calling you,” Loche murmured. “You turned your phone off. By the time Cole called me, I knew it would be faster for me to drive here than the police.” His voice was nothing more than a whisper now, leaving his body as his life drained away.
“I know.” Tears stung my eyes, almost making me forget the shooting pain in my back and down my arm. “But you can’t blame me for being super pissed at you.”
“I’m going to the front of the house to wave the ambulance down,” Nix said, standing up.
“Just a few more minutes,” I said to Loche, reassuringly, looking down to see his eyes closed. “Loche.” I shook him, receiving no response. “Loche, wake up. Wake up. Wake up!”
“Let’s get him to the front yard,” Malachi said to Cole, who nodded in agreement. I stood up, watching Malachi lift the top half of Loche’s body as Cole grabbed his legs, following them to my front yard. An ambulance and a couple of police cars pulled into the driveway seconds later.
