The tiny parrot, who was normally so passive, arrived with a cyclone of feathers, bites, and claws. “Hey!” I threw up my arm as she tore at my ear, shooting away in the direction of the path before repeating her dive-bomb attack.
Pika tried to intercept her carnage, only for her to turn vicious on his playful antics.
Either Skittles had suffered an aneurysm and had a total personality switch, or…
Eleanor.
I bolted in the direction Skittles seemed desperate for me to go. She squeaked and cawed, soaring ahead of me now that I’d gotten the message. I could barely keep up as sand flew from my shoes, Pika joining us in our hurry.
I would’ve missed them if it hadn’t been for Skittles. If the tiny, loyal beautiful bird didn’t zip into the undergrowth where a few purple orchids had been crushed by women’s feet.
Thanks to her, I stumbled on a murder in progress, and the rage I’d done my best to eradicate, thanks to talking to my brother, sprang into an uncontainable miasma.
I saw red.
I tasted blood.
I shut down.
Skittles didn’t wait for me to kill the goddesses; she took it upon herself to shoot forward, pecking at the eyes of the two girls trying to strangle Eleanor with a goddamn scarf.
Neptune winced and ducked her head, keeping her focus on pulling the scarf with all her weight.
Skittles kept them distracted while I followed with measured footsteps, my fists curled until my knuckles popped, my heart beating both wildly and not at all.
I was fire and ice. I was monster and man.
I was afraid of what I’d do because all I wanted was their chests ripped open, their entrails on the dirt, and their mouths open in pitiful screams.
A twig broke under my shoe as I closed the distance between us. Jupiter looked around the tree, her gaze snagging with mine. Instantly, her complexion turned snow-white, all pigment in her flesh retreating inside, as if fortifying the organs I was about to massacre.
Skittles flew into the branches above, sitting next to Pika, ready for me to deliver the messy consequences.
Neptune was next, releasing her hold on the scarf around Jinx’s throat, removing the barrier that kept her upright.
Eleanor tumbled to the ground. Weightless, elegant—a folding waterfall of legs, torso, and arms until she lay sprawled and eyes closed in the bracken.
Seeing her like that?
Seeing the redness around her throat and the paleness of her lips, it smashed through yet another wall around my heart.
It destroyed my lies that what I felt for her would fade. It obliterated my assurances that I would get over her. It forced me to admit that I would do anything for her, be anything for her, I would fucking slaughter every-fucking-body for her.
Starting now.
Up till that moment, everything had seemed in slow motion. The world had been replaced with molasses and mud, but with that arrow of self-truth, it turned into quicksand. Cascading through an hourglass, tick-tocking the wasted time that I needed to save her.
I didn’t remember much after that.
Skittles screeched as I snatched Calico’s hair and ripped her backward. She yelped in surprise as I spun her around, wrapped both hands around her throat, and squeezed with no fucking mercy.
She hung in my hold, her sharp fingernails leaving crimson furrows on my knuckles. Her eyes bugged, the gristle in her neck gave way under my strength, and her body went from fierce to floppy in a heartbeat.
Breathing through flared nostrils, I let her go the second she turned lifeless in my grip. She flopped to the ground, a matching marionette to Eleanor’s unconscious form.
Unlike Eleanor who stayed in the front of my mind—a glowing sacrifice I had to get to, had to save—I forgot about Calico the moment I stepped over her and prepared to punish the other two.
Jupiter burst into tears as I closed the distance between us.
Neptune fell to her knees, her hands in prayer, her lips white. “Sullivan, please. Please, don’t hurt us. We’re—”
I backhanded her.
Hard.
So fucking hard.
Her head whipped to the side and her body flayed in rhythm, crashing her to the ground.
Jupiter stayed standing, swaying with terror, her tears raining.
My blood-raged spluttered a little, allowing mercy to filter through the murderous haze. I snarled through gritted teeth. “Why?”
She blinked, sending another gush of tears to stain her cheeks. “Because…because you never looked at us like you look at her.”
Neptune slowly pushed herself from the dirt, cupping her swollen cheek and daring to look up at me while weaving on her knees. “We love you, Sullivan. Please—”
I laughed mercilessly. “Love? You think this is love?”
“We’d do anything for you. We obey your every command. We’re yours, through and through.”
Eleanor moaned as oxygen filtered back into her body, keeping her alive.
Love.
I’d refused it my entire life. I’d ignored its insidious pull toward Jinx. But she was right. It might not have been instant-love when we’d met, but it had been instant-something. And for the first time, I wanted to fight for that instead of killing it.