If this were a video game …

My cloak billows around me like a deep black sea. The cloak that I created with a single thought. What if—?

I reach behind my back as I would in the video game at the laundry mat, wrap my fingers around the hilt of a blade, and unleash a wicked sword. It’s hot like it just came out of a fire. Smoke drifts off its razor-sharp edge. An edge that’s serrated with wisps of curves and hooks, very much like the markings on my shoulders and back. And I know it’s from hell. Like me.

I wrap both hands around the hilt. I have no choice but to do this in front of Dutch. Her gaze is locked on to me. My every move. My every emotion. She no longer even notices where his fingers are. How he has violated her.

I jump onto a dresser and swing the sword. It slices clean through him. Easily. Like he is barely there.

But there’s no blood. There’s no wound. He doesn’t cry out or double over, and I stand there in shock. I’ve failed. My eyes drift shut. I’ve failed. There’s nothing I can do.

A thud echoes in the room and I look down as Ethan slumps over. His eyes are wide. He doesn’t know what happened. But neither do I.

What I do know is that they are looking for her. Her father and uncle are in the alley, calling her name. I can hear them, but Dutch is in a trance. She huddles in the corner, her panties around her ankles, the blanket bunched in her tiny fists and around her midsection. It covers half her face and she is biting it. Biting her knuckles through it.

“Run,” I tell her.

She hears me. Her eyes widen even farther, but she remains silent.

“Where?” her father asks a woman in the alley.

She shakes her head. Unsure. “I just saw a little girl. I was carrying groceries. I just— I don’t know.”

“Go, damn it. Run.”

Dutch continues to stare, so I grab a handful of hair and jerk her toward me. I don’t show her my face. I keep it hidden in the black. Maybe that’s even better. Maybe that will make her even more scared of me, which right now would be awesome.

I wrap my other hand around her throat. The fear in her eyes is almost unbearable, but her dad and uncle go the wrong way. Search in the wrong direction.

I lean in closer and whisper this time. “Run or I will snap your fucking neck.”

She takes a breath to scream, but they are too far away to hear her.

I squeeze harder, tighten my hold on her hair, and without another second of hesitation, she scrambles out from under the blanket and runs at last. The lock gives her some trouble, so I reach out and turn with her.

It gives and she lunges toward the stairs. Stumbles down them. Trips on the last one and crashes into the door. But she barely notices.

Then sunlight streams in and she steps outside. She is in a trance again, walking without seeing. When she gets halfway to Denise’s car, she stops, paralyzed. Fat tears shimmer between her lashes as urine streams down her legs. Soaks her socks. Pools in her shoes.

Humiliation blazes to life inside her. It brightens her skin and blisters her cheeks. At first I think it’s because she’s peeing or because of what Ethan did, but she has gathered her skirt into her tiny fists and is holding it to her legs. Sobs punch through her chest as she turns around and starts walking back towards the building.

What the hell? Why would she go back there?

Then I understand. Her panties. They got bunched up in the blanket when she scrambled to get away from me and she left them there.

I appear in front of her and she stops short. I take a step forward. She takes one back. I do it again and again. Her dad and uncle are running toward us. I can hear them. Another step forward. Another one back.

Then her dad’s arms are around her. He’s asking her questions, but she can only stare at me, so I back off to a safe distance. It doesn’t help. Her gaze never leaves mine.

Her uncle strokes her hair then notices her condition. He pulls out a handkerchief. Cleans her legs. Dabs at her socks.

Her dad sets her at arm’s length. Asks her what happened.

She bows her head. Shame incinerates her and it breaks my heart. But she doesn’t tell him. She shakes her head and says, “I— I got lost.”

He doesn’t believe her. I can tell, but after another quick scan of the area, he drops it and pulls her into his arms again. She is in a state of shock when he lifts her into his arms.

The pervert is alive. And he’ll be alive for years, slurping his supper through a straw. Fucker. If only I could do that in real life. I’d love nothing more than to have Earl slurping his supper through straws as well.

She may be afraid of me, but at least she’s alive. And then it hits me. I remember. Most of her kind don’t live long. Seekers. Reapers. Soul collectors. They always die very young, and I wonder if that is a part of the world I created. I just know in the same way I know when someone is going to hell. I know their name and what they did to get sentenced to such a horrible end.

Maybe I’m crazy. Maybe Earl has hit me one too many times. Drugged me one too many times.

Denise finally makes her way out of the bar, but Leland ignores her. He puts Dutch into his SUV and takes her home. When they are gone, Robert glares at Denise.

She raises her chin and is about to deny fault when he steps toward her and says, “Your father is dead. He died two hours ago at Pres.”

He seems to enjoy her astonishment. I didn’t take him for a cruel man, but I suddenly like him a whole lot more.

Too bad he dies in the most horrible way possible. Too bad he goes to hell.

8

By the time I realize I’ve been drugged, it’s over and Earl is done with me. He loosens the ties and goes to clean himself up. I must have fought him despite the drugs. He hits me when I fight him, and I’m pretty sure my jaw is broken. Pain tears through me every time I try to move, so I lie still.

The breaks are just one more way Earl makes sure I don’t run. It’s hard to sneak out of a crawl space with a broken wrist. To run with a broken ankle. Every time I’m almost healed, he breaks something else. Breaks are fine. I can endure the breaks. It’s the other things he does, the things that crush me on the inside, that make me want to die.

I would have if not for Dutch’s light. I would be dead. I know it. I wish it were real. I wish she were real. She’s getting older and more beautiful with each passing day, and even though she’s a figment of my fucked-up imagination, I love her. To the very depths of my soul.

Kim rushes in with a bowl of hot water and a rag. It’s our usual routine, and I try to remember what I did before she arrived.

Oh, yeah. I writhed in agony and bled a lot. Pretty much like now, only without Kim watching over me.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I say to her, my voice cracking with each syllable.

She lowers her gaze. Focuses on my wounds. Doesn’t believe me.

But I’m not lying. I think of a day very much like this one. I’m seven and three-quarters. That three-quarters is very important to me.

Earl sits beside me on the bed. I pretend to be asleep.

“What are you?” he asks. He examines a break I had two weeks ago. I was opening a can of SpaghettiOs and dropped it. The kitchen ended up covered in SpaghettiOs and I ended up with a broken wrist.

He lifts my arm, now completely healed, and turns it over in the light. I feel his confusion. His fascination. He’s been trying to come up with a way to make money off the fact that I heal fast, because he thinks of only two things: sex and money. Mostly sex. And it’s not worth losing me to get a little extra dough. Any attention he brings to me could open a can of worms he’s not ready to eat.