Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 72340 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 362(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72340 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 362(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
I look into the eyes of the man who took me, the man who I saved from death, but I see nothing of the person I fell in love with. I know today isn’t just my funeral but his as well. With my death will come guilt and heartache like he has never felt before.
The gun in his hand is cocked and loaded. The light glistens off the metal as I watch him raise the barrel toward the side of my head.
“Tell me you didn’t know, Amara.” His face is the same as the beautiful man I made love to just hours ago. Our love is magnificent, but in the big world of things, it is nothing. Fear courses through me as I wait for him to pull the trigger. He will… I have watched him kill too many people to think otherwise. He always pulls the trigger…
“Tell me! Tell me you didn’t fucking do it, Amara! Tell me that this bullet isn’t for you. Tell me because right now, I’m contemplating killing the one person who means more to me than anything else in the world.” Enzo’s voice, though frantic and anguished, is soothing me and giving me hope. Maybe, just maybe, our love can conquer the darkness that is lurking close to his surface.
There is no point in begging him. I know it will do nothing for me, but I have to try to make him understand Mack is lying. “I didn’t… I didn’t know, I swear...He’s lying! My God. How could I have even known you were going to be at my house to collect from my father the day I came home on break? You met my father, whom you, yourself, described as weak and simple-minded. You honestly think my father could kill someone? He didn’t even fight to save me, his own daughter! He let you take me because he was scared of you. There’s no way a simple, spineless farmer could be a tough, intelligent FBI agent...” My voice halts in the midst of me trying to convince him I’m telling the truth. Time stands still as Enzo stares into my eyes. He’s looking at me but doesn’t see me. Hate and anger come to the surface with a vengeance.
“He’s your father, Amara. You had to know. Payment is due, and this bullet has his name written on it in your family’s blood.” He refuses to listen to reason, refuses to believe me. Gone is the man I have grown to love and care for. I know death is imminent when I feel the cold metal of his gun against my head.
“Any last words?” His voice is so cold that I barely recognize it as the same tender voice that proclaimed his love for me only hours ago.
“You have to believe me. Look at me! Look at me and tell me you can’t see that I’m telling the truth. It is Mack who is lying, Enzo. Please. You once claimed you could always tell when I’m lying. Why can’t you tell now?” I’m breathless, drowning in my own tears as I try so desperately to make him believe me.
“You cloud not only my mind, but my judgment, as well. I want to believe you. I really do, but I’m in the middle of a war. Not only with Luccio’s people, but with myself. I’m at a fucking raging battle with myself because of you! The good you unlocked in me is fighting to be free, but the dark, evil, fucked up part of me is telling me not to trust either one of you. That part of me wants to see both of you with bullets in your heads.”
Time stands still as I take a deep breath. There is nothing else to say. The monster has been set free, and he won’t be at peace until I’m lying on this very floor in a puddle of my own blood.
The silence is literally killing me, it surrounds us, sucking the life right out of me.
“Then, pull the trigger!” I scream. I feel every single shred of hope leave me. My body, mind, and soul shut down. I am ready, there is no other way around it.
“I will…” He pulls the trigger. He actually pulls the trigger. The sound of the gun going off is loud as Enzo’s beautiful face is the last thing I see before my world goes dark.