Page 66 of Blood Ties

“I can’t.”

“Pick it up or I’ll tell Dad that this mess is Riley’s fault.”

I flinch. Force myself to crouch down, my fingers to close around the knife’s hilt. “Knox,” I say, pleading.

He shakes his head. “You don’t get off easy this time. This is your fucking fault, you handle it.”

My chest is rising and falling fast, but my throat is constricted, the air not reaching my lungs. My hand shakes as I force myself to lift the knife and shuffle on my knees toward where Knox is keeping the woman pinned.

When I press the blade to her throat, she finally seems to register the danger she’s in. She starts screaming anew, struggling so hard that she nicks herself on the edge. I stare at the red trickling down the side of her pale neck, and shoot Knox another pleading look.

We’re face to face, just a few inches apart.

“Do it if you want Riley to live,” he whispers.

Still, I hesitate. Then I hear the crunch of tires on gravel, the unmistakable sound of Dad’s truck pulling in. Panic blooms in my chest. There’s no way we can clean this up before he comes inside. He’s going to be so fucking angry...

Knox grabs my face and yanks it back toward him. I focus on his dark eyes. “Kill her and I’ll handle the rest for you,” he says. “I’ve got you, Kai. Promise. All you have to do is—”

I slash the knife across the woman’s throat, one quick motion, the same way I’d finish off a deer. Her scream dies in a choking gurgle. She’s dead within seconds.

It’s an easier death than Dad would’ve given her, I tell myself. Easier than Knox would’ve done it too. But all I feel is numbness.

Knox’s jaw hangs slack for a moment. Then he smiles, and leans forward to bump his forehead against mine.

“See? Not so hard,” he says, and releases his grip on my face and the slack body of the woman beneath him. He takes his knife from my limp hand, and wipes it on his shirt as he stands. “The next one will be even easier.”

?Chapter Thirty-Three

Riley

Kai doesn’t come backto the basement that night, nor the next one. I finish off my water jug and one of my last remaining protein bars, and then I’m left with nothing but metallic tap water to fill my stomach and my own thoughts to haunt me. Is this my punishment for screaming?

I did what I thought was right. I tried to save those girls... though from what I heard, the screaming and the scuffle and the long silence that followed, I failed horribly.

And those gunshots terrified me. I’ve never seen Knox with a gun, nor Kai. Was it one of those girls? Could Kai be hurt? I feared the worst at first, but I’ve heard him walking overhead since then. He just doesn’t come to the basement.