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Chase’s eyes are swollen, and his chest is heaving, but otherwise, he’s motionless. And it feels good, I realize.

It feels good to see him like this.

“That’s enough,” Brinklin says again.

Cortland backs off, and slowly, Van stands, glancing at the blood flecked on his knuckles, sweat beading along his hairline.

He drops his hand and looks to me. “We need to go, Rems.”

Cortland laughs, wiping the back of his hand over his mouth. “She’s not going anywhere without me.”

Van glares at Cortland, and I see a vein in his neck ticking. Then he looks at Chase, curling into a ball on the floor.

In the fetal position.

He has glass imbedded in his skin. Along his eye. His nose. His mouth.

Cortland reaches down and picks up the baseball bat he dropped by the toilet. He twists it in his hand, running it along Chase’s spine as Chase whimpers.

“You wanna swing, baby?” he asks me, his gray eyes lifting to meet mine.

Slowly, Storm lowers me down, and I sway a little in my heeled boots, but Storm’s hands come to my hips, steadying me.

I stare at the bat.

Chase whimpering on the floor.

I should say no.

I should say no.

But the door is closed.

No one says anything.

There’s only the sounds of Chase crying.

I think about how he was with me.

The names he called me.

What he said his dad did to Cortland.

I reach my bloodied hand out for the bat.

“No, Remi, please,” Chase begs me, looking up at me, blood in his mouth as he curls tighter into a ball. “Please don’t.”

Cortland offers me the bat with a smile, his eyes full of pride. “Go ahead,” he says, nodding toward Chase on the floor. “Swing, little wolf.”

And so I do.

When I drop the bat, Chase isn’t moving.

My chest heaves, and I stumble back again. Again, Storm is there, catching me.

Cortland looks down at a bloodied and still Chase, then to me, arching a brow.

Silence is in the room, just the sound of my own pulse in my temple.

“Remi,” Van says, swallowing as he looks from Chase, to Cortland, to me. “We need to go.”

Cortland turns to him. “I already told you,” he says, wiping a bloody hand over his mouth. “She’s not leaving me.”

Van’s eyes narrow as he steps over Chase’s still body, getting in Cortland’s face.

“You’re no different than him. This isn’t good rapist versus bad rapist , you dumb fuck.

” His hands are clenched into fists by his sides, a vein in his temple throbbing as his eyes gleam.

“Remi,” he says without looking at me, “let me get you out of here.”

Cortland steps closer to Van, and I move toward them both, Storm letting me go.

I put a hand on both Van’s arm and Cortland’s, steadying myself. Steadying them.

“Van,” I whisper as they stare off. Slowly, his eyes come to me, and they soften, even as his jaw is still tight. “He’s not what you think he?—”

“He is, though. You just don’t see it, because he’s fucked with your head.”

“Watch how you fucking talk to?—”

“You don’t get to be the hero!” Van snarls those words in Cortland’s face, and they both glare at each other, both of their chests heaving as I hold them both, feeling the tension in their bodies. “You’re not a hero. And if you were, if you want to be, you’ll let her go.”

Cortland pulls his lip ring between his teeth, his bottom lip blanching under his canine.

He turns to me.

“I’m not a hero. I never wanted to be. But Remi… I’m yours.”

“You’re so full of shit,” Van mutters.

Tears build behind my eyes, and I forget Storm and Brinklin are watching. I forget Chase is out cold on the floor.

My heart beats too fast, clouding my thoughts, making it hard to think. But I remember the porch. Cortland turning me away.

“We’re leaving, Remi,” Van says, his words lined with impatience.

“I don’t want to,” I whisper. I turn to Van. “I don’t?—”

“Do you see what he’s doing to you?” Van’s tone is angry as he grabs my arm, and Cortland lunges for him but Storm pulls him back, both Van and Storm hauling us apart. “You see what the fuck he’s doing to you?” Van yells those words, his arms around my waist now, holding me back from Cortland.

I push on his forearms, try to shove them down and off of me as I kick my legs, and Cortland attempts to jerk out of Storm’s hold, but Storm is relentless, not letting go, just like Van doesn’t.

“Get your hands off of her?—”

“Oh, like you did when you fucked her up? You haven’t been here the past fucking year!” Van is shouting, yanking me backward, over Chase’s body. “You haven’t seen her crying and trembling and hiding because of you!”

“You just want to fuck her, don’t you?” Cortland snarls, his gray eyes full of rage. “I saw you, mother fucker, I saw your hands on her?—”

“And I stopped when she wanted me to stop.” Van doesn’t scream those words. He just says them. Like a fact.

Because it is.

Cortland stops fighting in Storm’s arms.

He just looks at me like for once, he doesn’t know what to say.

Fight for me. Say something to make it better.

But there isn’t anything to say, is there?

“Let’s go, Remi.” Van pulls me back, and this time, Cortland doesn’t try to get to me.

“It was never going to be real, was it?” I call out softly to him.

He just stares at me and I think he isn’t going to speak.

Finally, as Van starts to drag me away, he does.

“It’s always been real to me, Remi. It’s so goddamn real.”

I stumble backward, turning in Van’s arms, throwing my own around him. He holds me tight.

“Van,” I whisper, the two of us still for a moment. “I don’t feel so good.”

Then everything just... goes black.