Page 56

RUMI

I can hear movement around me, but I can’t get my eyes to open. I try to peer through the darkness that has taken over, but I can’t see.

It isn’t until I reach my hand, touching my face, that I realize that one of my eyes is swollen shut, the other burning the moment I finally open it—something dripping into the corner of my eye.

Blood .

A loud cry sounds, and it’s coming from right above me.

Evee .

It all rushes back—opening the front door thinking it was Ava, footsteps behind me, a hand on my shoulder, him throwing two punches directly at me.

Trevor .

He’s here.

He’s found me.

I try to focus on my surroundings, needing to know where he is before I even think about getting up. The smell of scorched air and warm gas is faint but there from the pot of water I put on the stove before I was knocked out.

Right now, he must think I’m still out—I need to use that to my advantage.

Evee’s cries are hoarse, like she’s been crying for hours, and it makes my heart physically crack—knowing how scared she must be but also knowing I can’t do anything to comfort her right now.

I really hope I haven’t been out that long.

Footsteps sound on the other side of the kitchen, but I don’t want to risk moving to try and see them.

If he’s still here, it means he must want something.

Evee? No, he hasn’t given one single fuck about her, not even since she’s been conceived. And why now? We’ve been gone for over a year.

Me? But that doesn’t make any sense. Why aren’t we in the car halfway back to Minnesota now if he came for me.

Which can only mean one thing.

He’s here to finish the job he couldn’t do all those months ago—the night I left.

He’s here to kill me.

I try to angle my head up to see if Evee can see me and hoping I’m enough under the tray of her high chair that she doesn’t have to live with the image of her mom, passed out and bloodied on the floor, for the rest of her life.

The movement sends a shooting pain through my jaw and the back of my head, causing me to let out an involuntary whimper, and I hear the footsteps stop.

“Get up, you stupid bitch.” Trevor walks over to me, I can sense his presence even with barely being able to see through my swollen eye and the blood in the other.

I muster all the strength I have, pushing myself up and ignoring the pain begging me to stop moving. It must take me too long because I feel a kick to my side, the crushing blow knocking the wind out of me.

Forcing my mind into survival mode, I get up, and it feels all too familiar. It’s like muscle memory takes over, my brain taking me back to the place it used to take me when Trevor or my father would put their hands on me.

But there’s something more—I don’t know if it’s adrenaline or just sheer willpower that I feel deep in my bones.

A strength I didn’t have the last time this happened, or at least didn’t have until I got in the car and fled.

A strength that comes from being a mother, knowing your child needs you and doing everything in your power to get to them.

Standing up, I wipe the back of my hand against my eyes, swiping the blood so I can finally see through it. I feel my bare feet ground into the hardwood floor, and my fist clench as I look Trevor in the eyes, forcing him to see me in a way I’ve never made him do before.

If he’s going to kill me, he’s going to stare me right in the eye as he does.

My body moves to the side, shielding a crying Evee, and it takes everything in me not to turn and hold her close to me, to protect her from all of this, but I can’t risk having her in my arms when Trevor inevitably hits me again.

“What are you doing here?” My voice is scratchy and rough, but I keep my shoulders square and my eyes on the man I thought I loved.

His dirty blonde hair is cut close to his scalp, his dark brown eyes almost black in the lowlight of the kitchen, the only light coming from the sun slowly setting through the windows and the lit burner on the stove.

“What am I doing here?” He lets out a chuckle, one free of any humor. “I’m here because I woke up on my kitchen floor to find my slut of a girlfriend left in the middle of the night.”

The admission is anything but sincere, and it still doesn’t answer my question.

“And it took you over a year to find me?”

I don’t have time to brace for the slap against my cheek, the one already swollen from the first punch, and my vision goes blurry once again, the sting of his palm against my skin a familiar type of pain.

“Watch your fucking mouth,” he spits. “I thought when you didn’t come running back, that I was finally free of you and your fucking kid that won’t shut the fuck up.

” He yells the last part, and I resist the urge to flinch, the volume and cadence causing me to momentarily forget that I’m not back at the house.

Evee’s cries have lessened to a soft whimpering, no doubt tiring herself out, and I wish I could do something to comfort her, but there’s no telling what Trevor would do to her if I wasn’t the one between them right now.

“Then, I get your stupid little court-order,” he says, and it takes me a second to realize he’s talking about the paternity test. “You think you’re going to get money from me? For a kid who might not even be mine?”

“If you don’t think she’s yours, why not take the test?” It’s stupid to push him, but I can’t help it. Not when there’s so much anger inside of me that I feel like I’m about to explode.

Anger that he found me.

Anger that I let my hope get the best of me. Again.

Anger that he made my daughter cry, and that he’s still standing in my kitchen.

This time, I brace for the slap against my cheek, and I don’t know what pisses him off more. My words, or that I barely flinch.

“It wasn’t hard to find you, you know.” He smiles, and it makes my stomach twist. He looks like a predator, locking in on his prey, but I refuse to tear my eyes from his.

“When I saw the address was for Milwaukee, it wasn’t hard to locate the child support agency you were going through.

From there, it was just laying low and hoping our paths crossed. ”

“You’ve been stalking me?” The question comes out before I can stop them. The thought of Trevor going through those lengths to find me, having no idea he’s been so close, terrifies me to the core but angers me even more at the same time.

And it doesn’t sound remotely like him.

Trevor isn’t someone who waits for his chance to strike—he acts on impulse.

“Don’t give yourself that much credit, babe.

I just happened upon you today. It was more luck than anything else.

Or, what bullshit did you used to say? How soulmates find each other no matter what?

” He knows exactly what he’s doing as he grins, throwing words back at me—the ones I used to tell him when we first got together, thinking I had found the person I was meant to find, only to figure out I had to wait a little longer until I would.

“You just happened to find the place I worked?” I grit through my teeth, furious that Trevor had to come and infect my home, my place of work, my life that I worked so hard for.

“Actually, I was driving by, headed more into downtown near the agency when I saw the bar next door and thought I’d stop for a drink.” He crosses his arms, leaning against the counter next to the stove, reminding me of the lit burner.

Has all that water already boiled?

“And then,” he continues, “I was just about to get out of my car when I saw a firetruck pull up, one of the firefighters hopping out and literally skipping into the coffee shop as if he was a little school girl.” Trevor laughs, and I suck in a quick inhale.

“Then I saw him lean over the counter and kiss a girl who looked oddly familiar and happened to be exactly who I was looking for.” He smirks at me. “See? Soulmates.”

Bile rises in my throat, the thought of Trevor watching me today when I didn’t have a clue makes me sick.

“I should’ve known a slut like you would leave me and find some other man to take advantage of you. I’m sure you threw yourself right into his bed the first chance you got. How’s a man like that taste, you whore? One that only wants you for the one thing you're good for.”

I take a step toward him, leaning against the counter to keep my balance, my head spinning from both my injuries and trying to stay calm.

Trevor tries to hide the surprise on his face when I don’t cower and cry the way he’s used to—the way I used to when he’d say shit like that before throwing me to the ground.

With just the length of the stove between us, and a smirk of my own, I say, “Like you, but so, so much sweeter.”

His cocky, disgusting smirk falls, a familiar look of fury taking over as he looks at me, and I take advantage of his impulsivity to reach for the pot of boiling water, lucky to find it’s still as full as I had it—a rush of relief washing over me that I wasn’t out for as long as I thought.

Grabbing the handle, with one hand, I lift the pot quickly, aiming it toward Trevor, causing the water inside to splash out toward him.

“Fuck!” he screams when the boiling water hits his chest, causing him to stumble back, giving me time to turn and grab Evee, my plan to escape through the glass door the only thing on my mind.

But, before I can get to her high chair, I feel a hand grip my braid, pulling me back with such force that it feels like he’s tearing every piece of hair from my head.

I scream, reaching to grab the counter but I fall to the ground.

Holding my arms up to my face, I try to block his fists as he drives them toward me, but it’s no use.

The last thought I have before I pass out is of my daughter's cool blue eyes, and the jade green eyes I wish I could see one more time.