UNCAGED: Steel Gods MC by Heather West (37)

 

Evan

 

Evan awoke to the sound of rain, gentle but firm, pounding down on either side of the cabin’s walls. Hannah was still sleeping, naked in his arms, nuzzling his chest in her sleep. He felt warm inside, like a hot little nurturing star had taken up shop in the middle of his chest, especially when he spotted a tiny little puddle of drool on his chest from Hannah’s mouth. He smiled and stroked a gentle circle into the side of her neck.

 

But then a cold sensation sunk down from the top of his head, slinking down to the rest of his body. It was like his body knew that something was wrong before his brain did. But his mind eventually caught up to his anxiety a few moments later.

 

Salvatore. It was Salvatore, of course. What else could it possibly be? That fucker was the shadow hanging over everything else. Otherwise, this was the best day in his life. He’d had sex with a lot of women over the years, but he’d never felt like he’d made love before. Now that had changed. He had never felt closer to anyone, let alone a woman he was with, ever before in his life.

 

You’re mine now, he said silently as he stared down at Hannah’s adorable little scrunched-up sleeping face. And I have to protect you. I have to. Whatever doubt Evan had before was gone. Salvatore had to die. It was that simple.

 

In the other room, Alex started fussing, low, but in an impatient tone that told Evan that he was about to start screaming if he didn’t receive some attention. Hannah shifted a little bit but remained asleep as Evan lifted her gently off his chest and placed her down on the couch pillows. He walked into the bedroom to find Alex awake, playing with the blanket that Hannah had used to swaddle him hours before.

 

“Hey, buddy,” Evan whispered, keeping his voice low so as not to wake Hannah. “Whatcha doing there?”

 

Alex raised his little baby fists in the air, and at first Evan was confused, unsure of what the little guy wanted, but after a second it clicked. He was reaching for Evan, wordlessly begging to be picked up and held. Evan felt his heart stutter in his chest at the realization, swallowing thickly to clear the emotion that suddenly clogged his throat as he reached over to grab Alex and lift him from the bed. The baby immediately pressed his head against Evan’s chest and cooed lightly, content to be held tight.

 

“Jesus,” Evan murmured under his breath.

 

In a weird way, holding Alex made him feel like a kid again, reminding him of how he’d felt the first time he had held his younger sisters. That sense of wonder, that mixture of fear and excitement that something so small, something so fragile accepted you, wanted you, needed you, decided that you were the right person to keep them safe. It was thrilling and terrifying all at once, feeling the weight of a tiny child’s trust hit him straight in the chest.

 

Alex fell back asleep in his arms, sniffling lightly, and again, Evan felt certain of what he had to do. This tiny child, this precious sweet baby was hurt by a monster who was still hunting him. There was no way Evan could sit back and let that happen. There was no way he could just run away and hope for the best, not when Salvatore was still out there. He had to be gone. He had to be dead before Evan could ever rest.

 

He was so wrapped up in staring down at Alex and making silent promises to the kid that he didn’t notice Hannah walking up to the doorway of the bedroom. Eventually she cleared her throat and alerted Evan to her presence.

 

“How long have you been watching me?” Evan said, feeling a smile slowly stretch across his face at the sight of a naked Hannah standing in the doorway.

 

“Long enough,” Hannah replied, her voice light and teasing. Evan loved hearing that. It was so rewarding, seeing her relaxed and calm rather than stressed and panicked. “He likes you,” she added softly, her face turning serious. “He doesn’t like anybody.”

 

“What do you mean?” Evan asked.

 

“Back home,” Hannah started to say, but then she paused, wincing at her own use of the word “home” in reference to Sal’s place. “Back there, he wouldn’t let anyone hold him but me. He’d, like, scream if someone touched him. It used to freak people out. Salvatore…Salvatore hated it. He hated that it was so obvious that Alex preferred me.”

 

“What a piece of shit,” Evan muttered, more to himself than to Hannah.

 

“Yeah,” Hannah agreed, but there was still a little smile on her face, staring at Alex in Evan’s arms. “That he is.”

 

Evan tightened his arms around Alex and stared down at his fragile little head, admiring the tiny dark curls that were just beginning to take root there. “I’ve got to do it, you know,” Evan said. “Kill him.”

 

Hannah exhaled shakily and pushed her hair back from her forehead. Evan inwardly regretted saying anything, at least for the moment. It was so crushing to see Hannah fall back into worry. “Can you…can you please just let it go?” she asked softly, and the sadness in her voice was like a dagger aimed right at Evan’s heart.

 

Evan shook his head slowly. He wanted to lie to her, say anything that would get her to calm back down and relax again, but he didn’t want to disrespect her that way. He had to be honest. After years of deception and abuse, she deserved that much at the very least. “I really can’t. I’m sorry. I just…I just can’t rest until he’s dead. Please understand.”

 

“I’m afraid that I do understand,” Hannah said, her brow furrowing. “It’s like a habit with you, isn’t it? An addiction. It’s the only way you know how to be. Is that right? Is that what it is?”

 

Evan felt his heart sink in his chest. So, after everything, Hannah still thought of him as a killer. It made sense. It wasn’t like he could be mad at it. He was a killer. He’d hurt so many people. Sure, most of them had deserved it, but not all. And that was enough to legitimize Hannah’s fear. It was enough to legitimize her hatred, if she felt any. “Do you…do you think you’ll ever trust me?” Evan heard himself asking, his mouth moving of its own accord without his brain’s permission. That question was unfair. He hadn’t meant to ask it, but it just came out.

 

Hannah gave a shrug, and Evan felt his heart sink a little further down into his stomach. “I don’t know. But this—this killing Salvatore stuff? It doesn’t help. I just…I just wish we could let it go, let it fade into the past.”

 

“That’s what I want, too,” Evan argued. His heart had started pounding more insistently in his chest, but he made sure to keep his voice steady so as not to wake Alex back up. “And it’s the only way. He’ll never give up. He’ll never leave us alone.”

 

“Maybe,” Hannah conceded. “But he might not be able to get to us if we go south, get out of this country, get off this continent. He isn’t king of the world. He doesn’t have the same power everywhere.”

 

It sounded logical. Maybe she was even right. But it wasn’t enough for Evan. “Maybe. But…we can’t really know that for sure, can we? It’s not like either of us have tested it out. Do you really want to live the rest of your life with one eye looking behind you, constantly worrying that the second you let your guard down he’ll be there, ready to hurt you and Alex?” Evan asked.

 

Hannah was silent a moment, pursing her lips as she considered the proposition. “Maybe not,” she finally whispered. “But it’s better than having his blood on my hands.”

 

“It wouldn’t be on your hands,” Evan argued. “I’ll do it. I’ll handle the whole thing.”

 

She smiled a little, but it was sad, resigned even. “Your hands, my hands. There’s not that big of a difference anymore, is there?”

 

Now it was Evan’s turn to be silent and let her words truly sink in. They had joined their bodies together. More than our bodies, Evan thought. He didn’t know if he had a soul, but if he did, it had touched Hannah’s the night before. They were united now, in more ways than one. And that was precisely why he had to do this.

 

“I’m sorry,” he said, and he truly meant it. “I don’t want to hurt you. Please believe me, that’s the last thing I want to do,” Evan continued, his voice low and shaky. “But I have to keep you safe. Please understand that. I just…I just have to.” Maybe it was just because he was a murderer, maybe it was because his insides were all rotten-through, all dead inside. But Hannah’s weren’t. Alex’s weren’t. And Evan would fight like hell to make sure they stayed that way.

 

Silence fell again, but after a moment Hannah started nodding slowly, walking forward into the room. “Just don’t do it yet, okay?” Hannah said, stepping closer to Evan until the space between their bodies was erased. “Promise me that. Stay with us a while longer. I need—I need you.” She averted her eyes, staring down at the floor. “To feel safe.”

 

“Okay,” Evan whispered, staring at Hannah until she raised her eyes to meet his. “Okay, I won’t. I won’t do it yet.”

 

“And, and, please just give me some warning before you do. If you do,” Hannah said. “Because you know you can always…you can always choose not to.”

 

That wasn’t true, as far as Evan was concerned, but he felt himself nodding in agreement. “Okay.”

 

Hannah smiled again, weakly but genuinely, her eyes full and wide. Evan couldn’t help himself. He had to lean in to kiss her, making sure to keep one hand on Alex.

 

“Mm,” Hannah murmured into the kiss. “You taste good.”

 

“You, too,” Evan whispered, smiling into the kiss as Hannah deepened it.

 

They pulled back a minute later, the sound of the wind whipping the trees outside making Hannah tear herself away from Evan to look out the window. She groaned. “Unnnngh. I hope it doesn’t storm again. I fucking hate storms.”

 

“I’ll keep you safe,” he promised, smiling teasingly at her. But he meant it, more than he had meant anything in his whole life.

 

“The trees out there are beautiful, though,” Hannah said, walking over to the window to gesture to the one nearest the house. “Gorgeous.”

 

“You think?” Evan asked a little incredulously. “They’re so skinny and small.”

 

“Those are my favorite ones,” Hannah said. “They’re brave little fuckers. Making it through the winter somehow. That’s something to be proud of.”

 

“Yeah,” Evan said, smiling at Hannah as she continued to stare out the window at the trees. “It is.”

 

An idea struck Evan, and it sounded so stupid and ridiculous that at first he dismissed it, trying to push it to the back of his mind. But it didn’t work. It was a persistent little fuck of an idea, and Evan knew it wouldn’t go away unless he voiced it.

 

“Let’s bring one in,” Evan said.

 

“What?” Hannah asked, turning around to face him, confused.

 

“For, um, for Christmas.” He ducked his head down, focusing on the top of Alex’s head, feeling his cheeks heat up with embarrassment.

 

But Hannah didn’t mock his idea. “Really?” she asked softly instead, walking back over to him and grabbing his free hand. “You want that?”

 

“I want, um, I want Alex to have that,” Evan forced out, the words painful as they left his mouth even though he meant them. He did want Alex to have a Christmas. A real Christmas. A warm Christmas.

 

“I thought you hated Christmas,” Hannah replied, grabbing onto his hand more firmly.

 

“Not anymore,” Evan said, feeling himself blush more deeply, as if he was a weak little schoolboy.

 

“How would we do it?” Hannah asked.

 

“There’s an ax just inside the door,” Evan said. “I saw it when we came in. I can go out and take one of the skinny trees down and carry it in.”

 

“What would we do for decorations?” Hannah asked. “I don’t—I don’t want to leave the cabin unless we have to.”

 

Evan thought about it. “Well, what would we need, really? Some shiny, colorful shit. We got to be able to find that stuff around here somewhere.”

 

Hannah screwed up her face in concentration. It looked really cute, tempting Evan to lean in and kiss her again, but he let her think. “When I was a kid, we didn’t have any money, you know, so we made our own ornaments. We could…we could grab some paper and some scissors and make paper baubles that way. Let me look in the closets out there,” she said, crossing the bedroom to go to the main section of the cabin.

 

Evan put Alex back down on the bed, swaddling him securely with blankets before following Hannah out to the main room. “While you do that, I’m going to chop that fucking tree down before the storm sets in again.”

 

He grabbed the ax on his way out, heading to the tree right outside the bedroom window. Hannah’s favorite. But as he aimed his weapon at it, he mentally transformed it into another target entirely. Salvatore’s broad dumb face. “Yeah, eat metal, you fuck,” Evan muttered as he dug the ax into the base of the tree. “Fucking choke on it.” When the time came to kill Salvatore, Evan would enjoy it. Maybe he would hide that from Hannah. It might make her think less of him, but he couldn’t help but think some part of her would enjoy it, too.

 

***

 

Hannah

 

Hannah found some colored paper, albeit thinner than the kind she wanted, in an office room to the back of the house. Next, she located a pair of scissors from the kitchen drawers and set off to work, making rough, uneven circles out of the paper. Green, yellow, red, brown, and pink. Not exactly uniformly Christmas colors, but it would work. She got herself a pen from the office and traced out angel shapes, cutting them out as best as she could. They kind of just looked like wonky, lopsided people with huge arms, but it was good enough. More than good enough, she thought with a smile, listening to the low thudding sounds outside as Evan attacked the tree. They were making their own Christmas with their own hands. And it was Evan’s idea, which made everything a thousand times sweeter. She’d made him believe in Christmas again. That was the closest thing to a miracle she’d seen in a long time. Maybe ever.

 

Hannah found a set of paperclips next, using them to poke holes in the paper ornaments and sticking them through the new openings. She’d use them to hang the ornaments up, wrapping around the branches of the tree. A minute later, the front door swung open, and a panting Evan dragged the tree inside, probably ruining the nice welcome mat in the process, but Hannah couldn’t bring herself to care.

 

“Big mountain man,” she said teasingly as Evan huffed and puffed, pulling the tree to the center of the room.

 

“That’s about as far as it’s going to go,” he said between huge panting breaths, lifting the tree up and leaning it against the wall. “Little crooked, but it’ll have to work.”

 

“Let me get Alex. I don’t want him to miss this,” Hannah said before heading into the bedroom to grab Alex. She returned to the living room a minute later, placing him down on the couch so he could watch her decorate the tree.

 

Hannah grabbed the bundle of paper ornaments and placed them down in a pile on the floor next to the tree. “You want to help?” she asked Evan as she began to hang some of the paper baubles from the tree with the paperclips.

 

“That’s okay, I’ll just watch you,” Evan said, sitting down next to Alex, who was cooing lightly in curiosity.

 

“Come on,” Hannah prodded him. “Just hang one or two. For me?”

 

Evan was quiet a moment, but when she turned around to pout at him, it was all over. He got up and went over to her, bashfully smiling a little as she handed him an angel to hang from the tree. “Where do I—”

 

“Anywhere,” Hannah said, trying to be as reassuring as possible. “There’s no wrong place.”

 

“Yes, teacher,” he said teasingly before hanging an angel on a low branch.

 

But Evan didn’t stop at one or two. He kept accepting the ornaments as Hannah handed them to him, alternating branches to maximize coverage of the tree. Hannah felt her heart beat joyously in her chest. She hadn’t felt this good in…maybe ever. She felt like she and Evan were reinventing Christmas together, making it with their own two hands, reshaping it into something they could be proud of. They felt…like a family.

 

As they finished their task, Hannah clapped her hands together and jumped up and down like a small child, excitement filling her entire body. “It’s so cute!” she cried.

 

“No, you are,” Evan said, pulling her into a deep kiss.

 

“I just wish I had a camera to take a picture of it….or some hot cocoa or something to commemorate the occasion,” Hannah said against his lips as they pulled apart.

 

“Well, they might have some,” Evan said, walking off into the kitchen. “I’ll check.”

 

Hannah grinned, watching him through the open doorway as he shuffled through the cabinets and drawers. It didn’t matter if he didn’t find anything. Happiness filled her up with warmth anyway. It was even okay with her that the storm had returned. For once in her life she didn’t feel afraid.

 

But her joy receded as she turned to check on her child.

 

Alex was slumped against the side of the couch, sniffling in his sleep lightly. He looked…fine, but Hannah still felt a wave of anxiety crash over her. It took her a second for her to realize what was wrong.

 

“Why is he sleeping so much?” Hannah asked out loud, worry seeping into her voice. She didn’t want to alarm Evan, but this wasn’t normal. Alex was a very active child, constantly babbling and trying to climb up places where he shouldn’t go. It was almost a relief that he hadn’t gotten into anything dangerous over the past few days, but it was concerning Hannah now that he’d been so quiet and still. That just wasn’t her son.

 

Maybe it’s just overstimulation, she thought. He’s had to move around so much, maybe it’s just tiring him out. But she couldn’t stop the bile from rising up her throat and filling her mouth as a result of her anxiety.

 

“Found some chocolate bars, will that work?” Evan said as he walked back into the room. “Hey, what’s up?” he asked, clearly detecting her worry right away.

 

“Um, it’s just Alex,” Hannah murmured, sitting down and reaching over to take her son into her arms, rocking him a little bit back and forth. “He’s not…he’s not himself.”

 

“He’s just sleeping,” Evan said. “He looks fine.”

 

“Yeah, but he usually doesn’t sleep all the time. He’s more…jumping around and getting into trouble, you know.” She clutched Alex tighter, trying to get him to wake up. Alex just sniffled some more and crushed his face against her chest. “He’s not okay,” she murmured.

 

“How can you tell?” Evan asked, putting the chocolate bars down on the coffee table.

 

“I don’t know, I don’t know.” Hannah could feel panic fill every cell of her body. “I can just tell.” Mother’s intuition, she thought.

 

Alex sniffled again and whined low, deep in his throat. Shit. He had been sniffling a lot the past day. Did he just have a cold?

 

Hannah rubbed her hand down Alex’s back, detecting lots of tension in his tiny little muscles, as if all of them had expended far too much energy in too short a time period. “He’s not okay,” she said again.

 

“Okay, what do you need to do?” Evan asked, sitting down next to her.

 

“I don’t know, I don’t know!” Hannah said again, her voice rising in impatience and frustration. “Sorry, sorry, I didn’t mean—I’m not mad at you or anything,” she rushed to add, turning to face Evan. “I just don’t know what to do. My baby’s sick.”

 

“Does he have a fever?” Evan asked, gesturing to Alex’s head.

 

Hannah placed one hand on Alex’s forehead, trying to detect his temperature, but it was hard to tell. He felt warm; was that bad or good? “I can’t tell.”

 

“Let me look for a thermometer. There’s got to be one around here,” Evan said, getting to his feet.

 

“I think there’s one in one of the kitchen drawers,” Hannah said, remembering from her search for the scissors earlier.

 

“Got it!” Evan yelled from the other room, running back with an oral thermometer in his hand. “Do I wash it off or…?”

 

“Just to be safe,” Hannah said. “I can do it.” She got to her feet to reach out for the thermometer, but Evan was already on his way to the bathroom to rinse it off.

 

A minute later, he returned with the tool again, handing it off to Hannah, who made sure it was dry and room temperature before sticking it under Alex’s arm. “Hold on for me, baby, okay?” she whispered, soothingly rubbing the back of his head.

 

After another minute, the thermometer beeped, and Hannah pulled it out of his mouth. “Jesus fucking Christ,” she said. “We got to….we got to go, Evan.” She got to her feet, pressing Alex against her chest tightly.

 

“What is it? What’s wrong? Is it bad?” Evan asked, following her to the front of the cabin.

 

“Really bad,” Hannah answered. “Get…get your jacket on.” She didn’t know why she told Evan that. Her maternal instincts must have been going into overdrive. They must be compensating for time lost, she berated herself. As she walked through the front door and headed for the car, she couldn’t help but beat herself up internally. All day she’d been playing house with Evan when her baby was on death’s door. What kind of mother was she?

 

“It’ll be okay,” Evan said, even though he had no idea how bad things were. “He’ll be fine, baby.”

 

Hannah didn’t say anything, quickly putting Alex in his car seat and sitting right next to him. “Hospital,” she directed Evan. “Closest one. Just…please.”

 

“Got it,” Evan said, hurriedly backing out onto the dirt path again, speeding through the woods and heading for the main road. “It’ll be all right. It’ll be fine, Hannah. I promise.”

 

“You don’t know that,” she whispered as they found the highway once again. She leaned over to rub Alex’s head, even though he was fast asleep again. How much was this baby going to suffer? How much pain was he going to feel? Is he going to be taken away from me? Hannah wondered. Is this my punishment, for staying with Salvatore as long as I did, for letting Salvatore hurt my son, for stealing cars, for being a shitty mother, for everything I’ve fucked up?

 

It was another twenty minutes of driving before Evan pulled into the parking lot of a hospital. “Go in,” he said, pulling up to the curb of the emergency room. “I’ll find a place to park.”

 

Hannah nodded, too stressed to argue even though the hairs on the back of her neck stood up at the idea of splitting up even for a few minutes.

 

She rushed in, holding on to Alex with one arm and gripping her bag with the other, getting in line to talk to the receptionist to get a number for the nurses to see her son.

 

It was excruciating, waiting, but she didn’t want to ask anybody to skip the line or ask for help in any other way if she didn’t absolutely have to. The fewer people noticed them, the better. For all she knew, Salvatore had people camped out at all the hospitals, waiting for any sign of her.

 

Evan walked in a minute later, walking up to their place in line and taking Alex from her arms to give her a break.

 

“Thanks,” she whispered in response. She wished she could lean into him, let all of her weight sink into his body, but she was afraid of calling attention to herself in any way.

 

Finally, after another few minutes that stretched on and on and felt more like decades, it was her turn to talk to the receptionist and receive a number. “Hi!” Hannah half-yelled. Her voice was out of her control right now. The panic in her stomach was driving everything she did like a puppeteer. “My son is sick. Really sick. Got a really bad fever. Please, can we see a nurse, like, immediately?” she asked in a rush.

 

“Do you have insurance?” the lady at the front desk asked, rather than answering her question.

 

“Why does that matter?” Hannah asked. “I’m going to pay you, but please, look at my son, he’s sick, he’s really, really fucking sick.”

 

“Please refrain from using profanity, ma’am,” the stuffy nurse replied, her tone as even and calm as ever, as if a little boy wasn’t at risk of death. “It’s our policy right now. We need to know who’s able to pay up front.”

 

“I—I…” She couldn’t use her insurance. It was Salvatore’s insurance. He’d be alerted right away if Hannah used it to save Alex. Hannah sighed deeply and reached into her purse, rifling around for her supply of cash. She probably had a few hundred dollars left. That might work as a method of payment. Maybe she could even pay up front. That way they could get out of the hospital faster after Alex was better.

 

She pulled a pile of bills out of her bag and held it out for the receptionist to take, but the woman just shook her head and pursed her lips. “We’ll need to have a credit card on file if you don’t have insurance,” the woman said. “We don’t know what the total costs will be yet.”

 

Hannah blew out her breath in frustration. It was taking every last ounce of energy left to restrain herself from leaping across the desk and throttling the woman with her own two hands. She knew she’d told Evan that she didn’t want to kill anyone, but she was seriously considering rethinking that stance right now. “Please. Just take my money,” she said between gritted teeth.

 

“Credit card, ma’am. Credit. Card,” the lady said back, her voice going hard and mean.

 

Hannah sighed deeply and reached into her wallet for her card, handing it over a second later without a thought. “Will you please treat my son now?” she asked. Another wave of anxiety crashed over her, but she didn’t have the time or energy to ask herself why.

 

***

 

Evan

 

Hannah used the card. Maybe she hadn’t realized it, but Evan did. He knew what that meant. Salvatore’s men would be coming soon. Evan scanned his surroundings, looking for any sign of a familiar face among the crowd, but he couldn’t detect anything suspicious. Yet. He realized that they wouldn’t attack in this hospital lobby, but the second Alex was better and Hannah left the hospital with him, they’d be ready and waiting, and there was no way Evan could fight all of them off. The sensation of doom slipped down over Evan’s mind like a dark cloud, slow and steady and unstoppable. There was no way out. There was no way they were coming out of here alive.

 

Unless…unless I find a way to get to Salvatore first. Evan had an idea of where they were, geographically-speaking. They were actually closer to Salvatore’s place than they’d been just a few days earlier. That means it’ll take less time for them to get here, he thought silently, but it also meant Evan had an opportunity to reach Salvatore’s hideout, sneak in, and take him out before the hit was even called in. It would take them a few hours, probably, to notice the credit card activity and trace it back to the hospital. He had a head start, if he was willing to take it.

 

I am, he realized. I’m willing to do anything to protect them. Anything at all.

 

“Ma’am, you’ll have to wait with everybody else,” the receptionist lady was saying to Hannah.

 

“Excuse me, miss,” Evan said, stepping in front of Hannah to talk directly to the receptionist. “Hi. Could you please move us up as quickly as possible? Our child is very ill.”

 

“Everyone here is very ill,” the receptionist shot back. “Take your number and sit down.”

 

Evan could tell that arguing with her wasn’t going to get them anywhere. He took the little slip of paper with their number on it and nudged Hannah’s arm, encouraging her to follow him over to one of the seats against the wall.

 

Alex squirmed uncomfortably in Evan’s lap, his little chubby cheeks stained with tears. But he was crying silently rather than wailing sharply like he usually did. That’s not a good sign, Evan realized. It’s not a good sign at all.

 

But they were already doing all that they could for the boy, waiting for a doctor to come see him. And none of that would be worth a thing if Evan didn’t handle Salvatore, who would definitely know soon enough where they were. Alex sniffled against him and pressed his tiny hand against his chest, and Evan’s heart filled up with emotion. He knew what he had to do, and he had to do it now.

 

“Hannah,” Evan said, putting his hand on the bottom of Hannah’s back, trying to comfort her for one last second before saying something that would terrify her. “I think we should split up.”

 

“What do you mean?” Hannah said, panic clearly evident in her voice. Her eyes were as wide as Evan had ever seen them, worry filling every inch of her irises. It hurt Evan’s heart, to see her like this. But he had to do something. He had to take action, once and for all. For all of them.

 

“I’m going to try to find a doctor, tell him what’s going on. All this administrative bullshit is just getting in the way. The people here don’t know what they’re doing. If I can find a real medical professional somewhere else in the hospital, maybe I can get Alex in to see somebody faster.”

 

“What makes you think a doctor will listen to you and come help?” Hannah demanded. Evan wondered if she was already suspicious, if she knew what he was really planning, but he didn’t have any more time to waste convincing her.

 

“Trust me,” Evan said, getting to his feet. “I have ways of getting people to do what I want.”

 

Hannah bit down on her lip but nodded slowly. “Okay, okay, that makes sense. But shouldn’t I come with you? We should stay together, right? Salvatore—”

 

“Salvatore’s not going to try something in the middle of a crowded hospital,” Evan argued. “You’re safe here. Please, just stay put, surrounded by nurses, and you’ll be all right. I’ll be back as quickly as I can.”

 

Hannah was silent a moment, considering Evan’s suggestion. He didn’t know why he didn’t just take off, but somehow he felt like he needed her permission, even if she didn’t know exactly what he was going to do. He needed to know that she was okay with being left alone.

 

“Give me your phone number,” Hannah said after a long pause.

 

“Salvatore might be tracing our phones. We shouldn’t—” Evan started to say, but Hannah cut him off.

 

“I won’t use it if I don’t have to,” she said. “But if we’re going to be separated we have to have a way to contact each other. Otherwise, I just…I’d rather you not go.”

 

“Okay,” he said before rattling off the digits to his phone number quickly, letting Hannah type them into her phone.

 

“Got it,” Hannah said, putting her phone back into her bag. “Be quick, please, okay?”

 

“I’ll be quick,” Evan promised. I’ll kill Salvatore so quickly you won’t even notice I’m gone, he swore silently before leaning in to drop a soft kiss on her lips. It’ll be better for all of us after I do.

 

Evan turned on his heel and walked down the nearest hallway, turning a corner so that he was out of Hannah’s sight. He flattened himself against a wall so that nobody would see him before walking through the closest exit, back out into the winter night.

 

With every step he took back to the car, more and more guilt crushed down on him like a boulder. He’d promised Hannah that he wouldn’t go to kill Salvatore without warning her first, but there was no time. He knew that if he told her, she would try to talk him out of it, and he couldn’t afford wasting a single second more than he already had. It was Christmas Eve now, and there would be fewer men on Sal’s detail. Half of them would have gone home to spend time with their families, giving Evan the opportunity to sneak into Salvatore’s property and do the deed without alerting the whole crew. It was perfect, really.

 

I’ll use Christmas lights, Evan realized. They were meant for Hannah and now they’ll be for Salvatore. It’s perfect poetic justice. One last hit. One last time. It was worth it, if it meant freeing Hannah and Alex from the bastard that pursued them, if it allowed Hannah to be free for the first time in her life.

 

Evan slid back into the car, sighing at the sight of Alex’s car seat in the rearview mirror. “Dammit,” he grunted, leaning his head against the steering wheel. He knew he should go, take the opportunity while it was still fresh, but he couldn’t get over the memory of Hannah’s panicked face. He’d abandoned her during her darkest hour.

 

What kind of man am I? Evan asked himself, staring in one of the side mirrors at his aging face. What kind of man have I been? She deserves more. She deserves better. Far, far better than me.

 

But maybe this was Evan’s only way of giving her that. She deserved a man she could celebrate Christmas with, without all the hang-ups and baggage and bullshit. She deserved to be happy, without guilt. She deserved to be touched and held and protected by hands that weren’t stained with the blood of a hundred people. But she’d never have that unless Salvatore was out of the way.

 

Evan started the car, still pressing his forehead against the wheel, wanting it to be branded deep into his skin. He wanted to punish himself for leaving her, for hurting her, for damaging her trust once again. But this was the only way. Maybe she would hate him for it. Maybe she would never get over it. But there were more important things than feeling loved by someone you cared about.

 

They’re going to kill me, Evan thought distantly as he pulled out of the parking space and headed back to the main road. There are so many men in Salvatore’s mansion, there’s no way I won’t be detected after I murder him. They’ll find me, and they’ll kill me. But it’ll be worth it. It’ll be worth anything, to set Hannah free.

 

When Evan was a kid, the man who was supposed to protect him left, not caring whether Evan and his siblings lived or died. He was a selfish man, someone who chased his own happiness at the expense of everything and everyone else.

 

Evan set his jaw as he pulled out onto the highway, heading directly for Salvatore’s mansion. I’m not my father, he thought. I won’t be selfish. I won’t care about my own life if it means hurting others, not anymore.

 

Evan would sacrifice everything for the person he loved. One last hit. One last kill. Two final deaths. It was fitting, that this was the way things would end, on Christmas.

 

***

 

Hannah

 

After waiting for what felt like hours, they gave Alex a room and hooked him up to fluids. He cried terribly when he was pulled from Hannah’s arms, and for the hundredth time over the past week she had to force back tears as she allowed him to be pried away from her. It was for the best. She couldn’t take care of him, not the way he needed. It was up to the doctors now.

 

Where was Evan, though? He said he’d be right back. Was he going up to every doctor in the hospital individually and asking them for help? What the hell could be taking so long?

 

Shivers prickled up Hannah’s spine as she sat in the chair next to Alex’s bed, watching him sleep. What if—what if Evan was wrong? Hannah wondered. What if there is someone in this hospital waiting for us, and they found him and—and…. She allowed the thought to trail off, the alternative too horrifying to contemplate.

 

For several long minutes, she just stared out the window, looking out into the storm that rocked the trees back and forth, waving almost rhythmically like fans at a concert. Maybe that was why she was so on edge. No, it’s not the weather, she told herself. You’re worried that Evan has been hurt. You’re worried that he’s been—that he’s been killed. She swallowed heavily and buried her head in her hands, her pulse pounding in her temples against her wrists.

 

Her hands started itching painfully, like a thousand fire ants were crawling over her skin, biting every last inch of her palms. Images flooded her mind, one after another after another after another. Evan, tied up somewhere. Evan, bloodied and bruised. Evan, lying dead in a ditch. Hannah groaned, forcing the heels of her palms into her eyes to try to force the images out. But what could she do? She couldn’t very well chase after him. This was a large hospital, and he could be anywhere by now. And besides, Alex was still sick, even if the doctors had told her that he would be okay. She couldn’t leave his side.

 

There is one thing you could do, the voice inside her head said. The cell phone number. For a minute, Hannah argued her inner voice back down into silence. That option was reserved for emergencies only. Evan was right, after all. Salvatore had almost definitely put a trace on her phone, even if it was far less likely that he had a similar alert tied to Evan’s. But…there was a pay phone right outside Alex’s room. She’d noticed it when the doctor led her down the hallway thirty minutes earlier. Hannah had plenty of change at the bottom of her bag. She could use the pay phone to call Evan and see where he was.

 

Hannah shifted uncomfortably in her seat, trying to dispel the idea from her mind. She was just being paranoid, that was all. Evan would come back as soon as he could, right? But he doesn’t even know the room number, Hannah realized. He might be sitting in the emergency room right now waiting for some signal from me because he doesn’t know where to go.

 

That settled it. She’d make one call from the pay phone and leave a voicemail if she had to in order to tell Evan to come to Alex’s room. Then they could wait together for Alex to get a little bit better before leaving and never coming back to this godforsaken place. They could set off for South America, go someplace warm, where it never stormed at Christmas.

 

Hannah got up from her chair, making sure Alex was still asleep, before leaving the room and heading out to the payphone, digging around in her bag to find change. She pulled out her phone to retrieve Evan’s number as she fed coins into the payphone, typing out the numbers one by one before pressing the phone against her ear. “Pick up, pick up, pick up,” she muttered into the receiver as she listened to the drone of the ringtone.

 

But no such luck. The call went to voicemail. “Hey, um…” Hannah trailed off, realization dawning on her all of a sudden. What if Evan was captured or worse? That meant that Salvatore’s men could have his phone in their possession. It wasn’t a good idea to say the room number unless she was speaking directly to Evan. She’d just have to hang up and try again, as many times as it took for Evan to actually answer her.

 

She went through the whole process again, digging out change and placing it into the payphone to call him again. Yet once again, it went to voicemail after four or five pointless rings. Hannah groaned and took out more change, trying again. And again. And again. “Jesus, fuck, where are you?” she muttered into the phone, hanging up before trying one last time. This time, she left a message, choosing her words wisely to avoid saying anything specific. “Hey, call back at this number when you get this, okay? It’s important,” she said before slamming the payphone back down in frustration. Despite her anger, her stomach clenched nervously, all of her organs shriveling up inside of her.

 

Why isn’t he answering? Hannah inwardly demanded. She inhaled and exhaled several times, trying to get herself to calm down, pressing her head against the cold plastic of the phone. Maybe his phone is just switched off. Maybe he doesn’t have the ringer turned on. Maybe he’s in a busy loud room and he can’t hear anything over the noise of other people. Maybe he’s a stupid man who just doesn’t check his phone very often. Maybe everything is okay. Or maybe…maybe they have him. Maybe he’s not coming back. Maybe I’ll never see him again.

 

Hannah swallowed hard to steel herself, trying to turn into an unfeeling stone that wasn’t consumed with worry about Evan. Maybe that’s what she had to be in order to survive, in order to keep her son safe. Maybe it had been a mistake to ever allow Evan to crack her open like an egg, playing around with all of her soft, sensitive, weak spots. She had to be tough. She had to be strong. She had to keep it together. For Alex.

 

Hannah pulled her head back from the phone, hanging it back on the hook, and attempted to pull herself together, tying her hair back into a tight ponytail and straightening her clothes. She would be a good mother, for once in her life. She’d just focus on Alex and not worry about anything else for the time being.

 

She turned back to the room, pulling the chair from just inside the entrance up to press it against Alex’s bed, but when she looked up, he wasn’t there. “Alex?” she said, wondering if he managed to escape his tubes and climb down to the floor. “Alex!” She quickly scanned the room and then. She saw it.

 

There was a man in the corner of the room, dressed all in black, holding a small black gun in one hand and cradling Alex to his chest with the other. Hannah felt her heart jump up into her throat, but the rest of her body was frozen, stuck in time. “Please,” she whispered, barely moving her lips as she begged the man in black. “Please, don’t hurt him.”

 

The man grinned, mean and ugly, the scars on his face stretching out in every direction as he smirked at her menacingly.

 

“Please,” Hannah said again, slowly moving her hands in the vague direction of her bag. Maybe she could use her old keys to shove into the guy’s eyes and take her son back. It was a dumb idea, but what else could she do right now, other than beg? “Please, don’t hurt my baby,” she said.

 

“Scream, and he’s dead,” the man said in a low, gravelly voice.

 

Hannah shook her head. “No, no, Salvatore won’t let you. Please. Please, just put him down and take me. I’ll go with you. I’ll go anywhere you want. Do anything you want. Please. Just. Put him down.”

 

The man aimed the gun at her and squinted his eyes, and Hannah knew that she was about to be killed. If only I brought the gun from the cabin, she thought belatedly, the sick taste of bile filling up her mouth.

 

Just as the gun went off, Hannah dove down to the floor, crawling along as quickly as possible to shove herself under the hospital bed. There were three more gunshots—pop, pop, pop!—but then she heard the sound of footsteps running past her, and she shoved herself out from under the bed, taking off after the kidnapper.

 

“Stop him! Stop that man, he’s taking my baby, he’s getting away!” she shrieked at the hapless bystanders in the hallway before she broke into a run, rushing as fast as she could after the man.

 

She had almost caught up with him at the end of the hall when he suddenly turned around. This is it. This is where I die, Hannah thought, freezing in place as the man pointed the gun at her. There was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to run. Just death, looking her right in the eyes.

 

But at the last second the man turned the gun around and pointed it to Alex’s head. Alex cried out, suddenly wailing desperately, and Hannah felt her heart fall down into her stomach, threatening to continue to drop down and crash into the earth.

 

“Follow me, and your little baby eats lead. Stay fucking put,” the man said before breaking off into a run. Hannah’s feet burned to follow, especially when Alex’s cries grew softer and softer as the man went further away, but she froze on the spot.

 

A second later, Alex’s voice disappeared entirely, and Hannah’s legs gave out from underneath her, her entire body crashing to the ground in a heap of limbs.

 

“Miss, miss!” a voice said as someone leaned over her, trying to get her to stand back up. “Miss, it’s going to be okay. The police have been called.” But the voice sounded fuzzier and farther away with every second, dissolving into noises that Hannah could no longer understand, her brain switching off entirely as darkness consumed her.

 

When she awoke in a hospital bed sometime later, she knew what she had to do.

 

She reached into her pocket for her phone and texted Evan. There was no point in avoiding it anymore. It didn’t matter if anyone tracked her. There was nothing left to lose. Everything she’d ever loved had been taken away.

 

 

Evan

 

Evan gripped the steering wheel tighter, gritting his teeth as his phone rang again. Goddammit, she’s persistent, he thought to himself as he pressed his foot down harder onto the accelerator, changing lanes quickly before taking the last exit on the highway. Straight to Salvatore’s place.

 

Hannah must have called a dozen times by now, at the very least. He knew that if he answered the phone, he might have doubts, and if he had doubts, he might hesitate. And now was not time for hesitation. If this was going to work, he needed to be swift. Efficient. Clear headed. Get in, kill Sal, get out, and worry about Hannah later. That was what he had to do.

 

But still, Evan couldn’t deny that it sent sparks of fear up his spine every single time she called. She had to be pissed out of her mind at this point. God knows Evan would feel the same way if their situations were reversed. But he had to be strong for them both. This was the only way. Salvatore wouldn’t stop, not ever, not until he was dead on the floor with Christmas lights wrapped around his neck. If Evan got out of the situation alive—which, if he was really being honest with himself, he knew was a slim possibility—he might even take the Christmas lights back with him. He and Hannah could use them on a tree they bought together, even if they made all the other ornaments themselves.

 

Evan parked a half-mile away, far enough that the scouts on duty tonight wouldn’t notice, in a parking lot of a strip mall. He was already dressed in black and wasn’t carrying a lot around, so he knew he wouldn’t attract many eyes on the walk up. And if anyone tried to bother him, well, he’d just have to add another name to the hit list. Tonight, it ends, he promised himself. No matter what happens, I’m getting in that mansion and I’m choking the life out of Salvatore.

 

His phone rang again, shrill and sharp in the silence of the winter night. He made a mental note to turn the ringer off before heading into Salvatore’s place. It would obviously attract too much attention when he was surrounded by guards. But for some reason he couldn’t quite bring himself to switch it off yet. If he did, it would feel like letting himself off the hook. Hannah was upset. She was probably totally freaking out. He deserved to feel her pain rather than ignore it just so he would feel better. Images of her drawn, worried face filled his mind, and he felt pangs of guilt hit him right in the stomach. But he kept walking, slowly but steadily, staying to the tree line to avoid attracting attention.

 

Will she ever forgive me? Evan couldn’t help but wonder as he climbed uphill, his lungs working harder to compensate for the extra effort of his legs. The silhouette of Salvatore’s mansion was clear on the skyline now. Evan followed it like the North Star, as if it were guiding him home rather than to his probable death. So it didn’t matter, really, if Hannah forgave him, because more likely than not he was going to die tonight.

 

But somehow it still shook him to his core, thinking about Hannah hating him, even while dead. Even after he switched off the ringer on his phone, he couldn’t help but picture her spitting on his corpse. I abandoned her, he thought. I deserve it. Even though it’s all for her, I will deserve any and all of the hatred she sends my way. But still, he didn’t stop moving, the mansion getting closer and closer with each passing second.

 

Soon enough, he was on the property itself. He kept to the trees, careful not to step on any fallen branches or make any unnecessary noise. There were a few guards out front, but not a lot around the perimeter. In the back of his mind, Evan worried that Salvatore wasn’t even home tonight. It was possible he was out partying, maybe living it up at a strip club while his lieutenants hunted for Hannah and Alex.

 

Doesn’t matter, he decided, quickly crossing the flat empty space between the house and the trees, walking around the side of the building to find a back entrance. I’ll just lie in wait for him, then. Surprise him when he comes home.

 

But when he approached one of the back doors, he felt another wave of guilt crash over him, this time more powerful than any other he’d ever felt. Turn back, a voice in his head insisted as he squatted down next to the door. She cares about you, when you don’t even deserve it. Do you know what a miracle that is, that someone so beautiful and wonderful and strong has chosen you? Turn back. Don’t betray her. Turn back.

 

The words hung heavy in Evan’s mind. He couldn’t quite dislodge them or push them away like he had before. I can’t turn back, he tried to argue, but the voice just shouted over him. Turn back, turn back, turn back! He sighed deeply and reached into his pocket for his phone, seeing that she’d called over twenty times at this point.

 

But…there was a text message, too, this one directly from Hannah’s phone rather than an unknown number. Evan’s heart stuttered in his chest, fear clogging up his throat as he unlocked his phone. What could make her text him with her own phone? She knew the dangers.

 

Evan opened the message and read it, and his blood froze in his veins, turning to ice all at once, all throughout his body. They took Alex. That was all she said, but it was enough. Evan swallowed heavily and put his phone away, straightening his body and tensing up his muscles. He had no choice now. There was no turning back.

 

Right when he lifted his head, something cold and hard pushed against the back of his skull, sending chills rocketing through Evan’s body. Somebody was holding a gun to his head.

 

“Get up,” the voice behind him spat, shoving the gun a bit harder into the back of his head.

 

Evan slowly complied, feeling his heart stutter and then slow within his chest. It was like his flight or fight instinct had immediately switched off, all the adrenaline in his body abandoning him. The man behind him shoved an elbow into his side, urging him forward. Evan walked stiffly to the back door. This place used to be a hotel, Evan thought distantly as the man behind him opened the door and shoved him inside. It’s beautiful, really. A beautiful place to die.

 

If only I had gotten rid of Salvatore first, he thought silently as the man behind him pushed him more and more deeply into the golden hallway just inside the converted hotel.

 

Maybe it’s not too late, another inner voice argued back. If I get Salvatore out to see me, I could steal the gun from the guard and shoot him. It’d be suicide, for sure, but at least a useful one.

 

Evan cleared his throat and addressed the man behind him. “Let me speak to the boss.”

 

“Oh, don’t worry,” the guard replied in between menacing chuckles. “He’s been waiting to talk to you. Did you really think you could double-cross the man and get away with it?”

 

“I didn’t double-cross shit,” Evan said reflexively. There was really no point in keeping his mouth shut now. It’s not like he was going to walk out of here alive anyway. “Your boss is the piece of shit here. If you knew who you were obeying…”

 

Maybe I can convince him to drop the gun and walk away, Evan thought. He straightened his spine and cleared his throat again, trying to sound as calm and convincing as possible. “He’ll kill you, you know. As soon as you stop being useful. Why do you think he sent people after me right away? He didn’t want to have to pay me for the job.”

 

“A job you didn’t fucking do,” the henchman retorted, stabbing the butt of the gun into Evan’s spine painfully hard. “Save it, asshole. You’re going to die tonight.”

 

Evan nodded, more to himself than to the guard behind him. He inwardly debated his options. He could try to grab the gun from the guy now and shoot his way out, but it was too risky. The guard might see it coming and shoot him before he even got the chance. Better to be compliant and calm until the opportunity to hurt Salvatore arose.

 

Even if I don’t kill the bastard, I’m going to leave some scars. That much is for sure, Evan swore to himself.

 

The guard behind him shoved him to one side of the hall, pushing him in the direction of the last door on the right. Evan did as he was wordlessly instructed, walking through the open doorway and finally plopping down on the chair in the center of the room, clearly designated for him. As soon as the guard pulled the gun back from his head, Evan turned and looked around, trying to gather as much information about the location as possible.

 

Back when this place was a real hotel, this had been a luxury room for guests, obviously, with a huge canopy bed opposite the chair and an ornate mirror hanging above a set of drawers on the right wall. On the other side, however, there was a crib in the far corner. Evan’s blood ran as cold as the air outside. This is their old room. This is where he hit Hannah. This is where he hurt Alex.

 

There was only one door, only one way in or out, and the guard was standing on the threshold right now, still brandishing the gun. Images flicked through Evan’s mind, images of Hannah planning her escape. How had she done it? She had to have been in this exact position, terrified out of her mind, needing to get past guards with guns in order to save her son. She managed somehow, so Evan had to do the same thing.

 

Come on, think, he ordered himself, but it was no use. His brain was slowing down, accepting defeat, shutting off entirely, all of his neurons waving white flags of surrender. It was like he was slipping into a coma, but instead he was conscious and aware through the entire horrible ordeal, just frozen in place, waiting for death to come.

 

A second later, voices approached the room, on the other side of the huge hulking guard, who moved aside after a moment to allow someone to walk in. Salvatore, holding Alex. “Who’s a good little boy? Who’s Daddy’s little boy? Hmm? Are you Daddy’s little boy?” he cooed with a sneer on his face.

 

Every cell in Evan’s body sprung back to life again all at once. He leapt out of the chair and launched himself across the room at Salvatore, but a second later the guard interceded, knocking him back against the wall with two punches to the stomach. Evan saw another guard, then another enter the room, holding rope. Meanwhile, Salvatore didn’t even look a little frightened or disturbed by Evan’s display of anger. “I’m gonna fucking kill you, you shit,” Evan swore as the two new guards approached him and bound his hands behind his back. Next, they turned to his feet and tied them together, making it virtually impossible for Evan to move.

 

“Sure you are,” Sal said, chuckling a little as he stared down at Alex. “Just like you killed Hannah.” Evan strained against the rope binding him, hoping he could bust out with a combination of his muscles and force of will, but it was futile. They were tied way too tightly. But why hasn’t he killed me already? Evan wondered. He’s had me here for too long if he was just going to execute me for my failure. What’s his game plan?

 

“I don’t blame you, you know,” Salvatore continued. “She’s a real feisty one, my Hannah. It’s always been hard to keep her in check. I tried to love her, give her nice things, give her everything she wanted. But it still wasn’t enough. And now….now she thinks she’ll find the answer in you? Oh, no, don’t deny it,” Salvatore said, as if Evan had interjected, even though he made no movement to do so. “I can tell. It’s written all over your face. Plus, the only reason you’d come back here to kill me is if you….cared about her,” he said in a mocking tone of voice. “Silly, stupid Evan. You always were just a hired gun, you know, no brains, all muscle. Silly, silly, silly. You should have just run off when you had the chance. Now you’re going to pay.”

 

Evan just glared at him, watching as Alex squirmed uncomfortably in his arms. “He’ll never love you, you know,” Evan said, his voice calm and restrained, anger boiling under the surface. “You’ll try for years to control him, just like you did for Hannah, but it won’t work. He’s her son. He’s not yours, not really.”

 

That finally wiped the smile off Salvatore’s broad face. He snarled at Evan, stepping closer until he stood right over him. “What would you know about my son?”

 

Evan gave a half shrug in his restraints. “Take it from the son of another shitty father. You’ll never find what you’re looking for. You’ll never be happy, Sal.”

 

“What, and you are?” Salvatore shot back. “Tied up like a little bitch? You feeling pretty fucking happy now, huh?” He used the arm not wrapped around Alex to slam into Evan’s face, causing Alex to start wailing sharply, piercing the air with his cries.

 

“It’s okay, buddy, I’m okay,” Evan said soothingly, trying to calm the little boy.

 

“Don’t—fucking—talk—to—my—son!” Salvatore shouted, slapping Evan’s face from side to side in between every word. “Ever!”

 

Evan’s face stung with the impact of Salvatore’s blows, but he felt another sensation buzzing around in his head for the first time in years: pity. He actually felt sorry for the sick piece of shit beating him up. He’s never known Hannah. Not really, not deeply, not truly. He’s never known Alex. He’s never known their love, Evan realized. I have. It’s worth dying for. It’s worth it.

 

But that one bright spot of happiness started to fade as Salvatore backed away from him and cuddled Alex closer. “I’m so sorry,” Evan whispered out loud.

 

“What’s that?” Sal said, stepping forward a little bit again, but not as close as before.

 

“I’m not talking to you,” Evan said as rudely as he could. “Alex. I know you can’t understand me, but please forgive me. I’m sorry, I’m sorry I didn’t save you.” The weight of it all crashed down around Evan at once. He’d failed, really and truly this time. He’d failed to keep Alex safe.

 

At least Hannah can escape…maybe one day Alex will find her and they’ll be together again, but not me. It ends tonight for me. It’s what I deserve, really, after all these years, Evan thought, a quiet cloud of acceptance sinking down around his head and then dissipating throughout his whole body.

 

“Hit him,” Salvatore said to his guards before moving to the back corner of the room to watch.

 

Evan barely had a second to brace himself, going limp as one of the guards grabbed him by the chin and punched him directly in the center of his face. He heard something on his face crunch, lines of pain shooting out in every direction. The man smacked him again on the side of his face, then again on the other side. Evan let his head hang down, blood dripping from his nose down onto the floor. Out of nowhere, the second guard kicked the leg of the chair, sending it flying to the ground. Evan’s head smacked against the hardwood floor, the throbbing reverberating throughout his skull.

 

“Bring out the knives,” Salvatore directed from the back of the room. Evan could hear Alex crying, but softer now, like the baby’s panic had given way to sadness and resignation. No mark on Evan’s body, no matter how agonizing, could hurt him as much at that.

 

The guards pulled the chair back up, taking small knives out of their pockets and waving them in front of Evan’s face. He just blinked at them, refusing to show any fear. So what, Salvatore liked to play with his food before he ate it. Evan wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of screaming.

 

“Get his phone out of his pocket,” Salvatore said, and the guards rushed to comply, but then they walked back around the chair and used the knives to cut his hands free, handing him the phone. Evan was so surprised he almost dropped it. What are you playing at, Sal? Evan wondered.

 

“You’re gonna call that bitch and tell her where she can see her son,” Sal said.

 

Oh. So that’s what this whole thing is about. Hannah. He wants me to bring Hannah here so she can die, too. No fucking way.

 

Evan just stared at Salvatore, locking eyes with the evil bastard to show him he wasn’t intimidated. Salvatore’s upper lip curled as he pointed at the guards and snapped his fingers, wordlessly telling them to continue the torture.

 

Evan inhaled deeply and shut his eyes, awaiting the sharp ends of the knives. “Fucking traitor,” one of the guards said as he sliced into Evan’s cheek. Evan grinded his teeth together firmly to make it through the pain, trying desperately to avoid whimpering or crying out. At the same time, another knife slid against his knee, cutting through his pants and then into his skin, deeply and jaggedly. A moment later Evan felt thick streams blood slide down his calves and disappear into his shoes.

 

“Call her, Evan,” Salvatore said again.

 

“Fuck you,” Evan muttered as steadily as he could, speaking through clenched teeth.

 

“Do it!” Salvatore screamed, making Alex whimper in response.

 

There was silence for a moment, all of the guards evidently waiting for Evan’s reaction, but he just set his jaw and kept his eyes screwed shut, staring as hard as he could at the blank blackness of his own eyelids. Salvatore snapped again, and the cold slickness of the knives appeared on Evan’s wrists. His own lungs betrayed him, sucking in air in preparation for the pain to come. He almost winced as the knives pierced his skin, carving up his arms. I can do this. I can be strong. For Hannah.

 

“You can make it stop, Evan,” Sal said. “It’s all up to you. The pain can stop in a second if you want it to.”

 

“Fuck. Off,” Evan whispered, his breathing becoming too labored to speak any louder.

 

“All right,” Salvatore said. “If that’s the way you want it. I guess we’re doing this the hard way.”

 

One of the guards slammed his fist against Evan’s face, once, twice, three, four times while the knives kept digging into his arms. As time went on, Evan’s pants became drenched, sticking to his legs with a mixture of sweat and blood, while his face went numb, barely buzzing with pain with every subsequent punch that occurred. The longer the torture continued, the easier it became, all sensation leaving Evan’s body as he hid deep inside his mind. I’m somewhere else. I’m somewhere warm, with Hannah and Alex. We’re on a beach somewhere. We’re together. We’re safe.

 

Outside, in the real world, the blows and cuts and punches became increasingly frequent as Salvatore kept snapping his fingers. But somewhere in the world, Hannah was safe, and that was all that mattered to Evan, at least for the time being.

 

“Boss, it’s not working,” one of the guards murmured next to his ear.

 

“Fuck it, fine, give me his phone,” Salvatore’s distant voice said from somewhere in the room.

 

A moment later, Evan heard a distinct clicking noise and the sound of footsteps before the entire room fell silent. The guards and Salvatore must have left him alone. He struggled to open his eyes, but they were practically sealed shut by the swelling of his nose and forehead and eyelids. Evan sighed deeply, accepting his fate. There was no way out of here, even if the guards did stay gone for longer than a few minutes.

 

I tried, Hannah, he thought as the grip of sleep threatened to overtake his mind. Please forgive me. Please. I love you.

 

***

 

Hannah

 

Hannah stared down at her phone. No response. She didn’t know what she had expected, seeing as Evan hadn’t answered any of her calls either, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away from it. At the same time, she felt numb, her entire body feeling blank and neutral and empty. This must be what it’s like to lose everything, Hannah thought. You don’t get sad. You just become an empty vessel, full of nothing.

 

She swallowed around a lump in her throat and pressed her head down harder into the pillow. Her head was pounding, but she didn’t really care enough to ask for pills, even though she was still in the hospital. There was no point in making the discomfort stop. The pain would never stop now.

 

Hannah shut her eyes, facing the abyss of her own mind, trying to crawl her way into sleep. Maybe if I want it badly enough, she thought, I can sleep forever. I can just never wake up. It’s better that way. That’s what I should have done from the start, rather than try to give Alex a better life. I should have just given up. I should have just given in. Trying was bullshit. She should have just accepted the truth. She was weak. She’d always been weak. It was dumb to pretend otherwise.

 

Ping.

 

It took her several seconds to realize where the noise came from. But then realization dawned on her, making her stomach feel oddly sick. “My phone,” she said out loud, hoarsely whispering in the empty quiet of her hospital room. It should have felt like a lifeline. It should have felt like a relief, to finally hear back from Evan, but it was too late by now, she knew. Alex was gone. Salvatore had him, and she was never going to get him back.

 

Still, she swung her arm forward to the bedside table, reaching out for her phone and pulling it forward so that she could see the message through her blurry eyes, still clogged up with the tears she shed earlier that night.

 

What she saw made her blood stand still in her veins.

 

The text read come right above an image attachment. It was Evan, tied to a chair, his eyes swollen shut while fresh bruises and tiny cuts lined the rest of his face. He looked like he was knocked out cold.

 

Hannah barely had a second to absorb what she had just seen before the phone rang, Evan’s name flashing across the screen. She swallowed thickly, desperately trying to summon up the courage she needed, before she hit “accept” and pressed the cell phone to her ear. “Hello?”

 

“Hey, there, doll,” Salvatore’s voice said on the other end. “How’s it hanging?”

 

“Where’s Alex? Where’s Evan? Are they…are they still alive?” Hannah asked, her voice panicked and strained as she sat up in bed too quickly.

 

“They are….for now,” Salvatore said, dragging out the pause in between his words to convey his threatening message. “You want them to stay that way, Hannah?”

 

Hannah nodded before she remembered that Salvatore couldn’t see her. Unless he’s watching me right now, she thought, a shiver running up her spine as she looked around her to check her surroundings. “What do you want me to do?” she asked.

 

“Oh, it’s simple. Just come.”

 

“Where?” Hannah asked.

 

“Home, where else? The old hotel. Come, darling, and we’ll work something out.”

 

Hannah’s stomach clenched painfully, her heart throbbing in her chest. “What does that mean?”

 

She could hear Salvatore click his teeth impatiently on the other end of the call. “Just come out first and we’ll see.”

 

“How do I know you haven’t already killed Evan? You could be bluffing to get me to come out,” Hannah argued.

 

“You hear this?” Salvatore said, a whooshing sound filling Hannah’s ear as he moved the phone around. At first she just heard heavy breathing before a baby’s cry pierced through her ears. Alex. Shit. “See, your baby’s still alive. If you want him and Evan to stay that way, you’ll come out, as soon as possible. Goodbye, Hannah.” He hung up immediately, oppressive hopeless silence filling Hannah’s ears in place of the sounds of her baby boy.

 

She was still lightheaded from fainting earlier, but she had to get up without attracting the attention of any of the nurses. She slowly shifted and put her feet on the ground, carefully standing up and taking an experimental step. It took all of her energy, all of the effort left in her bones to move. But she did it. She pushed forward, finding her shoes on the other side of the room along with her big bag.

 

Hannah quickly slipped her feet inside her boots and swung the bag over her shoulder, heading for the door. She walked down the hallway casually, trying not to be noticed by anybody, but as soon as she turned a corner she broke out into a run, stumbling as fast as she could for the stairs. She kept going, her body relearning how to move with every step she took down until she exited out into a parking garage.

 

Shit, I don’t have a car, Hannah realized, looking around at the lines of SUVs and vans that surrounded her. Oh, well. Her old tricks from her teenage days would have to pay off for her one last time.

 

She chose a small blue car, pulling a long thin wire out of her bag to slip through the crack in the window and crack the lock on the front door. Her wrists weren’t cooperating with her, so it took a few minutes longer than it should have, Hannah constantly looking over her shoulder every few seconds and ducking out of sight whenever a random person walked down into the garage and went past her. But eventually the lock clicked open and Hannah climbed inside, slamming the door shut behind her.

 

What are the chances that a key is waiting for me? Hannah wondered, searching the glove compartment for a spare. When her trembling hands finally landed on the key, she brought it to her mouth and kissed it repeatedly, tears pooling in her eyes as a result of the miracle that she had just been granted. Maybe God is watching out for me, she thought despite the circumstances. I still have a chance.

 

She pulled out of the garage as quickly as possible, speeding down the main road until she could get on the highway, heading for the old hotel that used to be her home.

 

When the silhouette of the old mansion appeared on the skyline, her tongue went as dry as sandpaper in her mouth and the contents of her stomach swam around in her gut like fish trying to escape a bowl full of water. Just a couple of weeks ago she’d run from this place, and at the time she swore never to come back. How had she failed so terribly?

 

Enough whining, she berated herself, pressing down on the accelerator to get to the hotel faster. You have to go in again. You have to.

 

She had no choice. Evan had looked…he’d looked horrible, tied up the way he was in that picture. There was no way she could leave him there to die. But what if I’m too late? Hannah wondered, her heart pounding in her throat violently at the thought.

 

I can’t be too late. I can’t be, she argued with herself. There’s no way. I haven’t…I haven’t told him yet… Her inner monologue trailed off.

 

What? What haven’t I told him? Hannah thought as her car rapidly closed the distance stretching out in front of the old hotel.

 

That he is loved, she answered herself, and she knew it to be true the way she knew the earth was real, the way she knew that blood ran in her veins. It was like the love she felt for him had been hiding inside of her all of her life, waiting for this moment to finally wake up. It was exactly what she needed, energizing every cell in her body. Preparing her for war.

 

Time to stop running. Time to face the music, no matter how ugly it is. Time to save my boys.

 

The car rolled to a stop in the front driveway. She wasn’t trying to hide. She was going to walk in with her head held high, even if one of Salvatore’s guards put a bullet into it a second later. Hannah exhaled shakily. She decided to leave her bag in the car. It would only be taken away from her anyway.

 

Hannah got out of the car, locking it and shoving the key deep in her back pocket as she approached the front door of the old hotel. She used to love this place a little bit. It was the first home she’d had without a leaky roof. That counted for something, some feeling of security that she’d never expected to feel as a kid. But now as she walked inside, she couldn’t feel anything but dread.

 

As soon as she passed through the threshold, two broad hands landed under her arms, picking her up and holding her in midair. Hannah kicked her feet a little but didn’t actually resist.

 

“All right, all right, I’m coming willingly, hands off,” she said to the hulking guard that had lifted her and now patted her down, clearly looking for a gun or a knife or anything else she could use as a weapon. She held her breath as the guard patted down her back pocket, but he didn’t notice the key inside. At least there was a chance, however small, that she could still get away in the car if she got the opportunity to run back outside after grabbing Alex and Evan.

 

After another few seconds of searching, the guard was finally satisfied, but he grabbed her hands and held them behind her back, squeezing tight around her wrists.

 

“Is that really fucking necessary?” Hannah asked, trying to pull out of the guard’s grasp.

 

“Shut your trap,” the guard said. “Walk.”

 

Hannah did as he said, going forward into the entry hallway, turning corners when the guard unceremoniously shoved her left or right. Eventually she realized where they were going: to her old bedroom, where Salvatore used to keep her holed up with Alex. But before they could get there, Salvatore appeared out of one of the side rooms, causing the guard to freeze in his tracks before pushing Hannah forward in Salvatore’s direction.

 

“Hello, lover,” Salvatore said, an ugly grin spreading across his face. “You know, there was a part of me that hoped you wouldn’t come.”

 

“Oh, yeah? Why’s that?” Hannah asked, feeling the sick burn of hatred climb up her back and lower neck as she stared at the man who had imprisoned and then hunted her.

 

Salvatore shrugged a little, stepping forward to grab Hannah’s hands. “Oh, you’re cold,” he said, rubbing her wrists with his fingers. Hannah trembled and yanked her hands away out of his grasp.

 

“Okay, I’m here, I did what you wanted. But don’t fucking touch me, Salvatore,” she said, suppressing the urge to spit in his face.

 

He sighed deeply and cocked his head to one side, looking at her like she was an animal in a zoo. “I’m sad you came, because I thought that maybe I was wrong. Maybe you didn’t love him. But you do, don’t you?”

 

Hannah narrowed her eyes and scowled. “None of your fucking business.”

 

“But that’s where you’re wrong,” Salvatore replied. “It is my business, because you’re mine, Hannah. You’ve always been mine. All I wanted was for you to come home, come back to me, but instead you—”

 

Hannah cut him off, her disgust becoming too much to bear. “No, no, you didn’t want that, otherwise you wouldn’t have sent your fucking goons after me, trying to murder me and steal Alex—”

 

“And you fell in love with one of those goons,” Salvatore interrupted her, making her fall silent. “What’s going through your mind, Hannah? What is your silly stupid little head thinking of? You think anything will be different with him? You think he’s any different from me?”

 

Hannah just stared at him, watching as his face got redder and redder as his anger mounted. She felt herself start to tremble, the way she always would right before Salvatore hit her in the past, but she tried hard to quell the shaking as best as she could. Don’t give him the satisfaction, she told herself. Don’t give him your fear.

 

“Answer me,” Salvatore demanded. “You think he’s better than me? You think he’s not going to get fed up like I do by the stupid fucking bullshit you say and knock you around? Huh?”

 

Hannah swallowed to clear the lump in her throat, image after image after image of Evan flooding her mind at the thought. He was a murderer, just like Salvatore. So what was the difference, really? “He’s not a monster,” she whispered. “That’s the difference.”

 

She saw the hand aiming for her face before it connected. That didn’t make the pain any less real, her cheek stinging with the force of the impact. She cupped her cheek and rubbed her skin to make the pain go away, but she didn’t duck her head or drop her eyes like she would have in the past. She faced him down, staring as hard as she could into his eyes. I know what you are, she said silently with her gaze. And deep down inside you do, too.

 

Salvatore’s chest rose and fell rapidly, his face going a deep red as if he could hear the silent words. “You want to see how mean I can be? You haven’t seen shit yet.”

 

He launched forward and grabbed Hannah by the hair, dragging her across the hallway towards her old bedroom. No matter how hard she tried, she hadn’t escaped this place. This was where she was going to spend the rest of her life, no matter how short that might be. But as she crashed into the room and saw Evan, slowly sitting up straight in his chair, she thought, at least I won’t die alone.

 

***

 

Evan

 

It took Evan an eternity to open his eyes. That’s what it felt like, as if he’d spent a thousand years struggling with the pain to lift his eyelids. But he did it. He opened them, staring now at the crotch of the guard standing above him. Evan focused as hard as he could to lift his head, seeing a gun dangling down in front of his face from the guard’s hands.

 

Salvatore had been out of the room for a while, as far as he could tell, and Evan wondered a little vaguely where he’d been, but ultimately he didn’t care. Any second without him was a tiny moment of freedom, a few seconds where he wasn’t being beaten or cut into.

 

But then, suddenly he heard two voices shouting, one male, one female. A moment later two bodies stumbled gracelessly into the room. It was Salvatore, holding onto Hannah by the nape of her neck. Hannah. Hannah, no!

 

Evan had never felt more like crying ever before in his life. He thought for sure Hannah would stay away, that she would know better than anybody that there was no way out of this situation. Now they were all going to die: Hannah, Evan, Alex, all together. It was all for nothing.

 

“So, it’s a big fucking party now, isn’t it?” Sal shouted, pulling on Hannah’s hair until she visibly winced. “Fucking cunt.”

 

“Let her go,” Evan whispered, struggling to speak louder. He must have lost a lot of blood earlier; he felt so weak. But he still straightened up in the chair, trying once again to flex out of his restraints despite the guard standing over him with the gun.

 

“Yeah, okay, I’ll do that,” Salvatore said mockingly, shoving Hannah to the ground with all of his might. Hannah tried to get back up immediately, but Salvatore put his boot on her back and pushed until she sunk down to the ground. “Yeah, stay down. Stay where you belong, bitch.”

 

Hannah grunted weakly and tried to flip over onto her back and stand up, but this time Salvatore kicked her right in the stomach, causing her to cry out in pain and clutch her torso.

 

“I’ll fucking kill you,” Evan vowed between clenched teeth, but Salvatore just laughed at him, deep and full-throated.

 

“Yeah, keep talking that talk, big man,” Salvatore taunted him, gesturing to the guard dangling the gun in Evan’s face. “You know, I tried to give you both a chance. I invited you back into my home after you betrayed me, and you still give me this fucking attitude. Acting like I’m this big evil guy when really—” Salvatore slammed his fist against the wall, cracking the plaster a little. “Really, I’m the victim here. I’m the one who’s been betrayed. I’m the one who’s been hurt and cheated on by this fucking bitch. I would have forgiven you, too. Really, I would have,” Salvatore continued, leaning over to look in Hannah’s eyes and talk directly to her. “But you had to keep disrespecting me, always disrespecting me, always making me mad, always turning me into somebody I don’t want to be.”

 

“Fucking liar,” Hannah croaked out from her place on the ground. “You fucking love being who you are.”

 

Sal smirked down at her for a minute before the grin slipped off his face and was replaced by a scowl. A second later, he leaned over her and spat in her face. “After everything I’ve given you, taking you out of the trash where you were born, accepting you, cleaning you up, turning you into a real woman—after all of that, this is how you repay me. Ungrateful cunt.” Salvatore raised his boot again and slammed it down into Hannah’s legs.

 

“Stop it! Just stop it! Hit me instead, please!” Evan begged, the effort of yelling burning his damaged vocal cords.

 

Salvatore threw his head back and laughed. “Oh, Evan. Evan, Evan, Evan, you stupid little man. I expected better from you, you know. Not the loyalty thing, I mean. All hitmen are opportunistic pieces of shit at the end of the day, but I thought you were smart, you know? I thought you had your head on straight. Instead you just went and got distracted by this evil vindictive bitch. I made the same mistake, thinking she could love me. But there’s nothing good or pure about her. She’s just gutter trash, and she’ll never amount to anything. Especially now.”

 

Hannah started crawling in the opposite direction from Salvatore, and at first Evan thought she was trying to get away, but then he realized where she was going. Alex. Alex was in his crib, crying for his mother.

 

“Uh, uh, uh!” Salvatore yelled, like a teacher reprimanding her. He walked ahead of her and scooped Alex out of his crib, cradling him in his arms. “My baby. Not yours, Hannah. Not anymore.”

 

Hannah chocked out a sob, and Evan felt like a thousand daggers had just been buried in his chest. “Don’t hurt him, Salvatore!” she cried out hysterically. “Don’t you dare fucking hurt him!”

 

“Now, why would I want to do that?” Salvatore asked, a mocking edge to his voice. “He’s mine now. He’s not going to be corrupted by your weakness any longer. He’ll grow up to be strong, like me.”

 

Hannah started sobbing full-out now, cradling her head in her hands. “No, no, no,” she said between her tears.

 

Evan wished he could get up and comfort her, crush her to his chest so that he could take all her sadness and despair away. But his restraints were still tight and secure, even though he could tell the guard in front of him wasn’t paying close attention to his feet. Evan started moving around as subtly as possible, trying to get his feet free. He needed to be able to stand up if he was going to cross the room and take Alex away from Sal.

 

“You know, I think I’ve decided the appropriate punishment for you, Evan,” Salvatore said, suddenly turning his attention back to him while Hannah sobbed and banged her fists on the floor in despair.

 

“What’s that?” Evan said, trying to keep Salvatore’s attention on his face while he struggled out of his foot restraints. They weren’t as tight as Hannah’s were, he noted. They were coming loose, slowly but surely. He just had to make sure the guards didn’t notice and retie them tighter.

 

“You’re going to watch her die,” Salvatore said in a casual tone of voice, shrugging lightly. “Seems fitting. She’s the only thing you really care about, right?”

 

Evan didn’t say anything, setting his mouth into a straight line as he stared back at the mobster. He knew that if he reacted now, Salvatore might just torture Hannah more or worse, kill her faster.

 

“Answer me, you piece of shit!” Salvatore shouted, walking forward to kick Hannah in the side again.

 

“Don’t do what he says, Evan,” Hannah said in between huge panting breaths, curled up in a little ball on the floor. “He’ll kill us anyway. Don’t give him what he wants.”

 

“I know, baby, I know,” Evan murmured, watching as Sal turned practically purple in response to his words.

 

“Come here, ‘baby,’” Salvatore said mockingly, leaning over her with Alex in his arms and using his free hand to slam Hannah’s head into the ground again.

 

Alex started screaming, incredibly loudly, causing the guard above Evan to tear his eyes away from his captive in annoyance.

 

Now or never, Evan thought, flexing every muscle of his body until he finally somehow broke the restraints left on his arms. He reached up quickly and grabbed the gun from the guard standing above him, forcing it out of his hands. For a second he fumbled with the gun, almost dropping it, but he rapidly recovered, flipping the gun back around and pointing it at the guard.

 

“Back! Get back!” Evan shouted. But the man didn’t listen, launching forward to try to grab the gun back, so Evan fired, three times directly into his chest before immediately turning and aiming the gun at the next guard, shooting the man before he could try anything. Forgive me, Hannah, Evan thought. I’m not as good as you.

 

But this wasn’t the time to feel guilty. He got to his feet, shaking off the leftover rope around his legs, and pointed the gun at the last guard, who was cowering in the corner with his hands up. Salvatore was nowhere to be seen. He must have run out at the first sound of gunshots. “Stay fucking put!” he screamed at the last guard before running out into the hallway after Salvatore.

 

“Evan!” Hannah yelled after him, but Evan couldn’t afford to turn around or yell anything back, putting every ounce of energy left in his body into giving chase. He hurriedly fired the gun again halfway down the hallway, putting a bullet in the chest of the guard standing there, and continued running, seeing the distant silhouette of Salvatore disappear at the end of the hall.

 

“Come on, come on,” Evan said to himself, his lungs working overtime as he pushed his legs and arms as hard as they could go, leaping through the front door and out into the bitter winter night.

 

It’s snowing, Evan realized as soon as he exited the building, the snow coming down hard and fast and covering the ground thickly. Salvatore had disappeared, and Evan looked around desperately, but he couldn’t see any sign of the shadowy figure despite the flat landscape. But then he looked down, seeing new, undisturbed tracks in the fresh snow and quickly following them along toward the main road.

 

“Sal! Put the baby down!” Evan howled into the wind as soon as he saw the mobster running towards a line of houses across the way. But the man didn’t turn around or answer. Evan gripped his gun tighter and tried to take aim, but he realized a second later that he couldn’t do it and chased after him instead. He couldn’t shoot Salvatore like this, not when he was holding the baby. There was no way for Evan to be sure that he wouldn’t hit Alex.

 

Adrenaline pumped in Evan’s veins, his heart pounding so hard in his ears that it sounded like a drumbeat, like a war cry. He put this latest burst of energy to use, flexing his legs as hard as possible to catch up with Salvatore in the front yard of one of the houses across the road.

 

“Fucking asshole!” Salvatore shouted, holding the baby out in front of himself as a shield. “What are you going to do? Kill the baby? Hannah will never forgive you, monster!”

 

Evan groaned. “Don’t do that. Be a man and put the baby down,” he said, still pointing the gun in Salvatore’s direction.

 

“Not a chance,” Salvatore said between clenched teeth.

 

“I’ll put the gun down now if you drop the baby,” Evan bartered, slowly lowering the gun to the snowy ground.

 

“Kick it over to me,” Sal demanded.

 

“I’ll throw it off in the distance, okay? If you put the baby down first,” Evan said, but Salvatore just shook his head. In the past, Evan would have taken aim by now, finishing his hit no matter what the cost. But there was no way he could endanger Alex. I have to save him, he thought. Even if I die, he has to get out. He has to get away from Salvatore.

 

“Just hand me the baby and I’ll let you go,” Evan said. At first, he thought he was lying, saying something to get Salvatore to cooperate, but after a second he realized it was true. He was willing to let it go, move on, just like Hannah wanted, as long as they were safe. He didn’t care about revenge anymore. He just wanted to save Jeffrey.

 

“Throw the gun!” Salvatore demanded, his voice edging on hysteria. “Throw the fucking gun or I bash the baby’s head into this tree!”

 

Fear shot up Evan’s spine, consuming him. Please don’t hurt him, he thought about begging. Please, please, I’m sorry, just don’t hurt him. He’d never felt this desperate before in his whole life. But Salvatore was a man without a heart, without a soul. There was no way to barter emotionally with him.

 

Instead, Evan turned and tossed the gun behind him, putting his back into the effort to launch the weapon as far as he could throw it. Salvatore immediately set off in the direction of the gun, practically salivating for it, but Evan chased after him again, finally colliding into him and pushing him to the ground, trusting that the accumulation of snow would make a soft enough landing for the baby.

 

Alex’s cries mingled with the howling of the wind, but Evan barely had enough time to wonder if the baby had broken something when a fist collided into his face, connecting with a sore spot from earlier. Evan spat a wad of blood onto the ground and hurled himself forward, shoving his entire body into Sal’s and pinning him down on the ground. Evan smacked his fist into his face, again and again and again, grabbing Salvatore by the shirt collar and shoving him hard into the ground, trying to crack his head open.

 

Evan fought as hard as he could, but his injuries from the earlier torture had caught up with him, his lungs burning with every punch and blow that he gave to Salvatore. Several of his wounds reopened, and he bled into the snow, streaks of red mixing with the white to form pink clouds underneath his body.

 

He was running out of steam, and Salvatore took the opportunity to flip them over, shoving Evan into the snow and smacking his open wounds with his own bloody fists. Pain exploded in Evan’s skull, every last inch of his skin going numb and fuzzy again. I can’t lose, I can’t lose, he’ll kill Hannah, he’ll hurt Alex, I can’t lose, Evan thought, trying to force his body back up to flip them back over.

 

But Salvatore forced his knees down on Evan’s gut, pinning him to the ground as he wrapped his hands around Evan’s neck, squeezing powerfully, forcing all of the air out of Evan’s lungs. This can’t be how it ends, no, no, no, no... Evan’s thoughts grew softer and quieter as Salvatore’s fingers shoved deeper into the skin of his neck, pressing down hard on the bone.

 

This is how it ends, with me failing the only two people I love, Evan thought as his eyes threatened to shut for the last time…

 

But then something wide and black appeared over them like a flying saucer, smacking into Sal’s head and shoving him down to the ground. A second later, someone’s hand reached down and pulled Evan to his feet. Hannah’s concerned face appeared, wide and open and vulnerable as she cupped the side of Evan’s face and rubbed his sensitive neck. “Are you…are you okay?”

 

“Alex,” Evan said, remembering the baby had fallen somewhere in the snow a few feet to the left. He heard the wail of the baby rise above the sound of the wind, stumbling off in his direction until he found him and scooped him up, hurriedly pressing him against his body to warm him back up.

 

“My baby,” Hannah said in between choked-off sobs. “My baby,” she repeated, reaching out to rub Alex’s face. Looking at her now, Evan finally noticed that Hannah was holding the frying pan—the weapon she once used to knock him out. She must have gotten it out of the car parked in front of the old hotel.

 

A moment later they returned to stand over Salvatore, who was moaning weakly but barely moving. Hannah spat in his face and swung the pan down hard again, grunting loudly, swinging again and again and again until Salvatore stopped moving. “Fucking coward!” Hannah screamed, lifting the frying pan above her head again, and for a second Evan thought she was about to finish the job, but she hesitated halfway down, her arm freezing in midair. She shivered in the wind, staring down at her abuser, but Evan could tell she couldn’t do it. Hannah just didn’t have it in her. And that’s a miracle, a quiet voice in his head said.

 

“Let me do it,” Evan said softly. “I’ll do it, baby.”

 

“I, I—” Hannah stuttered, her face flushing a deep red. “I can…I don’t…”

 

Evan shook his head and offered the baby forward. “Take your son, Hannah. You keep him warm. I’ll do it. Just make sure this asshole doesn’t move.” He took off across the lawn of the neighbor’s empty house, walking up to the porch to remove the Christmas lights hanging down from the roof. It had to be done this way.

 

Rule six of killing: hold nothing back.

 

He returned to Sal, straddling the mobster as he wound the Christmas lights around his neck, over and over and over again until they were as tight as possible. Evan tugged the end of the string of lights as hard as he could, pulling them forward until Salvatore made a low choking sound, gasping for air. Evan stared down into his eyes, watching for several minutes as life faded from him, until he finally twitched a few times and went still.

 

It was done.

 

***

 

Hannah

 

Hannah watched as Evan got off of Salvatore’s body and walked back over to her, stopping to grab the gun from the snow on his way back. “I have to go back into the hotel,” Evan said, his eyes looking off far in the distance rather than meeting hers.

 

She shivered and held Alex closer, trying to transfer all of her body heat to his. “Why?”

 

Evan swallowed, his throat working visibly as he prepared to answer her. “There, um. The henchmen. The guards. There’s got to be some still left in there. I have to take care of them.”

 

“No, you don’t,” Hannah said, reaching forward with one hand to grab one of Evan’s, rubbing his bruised wrist with her thumb. “Just come with me and let’s get out of here.”

 

Evan shook his head, staring down at the bloody snow. “I’ve got to—I’ve got to take care of them. They could come after us.”

 

Hannah shook her head furiously. “No, no, please. Please, Evan. Let’s just go.” Snowflakes were falling in her hair, and Evan smiled at her softly, brushing a piece of snow from her eyelash.

 

“You know these men, Hannah. They were loyal to him. They were willing to torture you, to kill you, to watch him hurt a little baby. They’d do anything for him,” Evan said softly, his eyes wide and sad as he looked at her.

 

Hannah tried to think up a reason, something to argue with him, but she couldn’t come up with anything. “I’ll go in with you,” she whispered.

 

“No, stay,” Evan said. “Get in the car and lock the doors. Stay warm. I’ll be right back.”

 

“Okay,” she said, walking over to the car, feeling her stomach sink as she watched Evan walk back into the hotel with the gun in his hand. Please let him come back to me. Please let him be safe, she prayed to any god that would listen, leaning forward against the steering wheel and holding Alex as close as possible, rocking him back and forth.

 

Alex whined a little in her arms, but he otherwise seemed to be okay. Thank you, God, thank you, God, thank you, Evan, she thought, kissing the top of Alex’s head over and over again. She was sure that she had lost her reason for living, that there had been no reason to continue. She was certain that her family had been destroyed forever.

 

But it wasn’t. It was a miracle, a Christmas miracle. Her baby was returned to her, and she was never going to let him go ever again.

 

Now if only Evan would exit the hotel and come back to her. They could run away from this and never come back, leave this whole mess behind them forever. But the seconds ticked by and slid into minutes, and then the minutes stretched on and on, the snow falling more heavily onto the roof of her stolen car. Hannah strained her ears, listening for any gunshots. It’s okay, it’s okay, it’ll be okay, she tried to tell herself. It’s a big hotel. He has to search the whole thing from top to bottom.

 

Alex was starting to become more responsive and active again in her arms, the warmth from her body bleeding into his. That was a good sign. But then he started squirming a little and whining under his breath. “What’s wrong, sweetie?” she said, rubbing his little back in an attempt to soothe him. Hannah tried to smile down at him, but it must have looked as forced as it felt because he didn’t smile back up at her. He’s as anxious as I am, Hannah realized. Alex could probably sense how worried and concerned she felt. And indeed, her hands started shaking again as the seconds ticked by slowly, all without any sign of Evan reappearing.

 

Hannah inwardly debated her options. She and Alex were safest if she just waited inside the locked car, ready to go at the first sign of trouble. But…her entire body itched like it had been set on fire, desperate to move. Blame it on her childhood, on her genes, on the way God made her. But she just couldn’t stand staying still. It was part of the reason why her life with Salvatore had been so unbearable, locked up in that room for so long.

 

Pow! Hannah jumped up in her seat at the sound of a gun firing. Her whole body was tense, ears straining as hard as possible to pick up on any other noise, but nothing came. “Fuck,” Hannah murmured under her breath. There was no way to tell from out there what was going on. It could have been Evan killing the last henchman who hadn’t run away yet, but it could also be the exact opposite. Evan could be inside right now, bleeding to death…Hannah thought, the painful grip of panic taking hold on her heart.

 

The internal debate inside Hannah’s head abruptly came to a close. She reached into the backseat for her frying pan and adjusted Alex in her arms, placing his little arms around her neck. She had to go save Evan. She had to keep him alive. There was no other option.

 

Hannah was just about to swing the door to the car open and step out when a dark figure suddenly appeared from the front door of the hotel. “Shit,” Hannah murmured, rushing to switch the engine on and preparing herself to pull out of the hotel lot, but then a second later her eyes focused and saw the man approaching her. Evan.

 

A crushing wave of relief smashed over her head, making her feel light and woozy, like she was going to pass out. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she murmured to whoever had answered her prayer, quickly putting Alex in the backseat and rushing out of the vehicle to slam herself into Evan’s arms.

 

“Are you okay? Are you all right?” she asked urgently into his ear as she pressed him closer to her body.

 

“I’m okay, I’m fine,” Evan answered, but it was a little less than convincing as he wheezed for air and winced at the tightness of their embrace. He disentangled himself from Hannah’s arms a minute later, holding the side of his ribcage and bending over in pain. “Fuck,” he muttered.

 

“Were you hurt? Are you…?” Hannah asked, cutting herself off to focus on him, patting his body down gently, searching for a gunshot or a hole full of blood.

 

“No, no, just…from earlier,” Evan huffed out in between huge panting breaths, putting one hand on Hannah’s shoulder to steady himself. “I’m okay.”

 

“You don’t look okay,” Hannah said, reaching forward to pull Evan closer to her body, taking as much of his weight onto her as possible. “Why don’t we move to the car? You can lay down in the backseat while I drive.”

 

“No, no, we can’t, I can’t,” Evan murmured into her neck.

 

“What do you mean you can’t?” Hannah said, confusion tangling her thoughts together. She just stared at Evan for a long moment, waiting for him to explain himself or otherwise take his words back and follow her to the car.

 

“I have to—the other guards,” Evan said before pressing their foreheads together and falling into silence, as if that explained everything.

 

“What about them?” Hannah asked. “They’ve probably run away. They’re not our problem anymore. We should just get into the car and run away before the police get here and want to know about Salvatore.”

 

Evan shook his head, but his eyes stayed tightly closed, his face grimacing in pain. “They have to…they have to be taken care of.”

 

“No!” Hannah shot back. “We need to run. We need to put as much space between us and them as possible, and then…then we can just…be.” We can just be, she thought. We can just be normal people. We can just be happy.

 

“I have to, baby,” Evan said softly, rubbing his hand gently along the side of Hannah’s face, making her skin tingle like it had never been touched before. “I have to.”

 

“No, you don’t,” Hannah argued back. She wished she had the strength to pull out of his touch to punctuate her words, but she couldn’t bring herself to push him away. “You don’t have to do anything. We can just leave. Please, please, Evan, let’s just go. Please, let’s go.”

 

Evan stayed silent, his eyes remaining closed as he pressed his face against hers. “I need to…I need to go away for a while. I need to find them. Take care of all of them. If I don’t, we’ll just be waiting for the rest of our lives, looking over our shoulder and waiting for the worst to happen.”

 

The words sunk over Hannah’s head like a shroud, covering the entire world in its wake. “Why…why do you want to leave me alone?” Hannah whispered. “Why do you want to leave me?”

 

“I—I don’t,” Evan stuttered back, his voice weak and unsteady. “I don’t ever want to leave you.”

 

“Then don’t,” Hannah said, her voice hard and firm before melting at the sight of Evan’s pained face. “Please, just don’t.”

 

She watched him swallow hard before opening his mouth to speak. “Salvatore…Salvatore’s organization…” He trailed off, but Hannah remained silent, allowing him to gather his thoughts before speaking again. “It’s big. Bigger than you know, Hannah. They kept you in that little room so you’d never know enough to hurt them. But I know how big they are. There are tons of powerful guys aside from Salvatore, people who answered to him, people he answered to. It’s so big. You don’t know…you don’t know what they might to do us once they find out that Salvatore’s dead.”

 

“I don’t care!” Hannah found herself screaming, howling above the loud winter wind. “It doesn’t matter. I just—I just need you. I need you, Evan, okay? I don’t care if it makes me look stupid. I need you.”

 

Evan smiled at her then, slow and sad. “You don’t look stupid,” he said in a soft tone of voice.

 

“But you’re still not listening to me,” Hannah said in resignation. “You…you want to go kill, just like always.”

 

“Why—why would you say that?” Evan said, resting his head on top of hers, fighting against Hannah’s resistance to pull her closer. “You think I want to kill people more than I want to be with you?”

 

Hannah shrugged in his arms, giving up and sinking against his body. “I don’t pretend to know what you want,” Hannah whispered against Evan’s chest. “I just know that I want you with me. I don’t care about anything else.”

 

“That’s not true,” Evan said back. “You love your son more than anything else in the world, more than…” He cut himself off, sighing deeply. “You and Alex have to be safe. That has to come first.”

 

“He’ll be safe if you’re with him,” Hannah argued. “Not if you’re away from us, doing God knows what. It’s a goddamn suicide mission, Evan, and I’m not going to give you my blessing to go and get killed.”

 

“Maybe,” Evan started. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’ll get killed. But if I don’t…if I don’t go, if I just stay with you, we’ll always be worried. We’ll never rest, not even for a second.”

 

“But we’ll be together,” Hannah murmured against him, nuzzling against his collarbone.

 

Evan was quiet for a long moment, rubbing the back of Hannah’s head and stroking his fingers through her hair. “You’ve been scared all your life, ever since you were born.”

 

Hannah didn’t argue with him, although she wondered how he knew that, like he was reading her mind.

 

“You’ve always been scared,” Evan continued. “You deserve to know what it’s like, to live without fear. I want to give you that, at least once. Please, please, Hannah, let me.”

 

Hannah shoved her face deeper into Evan’s chest and groaned in frustration. He laughed lightly above her and ran his hands through her hair again, clearly trying to comfort her. “I can’t convince you otherwise, can I?” Hannah said, her voice muffled by Evan’s shirt.

 

Evan was silent, and that was all the answer that Hannah needed. The hot sensation of tears pressed against her eyelids, threatening to spill over and reveal her weakness. She sniffled hard, trying to keep everything in, but a few drops of tears came out anyway, rapidly dripping down her face. She could feel her tears freezing in the cold, but she didn’t care, shifting even closer to Evan, trying to shield him from the wind.

 

He’s going to leave me, Hannah realized, her insides feeling numb and dead, like her life support had just been switched off. He’s going away. He’s already gone. She would have felt terrified if she thought there was any way she could change the course of events in front of her. But it was no use. Evan had made up his mind, and she knew him well enough to know that he wasn’t going to budge. She felt empty, completely chewed apart, like a carved-up jack-o-lantern, bits of her heart clinging to her like limp pulp. There was no point in trying to put herself back together. There was no way she was ever going to be whole again.

 

“When are you going?” she whispered to Evan, resigned to his decision.

 

“Basically…now,” he said back, rubbing the back of Hannah’s neck with the hand that wasn’t holding a gun. “While the trail is still warm.”

 

Hannah blinked slowly, tears falling and spilling onto Evan’s shirt. “Oh,” she said dully.

 

“Get another gun,” Evan said a moment later. “As soon as you can. Hold on to it as much as possible, even though…you shouldn’t need it,” he continued, rubbing the bottom of her back in an attempt to reassure her.

 

Hannah pictured herself buying a gun, holding onto her frying pan for as long as possible before that point to protect herself and Alex. “So I just look over my shoulder all the time, until…what? You show up?” Hannah asked.

 

“If I show up,” he corrected her softly, and Hannah moaned in pain, crushing her face deep into his chest so she could smell his scent, take as much of him in as possible.

 

“Please,” Hannah said, and at that point she wasn’t even sure what she was begging for, but she was desperate for it nonetheless, feeling her heart stutter in her chest like she was bargaining for her life. “Please, stay safe. Please, just be smart. I don’t… I don’t want Alex to forget you.” She started sobbing then, thinking of her son growing up without knowing Evan, her entire body suddenly wracked with pain at the idea.

 

Evan made soft, soothing, meaningless noises above her as he stroked the back of her head, but it was no use. Hannah knew that no matter how much she concentrated, she wouldn’t be able to remember how this felt, the sensation of being touched by Evan. It would fade from her mind like all memories did eventually, only a vague outline of it remaining. She was losing him, and there was no part of him that she could preserve, not really.

 

“I have to go, baby,” Evan murmured against the top of her head. “I have to take care of us. Please.”

 

Hannah nodded slowly, inhaling deep to bury his scent into her lungs, trying to keep it inside. “Where do I go?”

 

Evan was quiet for a moment, pulling her deeper into his arms. “I always wanted to go to Belize.”

 

“Belize?” Hannah repeated.

 

“Yeah,” Evan answered. “I was going to go there after…after all of this. Just relax on the beach and…forget about everything else. That’s what you should do, baby.”

 

Hannah played with the collar of Evan’s shirt, trying to touch as much of his skin as possible. “How will…how will I know? If you’re coming or if you’ve…if you’ve died?”

 

Evan just kept moving his hand up and down her back, but it didn’t remove any of her tension. It was nice to feel his touch, though, so she leaned back into it, wanting more of his hands on her skin. “I don’t know,” he finally whispered against the top of her head. “Just go to the water. The shore in Belize. I’ll…I’ll search for you, if….if….” He trailed off, apparently unwilling to verbalize what might happen to him as he began tracking the other senior members of Salvatore’s organization.

 

Alex cried out quietly, almost mournfully, from the backseat of the car. Evan pulled away from Hannah, obviously concerned, so she walked back over to grab her son before walking back over to Evan. “You can hold him,” Hannah suggested in a soft voice. For the last time, she thought silently. She offered her baby forward, using her free hand to pull Evan forward by his sleeve.

 

Evan nodded slowly as he accepted Alex into his arms, immediately brushing his lips against the top of his head gently, making Hannah’s heart ache in her chest, throbbing like it wanted to burst out of her body.

 

“He loves you,” she whispered, watching as Alex’s tiny little hand grabbed at Evan’s shirt.

 

Evan stared down at the baby, his brow furrowed like he was examining an extraterrestrial creature. “He’s safe,” Evan murmured, talking more to himself than to her.

 

“Yeah, he is,” Hannah said. “Thanks to you.”

 

“No, no, you were right. I should have just waited in the hospital, with you the whole time. Maybe then tonight would have gone differently…” Evan trailed off, shaking his head.

 

“No,” Hannah said firmly. “Alex wasn’t kidnapped because of you. But he’s alive because of you, because you fought so hard for him. That…that counts. He’ll know about that. No matter what, Evan.” Hannah swallowed and rubbed her own cold shoulders to counteract the icy wind blowing against them. She wanted to communicate what she meant more clearly. If you die…he will know about you. I won’t let him forget, she vowed silently. But she just stared at Evan instead, watching as he brushed his thumb along Alex’s face and head.

 

“Thank you,” Evan murmured a minute later, still not looking directly into Hannah’s eyes.

 

“Of course,” Hannah replied, feeling fresh tears fill her eyes as Evan rocked Alex back and forth in his arms.

 

“He’s going to be strong, you know,” Evan said, staring down into Alex’s face.

 

“Like you,” Hannah said, sniffling a little to keep the tears at bay.

 

“No,” Evan said, shaking his head before lifting his eyes to finally meet Hannah’s once again. “Like you. Just like you.”

 

Hannah had to lift her hand then to wipe the tears from her face, pressing at her eyes until they stopped coming so quickly. “Thank you,” she whispered hoarsely as Evan handed her son back to her. “For everything.”

 

“Thank you for not killing me, Hannah,” Evan replied, his face falling as soon as Alex left his hands. “I know I didn’t deserve it.”

 

“No, you did, you did,” Hannah argued indignantly. “I just didn’t know it yet, but you did. You got a second chance.” Hannah paused, swallowing hard as Alex wrapped his tiny arms back around her neck. “Please don’t waste it,” she added in a low whisper.

 

Evan nodded slowly, his eyes glued to the ground. “I won’t,” he promised, his tone matching hers.

 

“Can you…can you look at me?” she asked shyly, feeling her cheeks heat up despite the cold.

 

He smiled a little and complied, lifting his eyes to meet hers. They stayed there, then, intensely staring.

 

“I’m going to miss you, Evan,” Hannah whispered, trying to memorize the way his eyes looked.

 

“Yeah,” he said back, clearing his throat to speak, but then he just repeated himself, “Yeah,” like that was the only word he could summon.

 

“Please. Be safe,” she said, finally turning around to face the car and walking off. I have to keep going, she told herself, despite the fact that her feet itched to turn back around and run back to Evan. I have to live. I have to survive. I don’t have any other choice.

 

Evan said nothing behind her. Maybe she had heard as much as she’d ever hear from his mouth. Maybe it was the end, now. Over before they even really started. Of course the true love of Hannah’s life would go that way.

 

Hannah leaned into the backseat first to secure Alex before moving up to the driver’s side, leaning her head against the wheel for a second before she straightened up and turned the engine on again. Hannah turned to stare at Evan, watching him through the opposite window.

 

Evan had started walking off in the distance, his figure appearing smaller and smaller against the horizon with each passing second.

 

“Evan!” Hannah shouted after him, tears suddenly streaming down her face as rapidly as a waterfall.

 

Evan turned back around to face her, his face falling at the sight of her tears. He sprinted closer to the car, stopping a foot away and freezing in place, almost like he was afraid to get too close.

 

“Merry Christmas,” she murmured softly.

 

Evan sighed deeply and closed the distance between them, slipping his mouth against hers through the open window. His thumb massaged her jawline, his tongue dipping in deeper to meet hers, nipping at her lips with his teeth.

 

“Merry Christmas, Hannah,” he whispered against her mouth a second later, before turning and breaking off into a run.

 

Hannah watched as he disappeared. Her eyes burned with tears, but inside she felt cold, frozen to the core. Her heart slowed down, and the sweat on the back of her neck immediately cooled. It was like her entire body had given up feeling things, but she was still functioning. She survived, again, like she always did.

 

In some ways that was the worst part, that nothing that happened had destroyed her. She would have to live with the consequences, feel the same numb pain, the same emptiness, for the rest of her days. Without Evan. She would have to be strong.

 

But it wasn’t like she didn’t have a ton of practice.