“I don’t think it was Gwen. It was Harvey.” I nod toward his body.
Tuija turns slowly toward Harvey’s corpse. Her eyebrows, still plucked to the wrong side of perfection, raise in jagged arcs. “Well, shit.”
Silence.
Another thwack and a long, pained scream.
“Is she always this noisy?” Tuija asks, scrunching her nose.
“Fuck off,” I seethe.
“Look. We got through a metric fuck ton of bad press together. You know that. But some things, I can’t save. And some things, you can’t save either.” She runs her fingers through her blood-sodden hair, tugging at the tiny clots in frustration. “Truth is, this goes way beyond that. I don’t know what can help you now.”
“This isn’t bad press, Tuij,” I say desperately. Panic wells up in a hot, startling wave. “This is my life. Her life. That’s all I want, there has to be a way…I can’t just sit here like some helpless shit...!”
Something stings my eyes. I squeeze them shut, willing the sensation to fade, but instead it practically squirts out.
“Fuck,” I manage. “Is that…is that blood?” I am bleeding from the eyeballs.
Either I’m dead too, or I really have fractured something.
Tuija reaches out and strokes a finger along my cheek. Her touch is strange; she displaces air rather than makes contact, but I feel it all the same. When she draws her finger back, it shines with a single bead of dew.
“It’s not blood. It’s a tear, Aeron.” She bites her lip, her jaw suddenly trembling. “Never thought I’d see that.”
“It’s not a tear,” I say, incredulous.
“No, really.” She lathes it over her tongue and rolls it around her mouth experimentally. “I’m getting top notes of helplessness and undertones of despair. Definitely a tear.”
I swallow. “Tell me how to get out of this, firecracker. I don’t have anything else.”
“Is there a sign on my forehead that says deus ex machina?”
“Don’t make me cry some more.”
She laughs, dry and bitter. “I guess this is what it takes, huh? Who are you even crying for? You know, this is your problem, Hitler. This is why you’re here—you can keep on playing pretend for as long as you like, but we both know you’re just a savage in a nice suit. You’re upset about you. And unless that changes, you’re never getting out of that chair.”
“Excuse me for not bursting into a thousand fucking rainbows of sympathy,” I snap.
“What are you going to do even if you escape? This shit doesn’t go away!”
A final bang sounds in the other room, followed by a low groan and a high-pitched, withering whine.
My Leo is in there.
“And here’s the thing,” Tuija goes on, her voice cracking. “You’re not his only son. You think he just took you? Where’s Asher?”
“He’s safe,” I insist. “I asked, I—”
Her jaw trembles again. “You know that isn’t true.”
“Shut up. Shut up.”
“You have to get out of this for other people. Not just you. Will you promise? Promise me you’ll do that, and I’ll…I’ll help if I can.”
“If I escape,” I whisper, “I will be better. I don’t know how, but I’ll try, okay?”
“Damn right, you will.” Tuija leans forward once more, her blood-sodden hair framing her face in crusty spikes. She grows paler by the second. “I’m your own personal fucking Jesus, and I deserve a little respect.” She traces a line across her perfect throat. “I died for your sins.”
At that moment, the door in the wall creaks open and Blood Honey pads out, still doing up his fly. Sweat sits in a sheen across his forehead, and his cheeks are lit with a faint flush. Tuija glances back at him, whimpers, and disappears in a blink.
“Who were you talking to, son?” he asks.
“Who were you fucking?”