CHAPTER 073

CHAPTER 073
«JARVIS'S POINT OF VIEW»

Slowly, my eyes fluttered open, but everything was cloudy, like a thick fog had swallowed the room. I could scarcely make out anything while my head thumped heavily, and a sharp, intense pain shot through my neck with every small movement. What was wrong with me?

I attempted lifting my hands, but something weighed them down, forcing them back. My legs felt just as heavy, like they didn’t belong to me anymore.

Unexpectedly, the sound of heels slamming against the floor reached my ears, getting closer. Click… click… click…

"Who's there?" I called out softly, my voice weak, but the heels kept coming. I tried turning my head, but I couldn’t move, like my body had been locked in place.

"Who's there?" My voice came out fragile and vulnerable. Still, there was no response.

Fear prickled through me, and I decided to lie still, staring at the white ceiling through my cloudy gaze until a blurry, veiled figure materialized before me. The person stood over me, holding up an injection.

"What's that?" I questioned tiredly, my eyes flickering shut against my will. I forced them open again, the blurriness making everything worse. The sharp needle moved closer to my face.

"Please don't," I pleaded, my voice breaking slightly.

"Shhh… shut your eyes. It won't hurt. I promise." A female voice reached my ears before a sharp pain shot through my neck, and everything went void.

~~~

“Wake up!”

The sharp sting on my face had me jolting awake. I panted heavily, blinking rapidly as I tried to clear the water from my nose and eyes.

“Welcome back,” a taunting voice echoed.

My vision slowly cleared, and my eyes widened as I took in my surroundings. How in heaven’s name did I get here?

The rushing sound of a waterfall thundered behind me, the constant crash of water against rocks. Ahead, a dense forest stretched endlessly, green and suffocatingly quiet. And I was sitting in a wheelchair.

On top of a cliff. And in front of me… was her. Stella.

“Missed me?” she smirked, flipping her black hair off her shoulders. “I bet you did.”

“What do you want from me? What did I even do to you?” I demanded, my voice rising with panic. I didn’t sign up for this shit. And how in heaven’s name did she get into my room and take me out from under the vigilant eyes of the police?

As if reading my thoughts, she smirked again and pulled out a gun from behind her back. My eyes widened instantly, fear gripping my chest.

“Those stupid officers can do nothing to me; they're sleeping on duty,” she said with a disappointed shake of her head. “But I guess… they are humans too. They get tired of people’s shit.”

“What do you want from me?” I asked again, my voice tighter now, more desperate. Only then did it fully hit me; we were alone. In the middle of nowhere. On top of a cliff, with nothing but water crashing violently below.

Where the hell was this in LA?

“I told you before,” she said softly, her smile fading just slightly. “I want your life. I found out Levi isn’t your brother… so I don’t have anything to do with him anymore.”

"Shouldn't you be going after my father instead?"

She shook her head, stroking the tip of the gun slowly, like she had all the time in the world. “No. I want him to feel what I felt when I lost my child. After that… It’s his turn.”

I threw my head back in frustration. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

“Oh no, don’t get mad!” she gasped dramatically, placing a hand over her chest. I stared at her in disbelief. Was she crazy? Of course she was.

“Look, I don’t know you, and whatever it is you have with my dad, you can just talk to him instead of taking it out on his son,” I enunciated, trying to buy time. Just a little more time. Maybe they’d notice I was gone and start searching. I only hoped they got here faster before this crazy woman decided to pull the trigger. Was I going to die like this? Fuck no.

Suddenly, her blue eyes darkened, the color shifting as if something inside her snapped. Her pupils turned redder than before, and her grip on the gun tightened. Her shoulders began to tremble slightly, like she was vibrating with rage. Great. I had only made her worse.

“There’s nothing to talk about!” she screamed, her voice tearing through the cliffside and bouncing off the rocks. “He killed my child when he refused to be with me! He chose that preposterous mother of yours! It was supposed to be me, not her!”

This woman had more than one issue with my dad. Why was I the one caught in the middle of this?

“Just keep the gun down, and we can talk about this,” I said again, raising my palms slowly, forcing my voice to stay calm even though my heart was hammering violently. One wrong move and I’d be done for. I was too young to die. What was taking Levi so long?

Abruptly, her hands dropped to her sides, and I exhaled in brief relief. “Twenty years I spent in that ward,” she muttered, her voice shaking. “They called me crazy, hysterical, atrocious… they called me all sorts of names. I was forsaken there to rot!”

Her veins stood out sharply against her forehead now. “For years, I planned my escape… and my revenge. And now… I can finally fulfill my dreams.” She suddenly laughed, loud and unhinged, echoing across the cliff again and again.

Slowly, I shifted the wheelchair backward without thinking, inching toward the edge. My breath caught. If I fell, there was no way I would survive. My legs barely worked as it was. I couldn’t even swim myself out of this.

“I suggest you don’t move. I want to kill you myself.”

My eyes snapped back to hers just in time to see the gun inches from my temple. I flinched. “What the—”

Was I going to die like this?

“Goodbye for the second time, kid. I’ll make the misery go away.”

I shut my eyes instantly, bracing for the end…but the gunshot cracked through the forest, echoing violently, followed by struggling sounds.

My eyes flew open.

Two policemen had Stella pinned to the ground. Where did they come from?

“Jarvis—”

My heartbeat spiked at the voice behind me. Slowly, I turned my head, and my breath stopped.

Levi was standing at the edge of the cliff, one hand pressed to his chest. Blood seeped through his fingers, spreading fast.

“Get away from there!!” I screamed, trying to wheel forward, panic tearing through my voice.

But then his eyes rolled back. And he fell straight into the water below.

“LEVI!!!”

WHERE DID HE COME FROM?!!