Chapter 130 Grass hill
Chapter 130 Grass hill
Chapter 130: Grass hill
The hill was quiet in the way only open spaces could be, wide, lonely, and honest. Grass stretched unevenly beneath the night sky, bending softly with the breeze. The city lights glimmered far below, distant and indifferent, like a different world entirely.
Coco sat at the top of the hill with her knees drawn up, elbows resting on them, a cigarette glowing faintly between her fingers. She inhaled slowly, deeply, holding the smoke in her lungs longer than necessary before letting it spill out of her mouth in a thin stream.
Her mind wouldn’t stop.
Thoughts came in waves, sharp, relentless, overlapping. Chief Kaave’s voice. Georgiana’s eyes. Vill’s smile. The applause. The suspension. Angel’s name echoing in places it shouldn’t. Every betrayal felt stacked on top of the last, heavy and suffocating.
She laughed quietly to herself, a short, humorless sound.
“So this is how it ends,” she murmured into the night.
The cigarette trembled slightly between her fingers. She hated that. Hated that even alone, even here, her body still reacted. She took another drag, grounding herself in the burn, the smell, the familiar bite at the back of her throat.
She had survived worse. She reminded herself of that.
She had climbed out of things meant to bury her. She had built, strategized, fought battles no one ever gave her credit for. She had loved and lost and learned how to keep moving even when her heart cracked.
But tonight felt different. Tonight felt like standing on the edge of something irreversible.
Coco leaned back on her palms and stared up at the sky. There were fewer stars than she remembered from childhood. Too much light pollution. Too much noise. Too much of everything that drowned out what mattered.
“I just need one moment of quiet,” she whispered.
The grass rustled behind her. Her body stiffened instantly.
She didn’t turn right away. She listened. Footsteps. Careful. Slow. Not trying to hide, but not careless either.
Her hand moved subtly, slipping inside her jacket.
“You know,” a familiar voice said behind her, calm but cautious, “this isn’t the safest place to be alone.”
Coco closed her eyes for half a second.
Roy was right there.
She turned sharply, the gun already in her hand.
“Don’t move,” she said.
Roy froze.
The barrel was inches from his forehead, steady despite the storm raging inside her. His eyes widened slightly, but he didn’t raise his hands. He knew better than to make sudden gestures.
“Coco,” he said slowly, “put the gun down.”
She laughed again, louder this time, edged with something dangerous. “You followed me?”
“I was worried,” he replied.
“Shut up,” she snapped. “Just shut up.”
The silence between them stretched.
Roy swallowed. “I didn’t know where else to find you.”
“Of course you didn’t,” Coco said bitterly. “You never really know where I am, do you?”
His jaw tightened. “That’s not fair.”
“Nothing about this is fair,” she said. “Stop acting like you still love me. Not after everything I did and will still do.”
He took a careful step back. “I’m not here to fight.”
“Then why are you here?” she demanded. “To check if I’ve finally lost my mind? To see if I’m really miserable?”
“No,” Roy said quietly. “I’m here because I still love you.”
Her finger twitched on the trigger.
“Don’t,” she warned, her voice breaking despite her effort to keep it steady. “Don’t say that.”
Roy’s gaze softened. “It’s the truth.”
“The truth?” she echoed. “The truth is you let them erase me. You let them suspend me like I was nothing. Like I didn’t bleed for this campaign. Like I didn’t build half of what you’re standing on.”
“I didn’t agree with it,” he said. “You know that.”
“But you didn’t stop it,” she replied. “You never stop anything.”
The wind picked up, carrying the scent of smoke and grass. Coco’s arm ached from holding the gun up, but she didn’t lower it. She couldn’t. It felt like the only thing keeping her upright.
Roy looked at the weapon, then back at her face. “Are you really going to shoot me?”
Her lips parted, but no answer came.
She thought of everything at once…late nights strategizing together, whispered arguments, stolen laughter, the way they had once moved like a single unit. She thought of the past that refused to stay buried and the present that felt like a knife pressed to her throat.
“I don’t know,” she said honestly.
Her eyes burned.
Roy stepped closer despite the danger. “Coco, look at me.”
“Stop,” she said, her voice shaking. “Just stop.”
“You’re a killer but you can’t kill me,” he said gently. “You’re angry. You’re hurt. But you’re not this.”
Her finger pressed tighter against the trigger. Her breathing grew uneven.
Images flashed through her mind, Angel’s death, Vill’s grin, Georgiana kneeling, Chief Kaave turning his back on her. The world closing in. The weight of always being the strongest one in the room.
“I’m tired,” she whispered. “I’m so tired of being strong.”
Roy’s voice dropped to almost nothing. “Then do this.”
Her hand shook violently now. She tried to pull the trigger. Her finger strained. Nothing happened.
She gasped, a sound caught between a sob and a scream, still struggling, still forcing her finger down as tears welled in her eyes, the gun pressed hard against Roy’s head, and the moment stretched, fragile and terrifying, suspended between choice and consequence.