247. “Don’t look, Charlotte.”

247. “Don’t look, Charlotte.”
I brace for the impact, but it doesn’t come. What I feel instead is the weight of Sebastian’s body over mine, his arms wrapped around me, his hands gripping my shoulders so tightly it steals the air from us both.

His legs give out, and he drops to his knees, taking me down with him without ever letting go. One of his hands presses my head into the curve of his neck, making sure I don’t lift my eyes and see.

More gunshots follow—three, four, five, I lose count.

Hot tears stream down my face as my hands move to Sebastian’s back, sliding slowly down his spine, trembling… please, no…

My fingers touch something wet, slippery. A sob escapes my lips, and I pull back, as if afraid of hurting him more.

The smell of iron fills my nostrils. Hot, suffocating, mixing with the sweat on his skin and the faint cologne still clinging to his collar, and all of it twists my stomach. I feel vomit rise in my throat, but nothing comes out except another sob.

“Sebastian…” I touch his lower back again, this time more carefully, feeling more wetness, more slickness. The fabric of his suit is soaked, stuck to his skin, and when I press lightly, he holds his breath.

My chest tightens.
No, no, no…

“You’ve been shot…” I whisper, even though I don’t want to believe it. His fingers clutch harder, like he’s trying to fuse our bodies together, as if keeping me there could stop the world from spinning. “My God… you’ve—”

“Shhh…” He forces a smile against my hair. “I’m still here, aren’t I?”

But his body can no longer hold its own weight. Slowly, he starts sinking, collapsing, making my own muscles lose their strength.

“No… please…”

I sit back on my heels as I feel the weight of Sebastian’s head in my lap. Now, I can see the wet stain spreading across his back, making my heart bleed from the inside.

“An a-ambulance… we need an ambulance…”

“I’m fine…” he gasps, his eyes heavy. His hands now clutch the hem of my dress with surprising strength. “I just… I’m not feeling my legs right now…”

My eyes widen, panic rising up my throat. I look up as I hear the cop call for two ambulances on the radio, finally seeing the grotesque scene just a few feet away.

Evelyn, lying on the ground in a growing pool of blood. Her hair is spread out, stained red, her body riddled with bullets. Two in the stomach, another in the chest and the collarbone. Deep, bloody holes that make her breathe with difficulty.

There’s so much blood I’m getting dizzy.

My hands tremble in Sebastian’s sweaty hair, and he squeezes my thigh over my dress in response, desperate. His eyes are wide, pupils so dilated I can barely see the brown I know so well. “Don’t look, Charlotte… don’t look.”

Evelyn spits blood, rolling onto her side with effort—which only makes more blood spill from the bullet holes. She claws at the floor with chipped nails, still painted red but now coated with her blood.

“Lazarus… damn you…” she mutters weakly, her words dragged out, spoken with a bloody smile. “Why’d you… leave just… one damn bullet?”

Then she lifts her eyes, as if that simple act were painful and drained her energy. And it probably does. With these wounds, she won’t survive until the ambulance arrives.

How could she be so stupid? Did she really think the cops wouldn’t shoot back? Or was she truly willing to drag me to death with her?

“Charlotte…” She rolls my name on her tongue and tastes her own blood as if it were mine. Her eyes are growing dimmer. Even the madness seems to be fading. “Do you think you can get rid of me? Of my hate?”

She laughs. Like a damned demon, she laughs.

“No… no, you won’t.” She points her bloody hand weakly in my direction. “My ghost will always haunt you. I know it will. You won’t escape me. Every time… every time you look at Christopher, you’ll remember me…”

“No, Evelyn… Not this time. You didn’t win.”

But she keeps smiling, or at least trying to, even with her lips torn and split by blood. Her almost-dead eyes shine one last time—not with regret, nor pain, but with the satisfaction of chaos. Evelyn always wanted this. Always wanted to see the world crumble around her. And now, at the end, she wants to take everything with her.

“You know what, Evelyn… I’m not letting you die with a smile on your face. Not after everything you’ve done.”

I press Sebastian’s shoulders tighter against my lap, pressing his wound the best I can. Clumsy, desperate, with my bare, bloodied hands. But firm, determined. Because we’re not losing anyone else to this woman. We’re not losing anyone else.

“You are the most despicable person I’ve ever met. So much so that I could almost pity you right now. I could, if you were worthy of it. But the truth, Evelyn… is that everything you’ve ever had in your life came at the cost of someone else’s pain. It was always in exchange for someone else’s tears. And that… that doesn’t make you worthy. No matter how high you climb, no matter how expensive the dresses you wear, no matter how big the mansion you live in, no matter the title—none of it will ever fill the emptiness inside you. Do you know why?”

My voice falters for a second, but I don’t back down. I hold her gaze, even though it’s fading, even though everything in me begs to look away, to Sebastian, away from the pain, the blood, what this woman represents.

“Because you never knew what love is. You never knew what it was to be truly loved without ripping it out of someone by force.”

She breathes with effort, mouth open, as if still searching for strength to hate me until the last second. But even that begins to dissolve in the blood.

“Because you’re a hole, Evelyn. A deep, cold, insatiable hole. And everything you touch turns into emptiness too.”

Evelyn tries to laugh again, but it’s only a choked, broken sound. Her mouth opens, blood runs out, and nothing comes. She still tries to hold that sick smile, but it wavers.

“The truth is you’ve always been afraid of being forgotten, haven’t you?” I whisper. “But believe me… nothing in this world will erase you faster than this pathetic death. No glory, no redemption, no grand theaters or dramas… just the end. On an abandoned counter, drowning in your own blood and hate.”

Her gaze dims little by little, but there’s still a shadow there—a final flicker of twisted humanity, or maybe just the remnant of a soul that had been dead for a long time.

Evelyn swallows hard—or tries. The sound is ugly, wet, choking. Her fingers twitch in the air, as if still trying to grasp something—a name, a memory, a shred of control. But there’s nothing left for her.

“Your story ends here, Evelyn…” I whisper, without pity. “And no one will mourn you.”

She blinks one last time. Then, nothing.

Just open, empty eyes, that twisted smile dissolving like dirty snow in the sun.

Then finally, silence.

My shoulders slump, and I realize I’ve been holding my breath for far too long. The world around me feels far away, distant—everything is muffled sound, shapeless movement. All I can feel is the warmth of Sebastian’s still-living body over my legs, the blood still flowing, the strong smell of metal and sweat.

I’m shaking, shaking so much, brushing his now-drenched hair away from his forehead, noticing his eyelids have closed.

“No, no, no…”

I sob, pressing harder on the wound. I don’t know if it’s right, or if I’m making it worse, I… I just want the hole to disappear.

“Sebastian, please open your eyes. Please… I’m begging you, Seb… open your eyes for me. You can’t go. You can’t leave us. You can’t leave Christopher… he’s already lost too much. He can’t lose you too.”