Page 132 of Equilibrium
“We need to get inside. I’ve no idea how many of them are here.” The words barely left my mouth as Indigo sprinted past us, running toward the side of the house.
“There’s a side entrance,” Storm answered, seeing the confused look on my face. “It’s mostly hidden so I’m hoping they haven’t found it.”
Without wasting a moment, the two of us joined Indigo, entering the basement area. I could hear voices from above, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying.
Storm pressed a finger to his mouth, indicating for us to be quiet. The three of us moved slowly, going to the area I now knew had the office and was closer to the stairs. A nervous energy resonated around us, all three of us on high alert.
A gunshot echoed from the floor above, stopping us in our tracks. Oh my God. Did they just kill someone?
Indigo tried going up the stairs, but Storm pulled him back, a stern look on his face.
“Zoe is there,” Indigo whispered, the vein on his forehead popping. “If I lose her—”
“You won’t lose her, but I need you to stay here.”
“No, Storm—”
“Indigo, stay here. When the other guys arrive, you will need to let them in. Take everything you need from the armory and hide. We will handle this.”
Shit, if they shot Zoe... No, I didn’t want to think about it. She was okay, she had to be okay. I couldn’t lose another friend. I just couldn’t.
“Ophelia.” Storm took my hand in his, sending shock waves over my skin. I didn’t think that he realized what he did, but I wasn’t going to remind him. “I need to go up. I am not ready to let innocent people die while I am hiding here. I want you to go with Ind—”
“No, absolutely not. I am not hiding while he tortures and kills people I care about.”
I pulled my hand back, taking a step closer to the stairs. “He wants me. He’s here because of me, Storm, and he’s not going to stop until he sees me. Until I go with him.”
In the blink of an eye, he was in front of me, holding my chin in his hand. “You’re not going with him, Sunshine.”
“And you have no right to tell me what to do, Storm.” I shook him off. “This is a win-win situation. He will get out of here and leave you guys alone, and you will finally be free of me.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“But that is what you said. Don’t worry, it’ll only hurt a little bit. You know the feeling of his whip’s lashes.” He flinched at that, but I was done tiptoeing around the topic. He didn’t want to tell me about it and wanted to continue denying everything? Fine, that was fine, but I wasn’t going to pretend that I didn’t know.
“Do you really think that I don’t care about you? That what was happening between us this last month was nothing but a lie?”
“I don’t know what to think,” I whispered. “All I know now are the things you said, in the car, and it’s obvious you want me gone. So here we are, Storm, I am about to be gone.”
“No, that’s not—”
“We’re wasting time, Storm. To be very honest, I don’t wanna hear it anymore. You want me to be the only villain in this story? Fine, I’ll be your villain. I’ll be the girl that broke your poor, little heart. You want us to end? That’s also absolutely okay. You don’t want to talk to me? You are not the first person that didn’t want to talk to me. You said that you couldn’t look at me, right?” He flinched at that question. “Well, don’t look, baby. Just don’t look when he takes me home.”
I took two stairs at a time, hating the tremble in my hands and the way my heart hurt at everything I just said to him. It was so easy falling back into the old habits, where pretending was better than showing what I truly felt. If only I could show him everything, maybe he would understand. A hand enveloped around my arm, and when I looked down, I could see the torment on his face.
I was suddenly pressed against the wall, with his body holding mine hostage. My legs were trapped between his and his nose pressed against the pulse on my neck. “I don’t know what to do, Sunshine. I don’t know what to do.”
I knew what I wanted him to do, but I couldn’t tell him to choose me, to forgive me, to tell me what was going on. He had to make the decision because I had already made mine.
“You know what to do, Storm. You already did it.” I chuckled. “You already told me to leave.”
“No.”
“We don’t have time for this. We really, really don’t have time.”
“I don’t want you to leave.”
“And I don’t want you to hate me,” I countered. “But we don’t always get what we want.”
