"NO!" I moaned. King shouted. The gun in his hand shot off once more, gashing open a wound on my arm when it strained me. I grabbed the gun from him and kicked him to the ground, shooting him in the thigh to bring him down.
I was feral, ready to finally kill him when her voice made me halt.
"He's mine", Cerise bit out. I lowered the gun but stomped my foot onto the gushing wound of King, making him howl in pain. "He's all yours", I whispered. Feeling sick to my stomach seeing how she collected her breath, the dagger still sticking out of her like it was the most normal thing. How she was able to walk, how she wasn't crumbling in pain was beyond my capacity to understand. I was trembling with adrenaline, too much was going on for me to focus on just one thing.
All I knew was that despite all that, she was still Cerise to me.
Grabbing her arm when she stumbled to balance, she focused on him, the dagger in her hand rushing down quicker than he was able to react. Before King could react, she whipped her arm out, slashing the second dagger between his eyes, right into his skull.
He let go of his leg and fell onto his back as the blood flooded his face. Cerise let out a scream, ripping her arm out of my grip and kicking the dagger further into his skull with all her might and left energy. A cracking sound shrilled through the room. Cracking bones.
King laid still, and no single muscle twitched as she kicked and kicked, stumping onto the man who was no longer breathing. Cerise screamed and leashed out on his body, letting out everything she held back her entire life.
I did not dare to get close to her. For the very first time, I saw a side of Cerise that frightened me, terrified me to my bone. Not that she would harm me but that she might harm herself in the process. She then turned to look at me, her hair sticking onto her face from the sweat. Her eyes were blazing but turned softer instantly when she spotted me. She almost smiled before slumping forward, clutching onto her abdomen. "Fuck", I rushed over to her. "I got you, I got you, Isabelle", I told her, laying her down in a stable lateral position. Pulling the dagger out would cause her bigger damage and a higher risk of blood loss, so I secured it with fabric. "Cerise", she coughed out, squinting her eyes. I looked at her face, cradling it with one hand. "What?", I whispered. "My name is Cerise", she mumbled, "you're hurt", she held my arm and tried to look at the crimson spot on my shirt where the wound was coating it. "Nothing compared to yours", I whispered, hearing the faint sound of sirens outside. "Guess so", she coughed with a smile before her head fell back further in my hand.
"You can pack up your stuff, both of you, once we are done here", Greenaway bit out in the hospital room. Magnus and I were the only ones inside the room. Sharma was resting in the room next door. Cerise just got out of emergency surgery. It was past 7 am when we arrived at the hospital. The first and perhaps last time I carried Cerise in bridal style was with her bleeding all over my hands. Sharma and I received the least amount of damage compared to Magnus with his 7 stitches and his left arm in an arm sling yet again.
"Care to enlighten me?", I asked Magnus once Greenaway left the room to check up on Sharma.
"I was a spy, what else is there to tell you?", he let out a yawn, laying down on his neck only to hiss. I walked over and repositioned the bed for him. "Really?", I gave him a look that he returned the very same. "I know you better than that. Why? And most important: since when?"
"The other dead body that was reported, the dead woman?", he breathed out and instantly closed his eyes. "Yes?", I watched him.
"That is-was my twin sister. Mina".
Thick silence erupted in the room and I didn't dare to make a sound at the information that he just told me. "She had been kidnapped from the playground when we were five years old. Our father wasn't looking... We searched for years till the police ruled out her survival. My mother never stopped searching. My father buried his guilt in alcohol. I promised my mother that I'd find Mina no matter what on her deathbed. I was 18, a week before the finals. She lost her battle with breast cancer with only her son next to her. Unaware if her daughter was still alive. Where she was. Maybe she hoped she'd be reunited with her in the afterlife", he sighed, "I did my research in the underworld after a trustworthy source whispered me some information. Attended the strip club when I was still a student. I had no name to myself back then. And then I saw her, my twin, giving a show to those creatures with a pulsing dick between their legs ogling her. I- I would have had no problem if she had wanted this life for her. She looked confident, and full of energy. Not intimidated. But she was. When she saw me, I saw pain flash in her eyes with recognition. She was kept within their shackles. I kept on coming back, many times to Burlesque. But she never performed again when I was there. One day, King invited me over to his desk and I knew I wouldn't make it out the club if I refused his offer. He said he needed men within the federals, government and more to ensure his control over them. Wanting to recruit me. In return, he'd ensure the well-being of Stella. They were calling her Stella. He had caught on to the similarity of our faces, us being twins. I couldn't reject it. If it meant keeping her safe. So I became a spy the second I swore the citizens of A.C.C. to protect them with the best interest at heart... Well... Now she is dead".
"But I guess it wasn't all to waste? Most of the men that Cerise murdered were chosen by me, approved of King. I ruled out who was a risk, and who needed to be eliminated. Cerise took care of them. Those men were monsters wearing human skin. Beginning from child molesters to much, much worse"
"How many did she kill?", I finally spoke up.
"She has been on her first mission when she turned 18. The morning of the day King married her. Since then... over a hundred? I stopped counting, maybe she held onto the numbers. You'd have. to ask her. It was either her being an assassin or her warming. the bed of the same men".
My head snapped in the opposite direction as I let the information wash over me. She had been his assassin. not only his assassin but some sort of property he claimed, seeing her as his only. Grooming and obsessing over a child that grew up right in front of him and Greenaway knew all of this.
"This is all so messed up", I groaned and rubbed my burning eyes. "But you love her, don't you?", he asked me and I didn't even hesitate to agree: "I still do. I love her, even if. I don't know her"
"You do know her. She showed you more than she has ever shown him. There she fought every day for survival. You showed her who she was. Why she could have been"
I opened my mouth. to reply but the door opened and a nurse entered. "Mr Park? Uh- Cerise requested to speak with you".
