Unmasked | Book 1 in "Dark Descendants" (Editing)

Chapter 18

~Rose~

"I can't believe it." Joe ran his hands through his hair. "We lost one of our only chances in finding and stopping them and we failed!"

He backhanded a glass off the table, causing it to smash into the wall and break into pieces. I flinched but nonetheless didn't say anything. Why bother? He was not going to calm down if I said anything.

Fallon and Nate had went back to the house to change out of their bloody, half torn suits while Joe and I remained at the building where the ball was held. It was empty now, the explosion had seemed to draw them out, and we compelled the others to leave. Clearly nobody in particular owned it—or someone technically dead did—since we could get in in the first place without being invited in first.

I had found some spare clothes as well, normal teen clothes. Lucky, eh?

Now I was sitting on a couch, worried for Matt and Diana. Now they were missing, for longer than Fallon and Nate had. 

"Now it's all ruined," Joe growled. "We're not going to get them back, they're probably already dead!"

That triggered something and I shot up from the couch. "Hey, they are not dead! They wouldn't do it just like that, they'd make a game out of it."

His eyes changed to confusion. "A...game?" He asked me slowly, as if he was confirming something in his mind.

"Yes, it's all a game to her." He stiffly shook his head, seeming lost. I frowned at him. "Joe?"

He snapped out of his thoughts and went back to his former self, leaning back on the wall behind him. "It's nothing."

I sighed and turned around, leaning on the wall next to him. We stayed silent for a while before I turned my head to look up at him. "I know this is a sensitive subject but...What happened to her?"

He knew exactly what I was talking about and his barriers fell, revealing a broken stare identical to Fallon's. "My love? Soul mate? My other half?" He paused for a moment, seeming unable in getting the next part out. "Fallon killed her."

I gasped soundlessly. It was getting harder and harder to believe that that sweet boy who promised me something ever so solemnly killed his brother's girlfriend.

"She was my only chance at containing me, like you and Fallon. The one shot, and Fallon took that from me." He spoke venomously. "He wasn't himself at the time, but he never lets me forget that he meant it. And he doesn't regret it one bit."

I shook my head. "No. He's not like that."

"I know my brother, Rose. I lived with him in my life for centuries."

"And he lets me into his mind," I still argued. I found the need to defend him. "He lets me see things he never let anyone see before."

He huffed. "Did he show you how he killed her?" I fell silent. "Did he show you how he held her immobile?"

Pictures flashed before my eyes. Pictures of the exact same scenario but different faces. And the face I saw, staring at me in horror, was Fallon.

"How he grinned at me, silently daring me to intervene?"

More flashes.

"How he then ripped her throat out in front of me and then left her last bit of life to disappear in my arms?" He was getting angry again. I could tell.

Instead of using a calm, sensible approach, I just snapped uncontrollably, "Then why did you save him? Huh?" That shut him up. "Why, after everything he did to you, did you two save each other countless times?"