An Eye For An Eye

•Chapter 10•

I gasped, sitting bolt up right.

I'd been laying on my side, curled into a ball on the hard tile of the bathroom floor. It was dark-- nearly black.

Had I turned the light off? Or had it gone out? If it had gone out, then how long had I been laying here?

Maks, Casey, Cheif, the blood, the pain, the lights...

The realization washed over me in merciless waves. This was real. This had happened... Was maybe still happening.

I looked down at where my hands would be if I could see them. Were my hands wet with blood? Was that what was all over the tile? The aftertaste of copper was gone from my mouth, but maybe I had just become numb to it. There had been so much blood.

I leaned back against the wall I had passed out against, pulling my tank top strap back onto my shoulder and hitching up my shorts. My clothing, like me, was completely disheveled. I didn't even want to imagine what I could look like right now.

There was one thing that hadn't changed, however. My head still pounded relentlessly, throbbing somewhere behind my eyes now instead of in my temples like it had been earlier.

The phone, Lola. Get to the phone.

With my hands planted firmly beneath me, I pushed my self up into a crouch. I rested there a moment, giving my shaking arms and spinning head a moment to adjust. After a few seconds, I grasped the edge of the counter and forced myself to stand.

I had to move quickly. I had no idea where Maks was; if he was still in the house, if he'd come back, how long I'd been unconscious, where Casey was... There were so many unknowns. Too many.

I needed my phone. The police had to know about this. They had to get Maks, had to find my brother and Chief before something terrible happened to them, too.

I was halfway to a standing position when my worst fear came true.

"Hello?"

That voice. That deep, grainy, baritone that had been so close to my ear, screaming and yelling and--

"Hello?" Maks called out once again.

His heavy footsteps creaked across the flooring of the living room. He was headed towards the hallway, where I was locked away inside the bathroom.

I held my breath to stay as quiet as possible. With my arms outstretched in the dark, I took small, shuffling steps towards the bath tub. My hand brushed against the shower curtain, and I used it to maintain my balance as I stepped over the edge of the tub and into the warm water.

Had I forgotten to drain it?

"Are you in there?" Maks' footsteps stopped right outside the bathroom door. "I can hear you in there."

A blurred, gold-yellow glow appeared where the bottom of the door must've been. He'd brought a flashlight back with him.

I pressed myself against the tile wall so that I was hidden away behind the curtain. I didn't dare pull it out farther. Maks was too close. He would hear.

"The door was open." Maks grumbled. "I found your dog."

The door knob on the bathroom door jiggled, and then the door clicked open. I felt my whole world come crashing down at that moment.

Maks had found me. He was going to kill me and Chief.

I didn't want to know what he had already done to Casey.

The bathroom flooded with light at the exact moment I reached above my head to pop the curtain rod out of its place.

With my eyes squeezed shut, I swung the metal rod towards the sound of Maks' boots squeaking against the wet floor just inches from my hiding spot.

He went down with a short yelp, and by down, I mean forward. His body slammed into mine, but I was quick. I dodged his full weight and avoided being crushed by mere seconds. There was a high pitched squeal as he clutched at the wet shower curtain, and then a gigantic splash as his body collided with the tub water. The waves slapped against my legs, but I didn't pay them any attention.

Half soaking and shaking like I had just learned how to walk, I swung the rod down on top of Maks' dark outline again.

And again, and again, and again.

"You will never--"

Smack.

"Touch--"

Smack.

"Me--"

Smack.

"AGAIN!"

I brought the rod down one more time, even though Maks had stopped struggling after the second blow.

I threw the rod away from me, and listened as it clattered across the bathroom floor. I slumped back into the water, legs drawn up close to my chest. With the lights on, I could see color now. A blurred mass of something red had began to grow, spreading outwards in the water from Maks' still shape.

I pressed my hands against my face, trying feebly to steady them, but it didn't work. I couldn't stop shaking, and if I had been able to hear anything but my own thoughts, or see anything but the cloud of red that was slowly engulfing me, I would've noticed Chief's incessant barking. I would've seen Casey's shape filling up the doorway, followed quickly by Beck's.

And I would've heard Casey's breathless voice as he cried, "Lola-- what did you do?"