When Trouble Comes ✔️ (Republished; Completed)

12: The Past (Part B)

A minute or perhaps a whole year must have passed when Alyssa finally woke up. She was still dizzy and weak. She was lying, face down, on the stone cold floor. Her eyes fluttered but she didn't dare to open them fully. She only lightly parted her lashes and saw a man pacing the length of the room.

He was a gaunt man with black, shoulder length hair. His face was sharp and confused, as if contemplating what to do next.

Alyssa had to bite down on her scream when she beheld the knife on his hand, and the hilt of a gun peeking out from his pocket.

She would've tried to run if it weren't for the fact that her hands and feet were tightly bound. Moreover, she was too sore to outrun a man like him, with a gun, nonetheless.

Against her better judgement, Alyssa blurted out, "What do you want?"

He turned towards her in haste, as if he himself had been shocked by her words. For a second, some strange expression passed in his eyes, before his features hardened. A malicious smirk played on his lips.

"You're awake. Took you long enough. It's a shame, really. Such a lovely girl born to those fucking bastards," he spat out the last few words.

Alyssa's blood ran cold.

Whoever this man was, he must have had a big grudge against her family. Not only her. 

He bent down his face too close. So close that she could see the strange coldness in the very depths of his silver-grey eyes. She could smell his tainted breath, which reeked of drugs she'd never smelt before. She felt like gagging.

She tried to drag herself away from him, even as her heart jumped with fear. His knife was too close to her neck. His other hand traced the length of her face, his long nails digging into her cheeks. Blood trickled down.

"Tell me, where is your great father and your step mother?"

His voice was a lovers' whisper but there was nothing kind or loving or even humane in it.

And how did he know that Liarane was her step mother?! No one knew that except for they themselves, and Brodey, who had somehow managed to figure that out. 

Alyssa backed her head. No, she would not reply to him even if her fear forced her to.

He growled at her defiance and she felt searing pain in her back as the knife dug in. Blood pooled out, hot against her skin. A scream escaped her lips but he immediately put a hand to her mouth.

"Don't scream or you'll be dead before you know it," he hissed. 

Hot tears trickled down her cheeks, mixing with the fresh blood there. Her eyes blurred. The pain continued. 

And... the sound of horns could be heard from the backyard.

Shit.

"No. No," Alyssa tried to scream again. But the knife pressing in deeper, the sharp pain, the numbing body and blood, reminded her. She mustn't scream.

Liarane and Ander walked in through the door and immediately froze on seeing the man standing there, and her on the floor.

"No!" Liarane screamed, running towards her but she stopped, as the gun was pointed towards her. The knife was still at Alyssa's back, piercing her skin.

Ander couldn't move either. If he did, his wife and child would be dead.

But Alyssa could move, she realized, even with the knife close to her body. The man's attention was diverted.

Her ankles were tied, so she brought her knees together, and hit the man as hard as she could.

With a growl of pain, he loosened his grip. The knife clattered to the floor and he kicked her in the stomach.

Liarane went in for the gun and Alyssa caterpillared forward while the man was distracted. Her legs touched the knife on the floor and she slashed at it as hard as she could. Her legs stung, but they were freed.

She pushed the knife towards her hands and after some trouble, managed to free them, suddenly glad for all the defence strategy classes that Ander had forced her to join.

Meanwhile, a lot had happened.

The man had his fingers wrapped around Liarane's throat. The gun in his hands pointed towards Ander. She saw tears glisten in his eyes.

And a loud shot rung through the air.

Alyssa screamed. And even as she did, she knew no one would hear them. Their walls were mostly sound-absorbent.

Ander was dead. Liarane was choking.

Alyssa sprang forward to stop him from strangling her. But she had forgotten about the knife.

The man let go of a breathless Liarane and plunged the knife into Alyssa's thigh.

Once, twice, thrice...

Until she fell and she couldn't get up. The knife clattered to the floor. 

Her leg was bathed in blood and the pain was unbearable. She clutched at the gore that her thigh had become, as if squeezing the flesh would rejoin the mutilated parts and the flesh together. As if the pain would be a little less. She thrashed her right leg, hoping the pain there would reduce the pain on her left leg.

She looked up. The man had his gun pointed towards her. Her vision blurred again. She hoped he would kill her.

But before she knew anything else, Liarane had dived in front of her. The man shot just as Liarane pushed the very same knife right through his stomach. And with a last feeling of panic, everything had gone blank.

Next time she got back her consciousness was after a twenty-days-long coma period. The doctors informed her that while she had had a lucky survival, her parents hadn't been so lucky. 

She herself would've been dead too, if Catherine, their neighbour and Alyssa's current legal guardian, hadn't come to their house soon enough. She was first person to have discovered the bloody mess.

Alyssa wished that she had died rather than faced the nightmares, horrors and lonely memories ever since.

A/N:- Why do you think Ken Evans attacked their family?! Tell me your thoughts.

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