Page 158 of Unholy Masks

RYDEN

Trish came back wearing a black T-shirt and black pants. Without Kurt. White gloves that were obscenely bright against her outfit. She carried a bouquet of lilies.

“The bitch is back,” Irene muttered under her breath.

“And she is ready to kill us,” I said. Irene scoffed.

“Yara would never let us die,” Irene said with a shrug. She looked determined, but there was a flicker of fear in her eyes, which she tried to hide.

“Eeny meeny miny…” Trish looked at Irene and me. “Wait, I’ll give you the choice. It’s only fair after everything you have to go through.” She clapped her hands. “Who wants to die first?”

“I do,” I said.

“What? You think you can overpower me because I’m just a weak, fragile girl?” She laughed.

“No, I’d never underestimate you, Patricia,” I said with a shrug. “You have killed, and you have stayed undetected for years. That needs… skill. I know Yara’s smart, but I also know you’re smarter.”

“So?”

“I want to protect Irene. Like you wanted to protect Tany. Is that wrong?” I looked into Trish’s eyes. She flinched as if I had kicked her.

“It’s not, Ryden,” she said, almost softly. Like she understood. “But I changed my mind.

She grabbed Irene up. Irene didn’t even struggle. I knew that irritated Trish more. She wanted fight—Irene wasn’t giving her one.

“You can watch,” she said as she painted Irene’s lips. “Watch, Ryden.”

“That’s Casablanca,” I said, staring at the lipstick shade. She had kept it… for this moment. This was the end. The finale.

“That’s very good.”

“We already knew…”

“And yet here you are.” She said with a deep sigh. “Let’s do this, Irene.”

She was going to murder Irene, and I couldn’t do anything but watch. I tried to get myself out of the chains. I tried. Trish wasn’t careless—of course, she wasn’t. She had planned this moment for years…

I hoped Yara would find us before it was too late. Maybe it was too late now.

She closed her eyes… softly caressing Irene’s cheeks. I flinched.

“Guardian angels God will send thee,

All through the night.

Soft and drowsy hours are creeping,

Hill and Dale in slumber sleeping…”

Trish started to hum, injecting something into her veils. She looked at me then, with bright, delirious eyes. This wasn’t the calm and calculated Trish. This was someone broken, someone… beyond repair.

The overwhelming sadness and loss in her eyes, I had seen them before.

“The sisters used to sing it before bed every night,” she said to me like we were old friends sharing life stories, like she wasn’t holding a red garrote closer to Irene’s neck. “God did not send any guardian angels. Not for us. Yara… now Yara… she was my guardian angel. She is my guardian angel.”

“And you’d do this to her? Take another person she loved?”

“It doesn’t matter. I will give her all the love she deserves. Kat and Irene… you… you are all a distraction.”