Page 16 of Violent Attraction

I look at the man standing in front of me and try to picture what his life, what my life, would have been if he hadn’t fallen into the world of the Muertos.

I can’t.

This is who he is, and it will be who I become.

After a few seconds I give my nod to my father, silently telling him that I understand.

With one final look at me and with an audible sigh, he walks to the door and unlocks it, opening it wide enough for me to walk through.

The doors close behind us, and the second that the darkness engulfs me, I hear it.

I hear the screams.

The begging.

The lives being taken.

I don’t have to take a step further to know that I won’t be the same person I was a few seconds ago.

The more I hear the screams, the grunting and the gunshots, I know I will become a new person.

And that person won’t deserve anything in this life and that includes asking Isabella to prom.

After what I’m about to witness, I don’t deserve to receive any of her smiles that she throws in my direction.

I won’t deserve her.

6

I had hope.

Hope that he would finally break completely and do what I know he wanted to do.

Hope that the promise he told me in the hallway was going to come true sooner rather than later on.

Hope that once and for all my dreams were going to come to life and I had something to look forward to.

I had hope.

There was something in his eyes when we arrived back to the estate that day, something that looked like determination.

I thought that it might have had something to do with me.

It didn’t.

How do I know?

Later that night, that determination was gone. It was gone and with it the light that lived in his eyes was gone as well. In a matter of hours, it had seemed like he had changed. In the days to come, I also noticed he became harder, colder. Even towards me.

The hope I had in me started to dwindle.

With every day, every week that passed, it dwindled even more.

Until I finally got to the point where I was losing hope that his promise to make me his one day, will never come.

And now weeks after those words were said, I have a feeling that I’m completely right.

I will never belong to Santiago Reyes, no matter how hard I had wished for it.