Oscar shuffles closer to Mom and whispers something into her ear. His eyes go from me to T-Bone and back again. Mom's face falls, and she shakes her head.
"Mila," she says, "is it true that you want to put me back in jail?"
"I want to give you the help you need, Mom. You need medicine."
"So it's true then..." she whispers.
Oscar hands her the gun. "You have to do it, Sveta," he says to her. "Think of the blood we could collect. Shifter blood. From a young bat. I bet this is exactly what we need to finish the formula."
If I thought it hurt when my mother was arrested, that was nothing compared to this.
She takes the gun and points it directly at me.
My mother's hands aren't even shaking as she aims a weapon at her only child.
I let out a breath, accepting this realization. I always wondered if I would have grown up to be one of her victims. I guess I have my answer.
I might be a shifter who can easily heal from a bullet wound, but she is pointing it directly at my heart. There is no recovering from that.
"Mom." I say the word, hoping that she remembers that she carried me for nine months. That she held me as a baby. That she kissed my skinned knees and read me bedtime stories. She lowers the gun one single millimeter.
"Do it, Sveta," Oscar eggs on. "We can use her blood to fix you. To find the missing link to immortality."
Her eyes slide over to Oscar. He is caught between pleading and faked bravado.
"Sure." I shrug. "You could kill me, Mom." I make sure to enunciate that last work, really hammering it home. "But would you be ready to face Dad at that trial? Look into Edward's face and tell him what you've done? Mom?"
The gun slides another millimeter down. If she were to shoot now, it would maybe nick an artery, but my chances of surviving have significantly increased.
"Sveta," Oscar growls. "We have worked too hard to stop now. What are you thinking? Do it. I can fix you."
“Mom, look at me. It’s me, Spooky. Remember? You called me that because I was the only little girl who wanted to dress like a monster instead of the princess at Halloween.”
She bites down on her lip, a mannerism that is so like me that it makes my heart ache. Mom lowers the gun, but Oscar anticipates her move. He grabs for it, and the two begin to scuffle for the weapon.
"Mila." T-Bone pushes me behind him and backs us up a few feet. I step back around him, trying to find a way to break between Oscar and my mom.
"Why are you doing this, Sveta?" Oscar shouts. "We had a deal. We said we would find a cure to death, to aging. You're ruining it."
"I can't hurt her." Mom weeps, clawing at her accomplice. “She’s my own. My Spooky. I can’t.”
I can only watch in horror as the two very sick people battle it out for the weapon. It would be comical if it weren't so goddamn sad.
She's too frail from battling the blood poisoning and the Foamies, and she loses the gun to Oscar.
T-Bone surely notices the turn of the tide as he dives in front of me.
I vaguely hear the sound of the gun going off, and I can only wait for the pain.
It doesn't come.
But T-Bone's leg buckles, and blood gushes from his thigh.
Mom launches herself at Oscar, screeching at him that he could have killed me. Her pale face is a mask of fury as she claws at his face.
I kneel by T-Bone and press my hand to his leg. A lot of blood is spouting out of him, and he’s unconscious.
"You’re going to be okay,” I say. But there is a lot of blood. Enough for me to know that he has indeed been shot in his femoral artery.
A few feet away, Oscar and my mother have stopped fighting. She's the one holding the gun. This time, it's pointed straight to Oscar.
"You could have killed my daughter, you idiot," she shrieks.
"It was for us, Sveta. You know you've grown old, and I only wanted to fix you. With her blood, we could have made you younger." He takes a step toward her, his hands outstretched for the gun. "We can still find the cure. We can make all of this better. You said, remember, that we could be heroes if we found the secret of life that lies in blood. We just have to kill her." He inclines his head in my direction.
I have no idea why he has fixated on killing me, but I don't particularly enjoy being his target. My hands are applying pressure to T-Bone’s wound, trying to find a way to get a handle on the situation.
"You know that legend, that daughters steal their mother's beauty and youth? That's what she did to you."
Oh, that mother fucker. If T-Bone's leg weren't bleeding so profusely, I'd beat Oscar’s ass for believing—and perpetuating—that asinine tale.
If T-Bone’s shifter healing could kick in, he would regain consciousness to hold his own wound while I tried to untangle the mess between my mother and Oscar.
Mom narrows her eyes at him. "I've been fighting against the image of Elizabeth Bathory put on me, and here you are, spouting another misogynistic bullshit story. I should have known that you were just like the rest of them."
In the distance, the sound of sirens can be heard.
Her eyes slip for a second, and then with a sigh, she shakes her head.
"What's a few more years added to my sentence?" she says, emptying the rest of the clip into Oscar's chest.
I can't help the gasp that tears out of me.
My knees go weak, and if I weren’t already sitting on the cold ground, I would
