Devil’s Vow

Laura

Gunshots flare in the air, but I am no stranger to this sort of scenario. My red dress shines in the dark night, a beauty, a stark contrast to the violence unfolding before my eyes.

My heart races, each beat a fiery throb, as if the poor organ is about to burst from my chest. Gunfire is exchanged, the staccato, non-rhythmic sounds of shots echoing relentlessly in my ears.

I see the muzzle flashes, smell the acrid gunpowder, feel the vibrations of each explosion ripple through the ground. The chaotic symphony of violence drowns out everything else, a pounding assault on my senses. 

I am no stranger to this. But for the first time, my heart jumps with every shot.

Because my husband is there, meticulously shooting back, dodging the bullets aimed at him with a lethal grace.

I see the new shooter before he fires, his eyes cold and merciless and his gun aimed at my husband. 

Time slows. I throw myself into the fray, my red dress billowing around me like a flag of defiance, wrapping my arms around my husband at the very moment the stranger pulls the trigger.

I feel it— the searing, burning pain as the bullet tears through my flesh, the shockwave reverberating through my body. My husband feels it too, as I catch a strange anguished emotion in his eyes, a mix of anger, horror and one I've never seen before— helplessness.

I collapse, and he holds me as I fall, the world blurs, the sounds of battle fading into a distant roar. They say your life's best moments flash before your eyes before you die. But why does he lurk in all my best moments? Why do they all contain him? Why does Andreas Hidalgo look this way even as the darkness approaches my sight slowly?

“Laura.” He breathes, his deep baritone stained with pain. It's the last thing I hear before the darkness claims me whole.

Death comes for everyone. But in my case, I ran towards it, and it took me without hesitation, and on the very day I was born.