His roar nearly shattered my eardrums.
"I told you I wouldn't do it again! Why are you so relentless?" He turned on me, eyes wild. "What did Lola do wrong? She just made me feel good—do you have to be this vicious?"
He didn't waste another second. He unbuckled, scrambled out, and sprinted toward the bridge's edge.
In the distance, Lola swayed in the wind, looking ready to plummet at any moment. Pitiful. Fragile. A perfect performance.
"Lola! Come down—don't do this!"
His eyes were rimmed red, and for the first time in years, I saw a tear slide down his cheek.
I sat there, stunned.
I remembered accompanying him to a high-stakes negotiation. We were intercepted by kidnappers. To protect him, I took a knife to the gut. As I lay in the ambulance, bleeding out and hovering on the brink of death, his eyes had been red too.
But he never shed a single tear for me.
I clenched my hands, bile rising. The bitterness was suffocating.
He was still running, his voice carrying as he coaxed Lola.
Then the car lurched.
My face went pale. In his rush to save his mistress, Adam had left the engine running, the car in neutral. He hadn't engaged the parking brake.
It began rolling forward, gathering speed toward the gap in the railing.
I stomped the brake. It sank uselessly to the floor.
The brakes had failed.
Terror seized me. I scrambled for my phone, fingers trembling as I dialed him.
Through the windshield, I saw him glance at his screen. He saw my name. With a look of impatience, he declined the call and shoved the phone back into his pocket.
His heart was filled only with Lola.
Desperation clawed at my throat. I rolled down the window and screamed.
"Adam! Save me! The brakes failed!"
"Adam, save me!"
No matter how loud I screamed, he didn't turn around. He acted as if I didn't exist.
As the car plunged toward the edge, I saw Lola look past his shoulder.
She looked directly at me.
And smirked.
My heart plummeted the instant the car tipped off the bridge.
In those final, suspended seconds, I managed to retrieve the pinhole camera I'd hidden inside the vehicle. Through the window, a singular image burned into my retinas: Adam coaxing Lola down from the ledge, cradling her like a treasure he'd nearly lost.
Then gravity took over. I crashed into the sea, and the bone-piercing cold swallowed me whole.
Consciousness returned in a haze of antiseptic and pain.