Free Broken to Pieces by Avery Stark Page A

fist. She brought it down onto his face over and over again, sending out increasingly violent splatters of his blood like red fireworks.
    Cartilage and bone crackled under her already swollen knuckles with every unrestrained swing that she took. To Adam, along with the other guests, she looked like a rabid animal. By the time that he reached her, Emily had succeeded in landing almost a dozen blows to the Father's face, leaving him bloodied and dazed.
    "Emily," he yelled and locked both arms around her waist, " stop !"
    She thrashed her body against him in a desperate bid to escape and continue her assault.
    "Get off of me!"
    "No, Emily. You need to stop!"
    She kicked and bucked under his powerful arms.
    "I won't stop," she screamed and pointed a bloody finger at Father Hall, who had scrambled to his feet, "until he pays for what he did!"
    Adam's heart was pounding in his chest, but as her squeezed Emily against him, he could feel that hers was even more erratic. What had this man said to her? Who was he?
    Had she finally snapped?
    Father Hall staggered back and nearly collapsed over the trunk of his car. He cradled his face with both hands, allowing a steady stream of blood to drip from between his fingers.
    "I'm calling the police," he slurred through some early swelling and a couple of loose teeth.
    Emily clenched her fists and tried to charge again. Adam gritted his teeth and pulled her in so close that he could smell the alkaline, sweet mix of blood and perfume wafting up from her shaking body.
    "Call the police, you piece of shit," she cried, "so I can tell them what you did to me!"
    Father Hall tried to balance himself on the heavy car but continued to stumble as he made his way toward the driver's side door.
    "Please," she begged sarcastically, "call them so they can hear about how you…"
    Her voice trailed off. Adam, with his hands still pinning her to him, could feel the fight leaving her petite body. The muscles in her back started to relax and the shallow breaths that she had been taking began to slow down. The change was subtle, but he knew that she couldn't go on like that for much longer.
    Father Hall jerked the car door open, threw himself inside, and fumbled with the keys that he had left in the ignition.
    In a heartbeat-a fleeting blink of an eye-he was gone.
    When the car disappeared from sight, Emily slipped through Adam's arms and took off down the road, her bare feet slapping down into the hard earth. Tiny pebbles stabbed and ripped dozens of little cuts on her tender flesh, but she didn't feel a thing.
    Not far behind, Adam was following and calling her name.
    By the time that he got close enough to grab her arm, they were almost off of the property completely.
    "Emily," he hollered and wrapped his fingers around her thin wrist when she swung it back mid-stride, "please stop!"
    When their skin met, Emily felt like she had been slammed into a brick wall. It was only then, as his finger tips dug into her flesh, that she started to come back out of the haze of her anger and stopped dead in her tracks.
    They stood there, each one of them breathing heavily, as a hot wind rolled past and made the surrounding wild flowers dance around them.
    "What," Adam gasped and brushed some of the scraggly hairs out of his face, "what was that?"
    She didn't answer.
    "What did he do to you?"
    Emily turned around slowly. Her red cheeks were smeared with Father Hall's blood and her usually bright eyes were red and swollen. The corners of her lips had dried out and, on top of the blood, a thick layer of dirt was caked to her otherwise soft face. Cutting through all of it were long, clean trails of skin that led from her eyes to her chin where her tears had wiped away the grime.
    "He," she stammered, "he…"
    Adam turned her hand over. All four of her top knuckles had been torn open and were slowly weeping blood onto his hand.
    "You can tell me."
    Emily lowered her head for a moment and considered her next words