36. Elijah
Chapter 36
Elijah
T he campus is quiet today, but my mind is elsewhere, replaying the events of the last week.
Confronting her.
The guilt.
Crew…
I wish I could shake off the weight pressing down on me, but it’s become a constant companion, and the nagging voice in my head tells me I need to speak to her.
Let her know he’s gone.
I round the corner near the library. He’s leaning against the wall, arms crossed, a smirk playing on his lips.
Archer.
“Elijah,” he calls out.
I stop in my tracks. “What do you want?”
He pushes off the wall and strides toward me, his eyes gleaming with a mix of amusement and something much darker… something I recognize. “Lottie sent me.”
Before I can react, his hand shoots out, gripping my arm in a punishing grip.
“Hey!” I protest, “I’d come willingly if you just ask!”
He doesn’t say anything else until we reach a classroom door. Archer knocks twice, then opens it without waiting for a response.
Inside, Lottie stands there, her expression carefully blank. “Elijah,” she says, her voice calm. “Sit.”
Archer leaves, the door clicking shut behind him. The silence that follows is thick and suffocating, and I can feel the weight of her judgment on me.
She doesn’t sit. Instead, she stands there until I shift uncomfortably in my seat, unsure of what to say or how to tell her everything.
“For a man who was so demanding before, you’re awfully silent now.” Her eyes lock onto mine with an intensity that makes my throat dry.
“Is it my turn now?” I ask.
“For what?”
“Revenge…” I say simply. “You told Crew he was first. Am I next?”
Lottie shrugs. “You could be. I thought for a long time about what would be the best revenge for you. For the man who demanded so much from me, and gave me nothing in return.”
I open my mouth to protest, to explain, but she holds up a hand, silencing me. “No. You don’t get to speak yet. I want you to be silent like I was.”
“You convinced me you cared,” she continues, her voice low. “You fed me lies, made me believe you would hold me together when I felt like everything was falling apart. That you saw me…” she huffs out a laugh. “And I was the foolish na?ve girl who believed it.”
Her eyes narrow, and I feel a pang of guilt twist in my chest.
“But the next day,” she goes on, her voice barely containing the tremble. “You were using it against me. You used my loneliness as a weapon to break me, then used those broken pieces to piece yourself back together.”
Any words I could say catch in my throat.
What can I say?
How can I defend myself when she’s right?
“You think you know pain,” her voice rises, like it’s been building for years. “You think you know what it’s like to suffer ?”
She steps closer, each word cutting into me like broken shards of glass.
I want to argue. Say I do, and that I suffered too. That losing her nearly killed me, but the words die in my throat the second her voice breaks.
“I was screaming,” she admits, the sound cracked and shaking. “Why wouldn’t you help me?”
She’s crying now, but it’s not soft or fragile. It’s brutal, like her body is trying to purge every ounce of pain she’s carried for years in a single breath.
“You locked that door… left me there. I couldn’t move. Pinned to the floor like an animal, and all I could do was scream and pray that someone would come.”
She jabs her finger into my chest.
“I cried.”
Poke.
“I pleaded with him to stop.”
Poke.
“I begged,” her voice splinters. “And screamed, and not one of you tried to help me.”
The air leaves my lungs in a rush. “God…” I breathe, because I can’t think of anything else to say.
“There is no god, Elijah.” Her voice is cold now. “Not one who gave a damn about me that day. That day I learned I was alone, and I swore I would never let another man get the satisfaction of hearing me beg again.”
My chest tightens. “We were told your dad picked you up… I swear, Mouse, we had no idea you were still in that room…” Then the realization hits me. The puzzle pieces click into place—and I hate how clear it is now—how obvious. “It’s why you stopped talking.”
“It was survival,” she says. “If I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t be ignored. If I didn’t speak, no one could twist my words. Silence became my armor, and it worked.”
I nod, the weight of everything feeling like it’s pulling me under.
“I killed him, you know?” I tell her, and for once, the coldness in my voice isn’t armor. It’s grief and regret. “The moment I found out what he did to you… I killed him.”
Her eyes flicker for a moment. “You didn’t do that for me. Don’t try to make yourself sound noble.”
“I did,” I start, but she cuts me off with a bitter laugh that makes my heart sink.
“If you really killed him for me…” She looks me up and down. “Then, where was that energy for Crew? For Roman? For yourself ?”
I stare at her in shock. “I?—”
“Because you three,” she continues, stepping even closer, “you shattered me. You knew me, knew everything I was going through. You looked me in the eyes and still chose to ruin me. Your dad was a monster, but he never pretended to be anything but. You? You left me in that room with him. You pretended to look at a broken girl like she could be your world, and then shattered her for your amusement.”
My voice feels trapped. I can’t breathe… can’t think.
“Let me make it right…”
She doesn’t respond at first. Just studies me, her face unreadable. Her silence is louder than any scream.
“You want to make it up to me?” she asks, her voice filled with confusion.
I nod. “Yes.”
“Then leave me alone.”
The silence rings in my ears. I feel the demand in my bones.
“And stop begging,” she adds, her lip curling. “It’s embarrassing.”
I flinch. She might as well have slapped me because I’ve uttered those same words to her once upon a time.
“What else? I’ll do anything but that.”
She thinks for a moment, then she leans into my face. “Kneel.”
I don’t move. Not right away.
I drop to my knees.
Her words hang in the air like smoke, thick and choking. Leave her alone. Don’t beg. It’s embarrassing.
But I am embarrassed.
Not because I’m kneeling in front of her, not because I’m pleading, but because she’s right.
I let her drown in silence and greedily stole parts of her for myself.
I look up at her, really look at her, and it’s like seeing her for the first time. Her arms are folded like armor, jaw clenched like she’s holding herself together by sheer will.
“I didn’t know…” I whisper.
“That’s the point, Elijah,” she says. “You should have known. You were supposed to be the one who saw me. You said you did. You said I was safe with you, and you made me feel anything but.”
My stomach twists.
“I meant it.”
“No, you meant I was safe until you were done with me,” she spits. “But I was never safe. I was cornered at every turn by the three of you, humiliated, violated , and every time I begged you with my eyes because my voice was stolen, you ignored me because it didn’t fit into your narrative.”
She paces now, each step like a drum beat echoing in my chest.
“Every time you would lock me in a classroom, I heard the click like a countdown,” she says. “And I would break… again and again. The pain. The fragmented memories of that night would break me apart, and I’d have to face you three straight after, like I wasn’t already teetering on the edge.”
Lottie takes a deep breath, haunted brown eyes finding mine. “I didn’t just survive him. I survived you, and I had to do it all without ever being allowed to scream. Dying was the best thing I ever did.”
She turns her back on me. Arms shaking, and it takes everything in me not to reach out and pull her into me.
But I don’t.
Instead, I do the most insane thing I’ve ever done. I speak the truth.
“I killed him because I hated what I became the day I realized I didn’t protect you. It broke something in me knowing what he did to you… You died, and I?—”
“You don’t get to say that,” she snaps. “You don’t get to act like you were the one who lost something. I lost my voice, my safety, my name. I had to die to get away from it all, and now here you all are demanding answers like you have any fucking right.”
“I know,” I murmur. “I know. Your death wrecked me, Mouse…”
I shuffle forward on my knees, bowing my head.
“I was feral with grief, and I didn’t know how to deal with losing you…” I grip her hand in mine, feeling its warmth and the way her pulse flutters in my palm. “I wanted to be near you even in death. If I had been allowed, I would’ve held your body against mine until you rotted through my fingers. And I wouldn’t have let go until we were both nothing but bones.”
Her breath stutters,
“But I’m alive.”
I nod, still on my knees, head bowed like a sinner at an altar.
“You are,” I breathe, “It’s why I keep demanding answers from you. I need to convince myself you’re real. That I haven’t imagined you back into existence, I can see you, but two years is a long time to grieve, wishing you were alive and knowing I had no power to do anything to bring you back.”
The warmth of her body brushes against mine, and I swear time slows. For a second, I think my words have been enough to get through to her, to get her to forgive me.
Maybe the way I’m trembling is enough.
Maybe she can see that I’m already ruined.
But then her fingers curl under my chin.
“Look at me,” she demands.
I do. Slowly.
Her eyes are wild—not with rage, but something colder. Resolved. The kind of fury that doesn’t shout, but cuts you to the core.
“Open your mouth.”
I hesitate, confused.
“Do it!” she snaps.
I do.
She spits right into my mouth. I don’t flinch.
“Swallow.”
I do because this is the girl I failed, and she’s giving me one of the last things I gave her.
“Good boy…” she looks down at me. “I remember every time you humiliated me. Every time you used my silence as a weapon against me. Every time you reminded me, I was below you. Now look at you, Elijah, on your knees for the ice queen who shut you all out like you didn’t build those walls yourself.”
Her hand drops from my face, but the weight of her words lingers.
“I know what my revenge is now.” Lottie takes a step back. “It’s not a punishment because that would imply I cared.”
“What is it?” I whisper, my voice hoarse.
“Forgetfulness. I’m going to get revenge on the other two, but we’re done now. You don’t get to haunt me like some tragic story. I’m going to forget you even exist because it’s going to wreck you… And the best part is I don’t have to do anything else.”
She walks away, her back straight as if nothing has ever touched her.
But I know better.
She’s carrying every scar we gave her.
The door clicks shut behind her. A second later, the sharp clink of the lock sliding into place echoes through the room.
I let out a low, bitter laugh because, of course, she did.
She’s done to me exactly what I did to her the last time I saw her alive.
Left me alone.
Trapped.
Powerless.
Humiliated.
Forgotten.
And somehow, it’s not the confinement that hurts.
It’s knowing she learned it from me.
Maybe that’s the real revenge—becoming my reflection long enough to show me what I did to break her.