Chapter Twenty-six
Serena
I breathe in.
Slow. Shaky. Useless.
It’s fine. You have nothing to do with this. It’s not your fault.
I repeat it like a prayer, like if I say it enough times it will become true. My heart is racing so fast it feels like it’s clawing its way out of my chest. My hands tremble against my stomach.
Please. Not today.
Oh God, please, it’s too early.
Panic coils around my ribs, tight and merciless. I focus on my breathing, on the weight of my body, on the quiet voice in my head that keeps whispering it’s fine, it’s fine, everything will be okay. I try to believe it. I try so hard.
“Serena.”
Lorenzo’s voice reaches me, deep and familiar, but I can’t bring myself to look at him. Every time I do, all I see is blood. All I see are lifeless eyes staring at nothing. I hear the gunshot again, feel it echo in my bones.
I turn my head away, but it doesn’t help. The images follow me.
It’s not your fault, I tell myself. You didn’t do this. You don’t control what people do.
“You don’t?” a voice inside me whispers.
“Yes,” I answer silently, desperate. “I don’t.”
But the voice doesn’t leave.
“Maybe if you hadn’t gone into that room,” it murmurs, soft and cruel, “none of this would’ve happened.”
My chest tightens until it hurts to breathe.
A hand closes around mine. Firm. Warm. Real. The contrast between his heat and my cold skin makes me flinch.
“Let me go,” I say.
The words come out sharp, brittle. He did it again. I shouldn’t be this worked up, I tell myself. That man was probably dangerous. Maybe even a rapist.
“You don’t know that,” the voice answers.
I squeeze my eyes shut. “Since when do good men assault women?” I hiss back at it.
“And since when do good men get to decide who lives and who dies?” it whispers.
My throat burns. Tears spill over, hot and relentless. I feel like I’m splitting in two.
Sienna appears in front of me, her face steady in a way mine isn’t. Too steady.
“Are you okay?” she asks softly.
The sound of her voice breaks something loose inside me.
“I don’t even know who you are anymore!” I cry.
Pain flickers across her face, but it doesn’t erase the image burned into my mind. “What the hell was that?” I ask, my voice cracking. “What did you just do?”
“I was protecting you,” she whispers.
“I didn’t even know you carried a gun,” I sob, my voice breaking under the weight of everything I’ve just seen. “I didn’t know you were some trained fighter who can take down a man twice your size.” My hands shake as I look at her. “Who are you?”
She doesn’t look away. “I did what I had to do,” she says firmly. “I won’t be helpless. I won’t be unable to protect myself or the people I love.”
Her words hit harder than I expect.
“So I’m helpless?” I shout. “Because I don’t shoot people? Because I don’t beat them until they’re bleeding?”
“You were kidnapped,” she says.
The sentence slices straight through me.
“So it’s my fault?” I cry, the question ripping out of my chest.
She steps closer and I instinctively step back, my body reacting before my mind can catch up.
“Of course not,” she says, her voice softer now. “I’m sorry if it was too much. I was just trying to protect you.”
Tears blur everything. “You didn’t even blink,” I choke. “You didn’t blink when he killed him. You pulled us away so he could do it. What is wrong with you?”
There’s no answer that can fix what I feel.
“Let’s go home, love,” Lorenzo says quietly. “You’re overwhelmed.”
“I said let me go!” I shove his hand away, my whole body shaking. “There is no us going home together.” My voice breaks. “Please. Just leave me alone.”
Sienna hesitates, then nods. “I’ll be in the kitchen,” she says softly. “I’ll give you two some space.”
She walks away, and I feel stupid for ever thinking this would be different. For ever believing I could survive loving him again.
“You don’t mean that,” Lorenzo says.
But I see it. The fear in his eyes. The real kind. The kind that doesn’t come from guns or blood.
And that’s what finally breaks me.
“Why?” I cry, the word tearing out of me like something ripped from my chest.
“Why what, love?” he asks softly, as if softness can undo what I just saw.
“Why did you have to kill him?” My voice breaks completely. I’m crying openly now, my body trembling. I look at him and I see it happen in real time. The darkness settling in. The softness draining from his eyes like it was never real to begin with.
“I’m sorry I did it in front of you,” he says quietly. “I should’ve waited.”
The words stun me.
“You shouldn’t have killed him at all!” I scream. “That’s not how this works, Lorenzo. You can’t just kill everyone who ever wrongs me in any way!”
His jaw tightens, sharp and unforgiving. His face goes cold, blank, terrifying in its calm.
“Serena, he didn’t just assault you,” he says, his voice low and controlled. “He had the nerve to do it in front of me. In front of all of us.” His eyes burn into mine. “Do you have any idea what that man would’ve been capable of if he’d been alone with you?”
“You don’t know that!” I shout back, even though the thought makes my stomach twist. I’m not naive.
I know he might be right. But knowing doesn’t make it right.
Knowing doesn’t make it bearable. “You can’t just keep killing people because of me!
” I sob. “My conscience can’t take it anymore, Lorenzo. ”
His expression softens, just slightly. Enough to hurt.
“Come here,” he murmurs, opening his arms.
I shove him away.
“How can you kill so easily?” I cry. “Don’t you have a conscience?”
“Not when it comes to you,” he answers without hesitation.
Something inside me cracks. Fully, irreparably. I should have known. This was always going to end this way.
“You can’t ask me to forgive you and then act like a murderer,” I say through tears.
“But I need you to see me clearly, Serena,” he says softly.
“I am a fucking murderer.” His eyes shine, emotion breaking through iron control.
“And I will murder every fucking person in this world if they ever hurt you. If they even think about it.” His voice fractures.
“I wouldn’t hesitate. Not for you. Never. ”
He lifts my chin, forcing me to look at him. I can barely see him through the blur of tears.
“This is me,” he whispers, close enough that the words feel fragile. “All the parts you were never meant to love.” His thumb lingers. “I just hoped you would anyway.”
“It hurts me,” I cry, my chest aching, “when you hurt other people because of me.”
He wipes my tears with his thumbs, his touch gentle, almost reverent.
“I can live with you resenting me,” he murmurs. “I can’t live with your absence.” He swallows. “I’d kill the whole fucking humanity and carry your hatred forever if it meant no one ever laid a hand on you again.”
I push him away again, my hands shaking.
“You want to know why?” he asks.
I shake my head, but he continues anyway.
“I’m not capable of it,” he says, pressing his forehead to mine. My sobs shake between us. “I don’t have it in me to spare anyone who hurts you.” His voice drops to a whisper. “It destroys me from the inside.”
And that’s when I realize the truth.
This isn’t just protection.
This is obsession.
This is love twisted into something violent and absolute.
And I don’t know how to survive it.
“This isn’t working,” I cry, and the way he looks at me tells me I’ve hit something fragile in both of us.
Something already cracked. “I see them. All the time. The lives you take.” My voice trembles, my chest tightening until air feels optional.
“I see my father standing in the corner of the room, watching me. I see John’s lifeless eyes staring at me every time I think maybe, maybe, I can put all of this aside so we can be together.
” My words break apart, soaked in tears.
“And now there’s another pair of eyes. Judging me.
Again and again. For choosing you over my conscience. ”
My breath comes in short, panicked gasps.
I press a hand to my chest, like that might stop my heart from tearing itself out.
“I keep telling myself that I deserve to choose me. That I deserve to be loved. That I can forgive you and still be happy.” I sob, the truth clawing its way out.
“But how can I keep doing that when you keep adding another pair of eyes judging me? And another one. And another one. Until I feel like the worst person in the world just for loving you?”
His hands come up, firm, steady, cradling my face.
His palms are warm against my skin, forcing me to look at him when all I want is to disappear.
“Why are you listening to the dead?” he asks, eyes dark and unyielding.
“Right and wrong are just words people use to feel better.” He kisses me softly, like a promise.
“Who fucking cares, baby? If I love you and you love me, nothing else gets to matter.”
A broken sound tears out of me. “Because I want to care,” I cry.
“About others too. Not just about myself.” My shoulders shake as the words spill out.
“I want to be able to live with myself. With the decisions I make.” My hand drifts instinctively to my stomach.
“I want my babies to look at their mother and see someone good. Someone who teaches them to be kind, to be caring, to choose what’s right. ”
His expression softens, something aching and raw passing through his eyes.
“You already are,” he says softly. “You’re beautiful beyond reason, but your heart is what breaks me.
” His voice drops. “Even now, you’re thinking about the man who assaulted you.
About whether his life mattered.” His thumb brushes my cheek, careful, almost worshipful.
“When you should be thinking about your own.” I lean into him, unsteady, like his touch is the only thing keeping me upright.