Chapter Twelve #2
Xaden’s eyes blaze with something I’ve never seen before…
not rage, not cruelty, but a wild, primal terror that strips away every layer of the monster he wears like a second skin.
A strangled sound escapes Cas somewhere behind me but I don’t look away from Xaden.
I can’t. Because for the first time since I’ve known him, he looks afraid, and the broken, vengeful thing inside me feeds on it.
And the other part of me, the part that’s still bleeding, still grieving, still stupidly in love with him, that part wants to kneel back down, press his hand to my stomach, and whisper we made something that isn’t destruction.
I bury that part alive.
“I’m the one with my back against the wall,” I say, and my voice is iron wrapped in ice.
“I’m alone. I’m surrounded by enemies wearing the faces of people I love.
But I’m still fighting.” I pause, letting the weight of what comes next settle between us like a blade.
“Mark my words, Devlin. I’ll destroy my family and take everything from them.
I’ll seize their cartel and rebuild it with my bare hands.
And once I’m the head of my family?” I tilt my head, and the smile I give him is the most terrifying thing I’ve ever worn. “I’m coming for yours.”
His jaw clenches so hard I can see the muscle jumping.
“And I promise you,” I whisper, leaning down just enough that only he can hear me. “I’ll make sure our child knows I was the one who slaughtered their father.”
His eyes blow wide. The color drains from his face.
And for one single, devastating heartbeat, I see him, not the monster, not the killer, not the ghost wrapped in vengeance and violence but the boy underneath.
The one who lost everything. The one who might have been different if the world hadn't broken him first. The one I would have loved in another life, a kinder life, a life where we weren't built to be each other's undoing.
The sight of him nearly cracks my resolve in half.
“Kellan lied,” I continue, and each word costs me more than he’ll ever know. “It’s yours, Xaden. When you try to kill me again, and we both know you will, take a second to think about how Emery would view you from above, knowing you murdered your own child.”
I don’t wait for his response. I can’t. Because if I stay one more second, if I look at his shattered expression for one more moment, the part of me that loves him will win and I’ll fall to my knees and beg him to choose differently.
To choose us. And that girl died tonight alongside Kellan, bleeding out on the ice in a rink that smells like gunpowder and regret.
I take one last look at Kellan. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I’ll make it count, I swear.
I walk away. One foot in front of the other. Steady. Unshaking. A queen forged in blood and fury.
The sound of a gun cocking behind me barely registers.
My spine doesn’t stiffen. My step doesn’t falter.
Let him shoot. Let him put a bullet in my back the same way he put one in Kellan’s head.
At least then the war inside me would finally end, the unbearable, excruciating battle between wanting him dead and wanting him mine.
“Xaden, don’t! That’s your kid!” Cas’s voice cracks through the silence like thunder.
I step off the ice and push through the back door without looking back.
The second it closes behind me, the queen crumbles.
I yank my shirt back on with shaking hands and collapse against the side of the building, my body folding as everything I held back comes roaring out.
I heave, violent and merciless, the meager contents of my stomach splattering against the concrete as my body tries to purge what my mind can’t.
But you can’t throw up grief. You can’t vomit out love. And you sure as hell can’t purge the image of the man you’re falling for standing over the body of your friend with a ghost of a smile on his beautiful, terrible face.
I’m still retching when I sense them approaching. Halo, Pope, Vatican, and Carnage, stalking toward me with fury etched into every line of their faces. The second Carnage sees the blood, he breaks into a run, and when his arms close around me, something inside me shatters completely.
I cling to him like he’s the only solid thing left in a world that’s dissolving beneath my feet, and I let myself break.
Because pain is a reminder that you’re alive, and right now I wish I wasn’t.
Living isn’t for the faint of heart, it's grueling, relentless, a daily exercise in surviving things that should have killed you.
You fight and you pray and you drag yourself through one more day, and for what?
Death is easy. Death is quiet. No pain. No war. No guilt. No Xaden’s eyes burning into yours while your heart tears itself in two.
“Who’s inside?” Pope asks, his voice tight and dangerous.
“Xaden... Cas…” The names scrape out of my throat like broken glass. “They killed him…”
The four of them exchange words in hushed, furious tones, but I can’t hear them over the roaring in my ears. I bury my face in Carnage’s chest and let him hold together the pieces of me that are trying to scatter.
“Come on. I'll take you home,” Carnage murmurs, then he lifts me into his arms, carrying me like something precious, something worth protecting, and I press my face into his neck and try to hide from the truth that’s chasing me.
I don’t just want vengeance against Xaden Devlin.
I want vengeance against myself, for the unforgivable sin of still wanting him even now.
I stayed in the shower until the water ran cold, then sat in it still, letting the icy spray punish me because I deserve it.
Kellan’s blood swirls down the drain in diluted pink rivers, and I watch it go, scrubbing at my skin until it is raw and angry, and still, I don’t feel clean enough.
The blood is gone but I can still feel it, that phantom warmth on my face, the ghost of him dying against my skin.
Every time I close my eyes I see it, the gun, the flash, the hole, the light leaving, Xaden's hand releasing him like garbage.
And then, because my mind is a traitor just like my heart, I see Xaden’s face when I tell him about the baby. That flash of naked terror. That split second where the monster disappeared and the man surfaced, gasping for air. And something inside me will ache in a way that makes me sick with myself.
I want to gouge that feeling out with my bare hands.
I knew Xaden was dangerous. I knew he was a killer.
I’d seen the darkness in him from the very first moment, felt it calling to the matching darkness in me like a frequency only we could hear.
But I deluded myself. I told myself the tender moments were real: the way his voice softened when we were alone, the way his hands trembled sometimes when he touched me like he was afraid I’d break, the way he looked at me like I was both his salvation and his damnation.
Tonight he proved that he is exactly who he told me he was. And I am the fool who loved him anyway.
Loved. Past tense. I’ll make it past tense if it kills me.
I pull on one of Carnage’s stolen shirts, letting it fall to my knees like armor, and climb into bed. I pull the covers up to my chin and stare at the ceiling, while the war inside me rages on.
He killed Kellan. He killed your friend. He’s your enemy.
He’s the father of your child. He’s haunted and broken and drowning.
He smiled. He smiled while Kellan bled.
He was terrified when you told him about the baby. You saw it.
“Stop,” I grit out, trying to silence my thoughts.
Stop making excuses. Stop looking for the good in a man made of nothing but sharp edges and blood.
But what if there’s something left in him worth—-
“Kellan is dead!”
That’s the one that silences everything. Kellan is dead, and Xaden killed him, and I will never hear Kellan’s laugh again, never feel the quiet safety of his presence, never get to say the words that could have given him peace.
The plan I had, take down my father, take down Xaden, flee with my child to somewhere quiet and safe and untouched by this war, that plan died tonight on the ice alongside Kellan.
Running is a luxury for people who haven’t held their dead in their arms. Running is for people who don’t hear gunshots when they close their eyes.
I won’t run.
I won’t let anyone else hold the reins. I’ll cut off the head of the snake and wear it like a crown.
For Kellan.
For KennaDee.
For Emery.
Even for Neave and Miles.
Even if it means destroying the only person who ever made me feel alive.
I don’t know how much time passes before my bedroom door bangs open and Vatican stands in the frame, looking like barely contained violence. “You got a visitor.”
He stalks away without waiting for a response. I drag myself out of bed, padding through the house, ignoring the guys as I pass. I yank the front door open and my blood turns to acid.
Caspian.
Leaning against his bike at the curb, arms crossed, looking every inch the loyal soldier of the man I've sworn to destroy.
I don’t move from the doorway. “How the fuck did you find me?”
Cas scoffs. “Wasn’t that hard to follow them after they left the rink.”
I almost laugh. “The only reason you found this place is because they let you follow them.” The fact that he’s standing here breathing means the guys allowed it, and that means they have a reason. Everything is a chess move now.
“Terror—”
“What the fuck do you want?” The words are a whip crack. I don’t have the bandwidth for his bullshit. I’m still trying to keep my seams from splitting.
His gaze drops to my stomach. “That really his kid?”