Chapter 25 Shattered
Shattered
The sound came before the understanding—a sharp crack that split the air like breaking bone. Gabriel's body jerked against mine, warmth spreading where cold had been, and then I was screaming.
Blood. His blood, spreading across the white shirt, blooming like some terrible flower from his shoulder. Nathan stood in the doorway, gun steady despite the tears still tracking down his face.
"I can't let you keep her." His voice came out wrecked but determined. "Not again. Not after what you did."
"What I did?" Gabriel laughed, the sound wet and wrong. "I made her magnificent. You were preparing her for—"
The world went red.
I moved without thought, pure instinct driving my body toward threat. Toward Nathan. My scream wasn't human— conditioning colliding with animal protective rage. He'd hurt my Daddy. Shot him. Made him bleed.
Nathan saw me coming but didn't raise the gun. Didn't defend when I hit him full force, momentum carrying us both to the ground. My nails found flesh, teeth seeking throat, every careful lesson in control abandoned for feral protection.
"Bunny, stop—" But his words meant nothing against the roar in my head. Daddy was hurt. Daddy was bleeding. This threat had to be eliminated.
I clawed at his face, drawing parallel lines of red down his cheek. My knee found his ribs, driving air from his lungs. The gun skittered away across the floor, but I didn't care about weapons. I had teeth and nails and pure killing intent.
"I won't hurt you." Nathan caught my wrists, holding them away from his eyes but not fighting back. Not really. "I won't—I can't—"
"You shot him!" The words tore from my throat, raw and breaking. "You shot my Daddy!"
"He's not your—" Nathan's voice cracked as I wrenched one hand free, nails seeking soft tissue. "Bunny, please. You know what he is. What he did to you."
"He made me his." Simple truth through the chaos. "His to keep, his to protect, his his his—"
My elbow caught Nathan's jaw, snapping his head back.
I pressed forward, grinding against him in confused aggression, body trying to hurt and claim and destroy all at once.
Could feel his chest heaving beneath me, the careful way he controlled his strength to avoid truly damaging me even as I tried to tear him apart.
"That's my girl." Gabriel's voice cut through the frenzy, fond despite the pain. "Look at her, Nathan. Look at what proper conditioning creates. She'd kill you for me, wouldn't you, sweetheart?"
"Yes." No hesitation, no doubt. Would tear Nathan's throat out with my teeth if it meant keeping Gabriel safe. "Mine to protect. Mine to keep safe."
"Bunny." Nathan's voice broke completely. "This isn't you. This is what he programmed you to be."
"Same thing." I drove my forehead into his nose, felt the crunch of cartilage. His blood mixed with Gabriel's on my hands, painting me in competing loyalties. "I am what Daddy made me."
Nathan made a sound between sob and groan, still not fighting back with real force. His hands caught mine again, holding them still but not hurting, never hurting even as I tried to end him.
"I love you." Quiet admission through blood and tears. "Not what he has trained you to be. You. The girl who sang in the shower and stole my hoodies and made bad jokes when she was nervous. That was real."
"Lies." But something cracked in my voice. "All lies for the sale."
"No." He shifted beneath me, not throwing me off though he could have easily. "There is no sale, whatever he told you is a lie Bunny."
"How touching." Gabriel had managed to sit up, one hand pressed to his shoulder. Blood seeped between his fingers, but his eyes stayed sharp, amused. "Nathan Cross, compromised by his own asset. Rather defeats the purpose of retrieval, doesn't it?"
"Shut up." Nathan's attention stayed on me even as he addressed Gabriel. "You did this to her. Made her into something that can't tell love from ownership."
"I made her perfect." No apology in Gabriel's voice. "You tried to make her ordinary. Which one of us showed more respect for what she could be?"
I snarled, pressing harder against Nathan's grip. He was distracted by Gabriel, guard dropping, and I used it. Twisted free and drove my fist into his solar plexus, putting all my weight behind it. He folded, breath exploding out, and I was on him again.
"Don't talk about him." Punctuating words with blows. "Don't look at him. Don't exist near him."
But Nathan caught my wrists again, rolling us so I was pinned beneath him. Not hurting, just containing, his weight careful even now. Blood from his nose dripped onto my face, and I opened my mouth to catch it. Taste of copper and betrayal.
"I'm not going to hurt you." He said it like a promise, like prayer. "No matter what you do. I'm not going to hurt you."
"Coward." I spat blood back at him. His blood, marking him with his own weakness. "Too soft to do what's necessary."
"Yes." Simple agreement that stole my momentum. "Too soft when it comes to you. Gabriel's right about that much—I love you Bunny."
"Because you're human." Gabriel's voice came closer. He'd stood, moved despite the bullet wound, and I could see him in my peripheral vision. Swaying but upright. "Weak to the same needs you exploit in others. Rather poetic, really."
Nathan's jaw clenched. "Stay back. And shut the fuck up."
"Or what? You'll shoot me again? While she's watching?" Gabriel laughed, the sound dark and liquid. "We both know how that ends. She'll tear you apart before you can squeeze the trigger."
It was true. I could feel it in my bones, the absolute certainty that I'd destroy anything that threatened Gabriel. Not because I loved him—love was too simple a word for what we had built. But because he was mine to protect now. My creator, my owner, my perfectly terrible constant.
"Let me go." I writhed beneath Nathan, testing his grip. "Need to check on Daddy. Need to stop the bleeding."
"He's fine." Nathan's voice gentled marginally. "Shoulder wound. Painful but not fatal. I'm a better shot than that."
"Should have aimed for the head."
"Should have." Agreement that made something twist in my chest. "But I couldn't. Not with you there. Not with how you'd—" He stopped, swallowed hard. "I couldn't make you watch that."
"Sentimental fool." But Gabriel's voice held something like approval. "Still trying to protect her even as she tries to kill you. The family would be so disappointed in what you've become."
"What the fuck are you talking about you fucking asswipe?"
The words hit the air like another gunshot. Nathan's control slipped for just a moment, real rage flickering through. I used it, bucking hard enough to throw him off balance. We rolled, me ending up on top again, hands finding his throat.
"Don't threaten Daddy." Words that came from somewhere deeper than conscious thought. "Daddy is everything. Daddy is safety. Daddy is—"
"Lies." Nathan didn't fight my grip, just met my eyes steady. "Everything he told you is lies, Bunny. He isn't safety. He is the cage."
"Better a familiar cage than false freedom."
"Is it?" His hands came up to cover mine on his throat. Not pulling them away, just holding. "Is Gabriel's cage really better than what we were building?"
"What we were building was transport to sale." The words hurt coming out. "At least his cage comes with honesty about the locks."
Nathan made that broken sound again. I'd drawn more pain from him with words than with all my physical attacks combined.
"I would never sale you. I would never hurt you." Quiet admission. "Even if I had to die right now to prove that, I love you Bunny. No matter what lies he is filling your head with." His thumbs stroked across my knuckles, gentle even as I squeezed.
"Touching." Gabriel moved into full view, and I could see the damage properly.
Bullet had torn through the shoulder, missing anything vital but painting him in red.
He looked pale but steady, sustained by whatever chemical cocktail he'd been feeding us both.
"But irrelevant. Feelings don't change facts. "
"No, they don't." Nathan's gaze stayed on me. "But they change choices."
My hands loosened on his throat. Something in his voice, his eyes, the way he accepted death as a fair trade for my freedom—it didn't fit the narrative. Handlers preparing assets for sale didn't make those kinds of calculations.
"You're lying." But uncertainty crept in.
"About loving you? No." He sat up slowly, me still straddling him, our faces close enough to share breath.
"Pretty words." Gabriel's hand found my shoulder, trying to pull me back. "But she's already chosen, haven't you, sweetheart? Chosen who to protect, who to trust. And it isn't the brother who tried to give you artificial freedom."
I looked between them—Nathan bleeding beneath me, Gabriel bleeding beside me. Both monsters in their own way. Both offering different cages dressed as salvation. The chemical clarity Gabriel had promised was coming in waves, memories reassembling into patterns that made horrific sense.
The Institute. Gabriel's hands teaching me to crave my own destruction.
The safe houses. Three months of careful rebuilding. Nathan's hands teaching me to trust again, to feel human.
Both were real. Both were lies. Both were love wrapped in ownership, just wearing different masks.
"I can't." The words came out broken. "Can't choose. Can't think. Everything hurts."
"I know." Nathan's hand came up to touch my face, gentle despite the blood I'd drawn. "I know everything hurts."
His thumb traced over my cheekbone, and something in that touch—the careful restraint of it, the way he held back his strength even now—made the fractured pieces in my head shift. Like a kaleidoscope turning, showing a different pattern through the same broken glass.
Gabriel's hand tightened on my shoulder. "Come away, sweetheart. You're confused."
But I wasn't. Not anymore. The chemical clarity he'd promised was finally delivering, but not how he'd intended. Each memory slotted into place with surgical precision, the drugged haze burning away to show the truth beneath.