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For one tiny flicker, I really was his.

And then the nausea came again.

Not from the kiss, but from the betrayal.

I was carrying another man’s baby, and my heart was buried right along with his body.

I had nothing to give this man.

He’d given me his flesh.

All I had were my words.

We each only had half of what we needed.

We would make it work.

I pulled back as his head lolled to the side. The last words he whispered were, “I haven’t had one of those in a while.”

“A kiss?” I whispered leaning forward.

He shook his head and frowned, his eyes not opening. “No…a really good dream.”

"Dream?” I repeated. “What dream?”

“The one where I finally told someone about the waffles—and she kissed me anyway.”

And to think…just a few days ago, he was still calling me Little Nightmare. I spent the rest of the night awake.

And when midnight hit—my birthday.

I cried.

I just wasn’t sure if it was for him.

Or me.

17

ACE

The one with the sad beginnings don’t always mean happy endings.

"They’re staring at me,” said Ivan on my left. “Look.” He was pointing at a few dozen of the saints that were etched out of pure marble just watching us from the ceiling waiting for us to burn in hell. At least that’s what it felt like.

I hadn’t seen Raven since her birthday.

I'd been in and out from the pain meds and finally told Sergio, our resident doctor, that if he gave me any more morphine I was going to ketamine his ass and make him watch me, paralyzed, while I carved my initials in his thigh powerless to stop me.

It got a bit more graphic but it worked. He said I was the worst patient he’d ever had—and he’d treated Phoenix—and let me heal back on campus, which meant no Raven.

She’d deserved one last day with her family.

Both she and her dad shared the same birthday weekend.

When she came home later that night, I heard her stumble into bed and then Ivan’s footsteps.

He’d taken over as bodyguard for the night.