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“It’s a relapse, Austin, nothing more. You can start again at any time, but you have to start.”

“What the fuck is he talking about, Austin?” Luca spits.

I ignore him, keeping my eyes on the floor. “How is she?” He knows who I’m talking about, even if I can’t say her name.

“I wouldn’t know. She left a few days ago.”

For all I’ve tried to avoid his eye, it’s that sentence that snaps my gaze back to him. I can barely stand to look at him. Having to ask Olivia to pretend to be with Dr. Alfie almost killed me. When I saw the banter on his TV show between the other presenters that Dr. Alfie had a girlfriend, I wanted to throw up.

The plan had worked, but at what cost? Seeing her with him made me hate myself all over again. If only I’d kept Danny safe, none of this would have happened.

“Where is she?”

“She left a note saying you’d know where to find her when you were ready.”

Where would she go? I have no idea. We never talked about wanting to live anywhere else. We were in our own little bubble.

I say nothing, and Luca is getting antsy and starting to pace.

“Are you going to stop fighting your father?” Dr. Alfie asks gently.

“She’s gone. It’s over.” I don’t answer his question, but in my mind, I do. She’s gone, and it’s his fault as much as it is mine. I’ll punish myself by becoming the man he wants me to be and using it against him.

He sighs, frowning—no doubt racking his big brain on how to convince me to move on. “You didn’t start this to win her over, you always thought that was an impossibility. And yet, you started anyway. You did it for you. We can’t do all the work for other people, Austin, we have to do the work for ourselves.”

“Could you stop?” I pace, back and forth, pointing my finger at him like he’s the one that got me in this mess. I know he’s not, I know my father betrayed me, I know I had a fucked-up childhood. I know, I know,I FUCKING KNOW. “I’m done denying who I am, I was born to be this.”

My arms are spread wide, like a ringleader at a circus. Except my circus is some fucked-up house of horrors that would make a great set for the nextSawmovie.

“How wonderful. You’ve chosen the easy option.” His eyes roll.

My blood-spattered shoes eat up the distance between us, and I shove him hard in the chest.

“You think I chose this? I choseher.She was taken fromme.”

“And by the looks of it, you allowed it to happen. Have you reached out to her? How does the great Austin Black not even know where she is?”

Fuck, this guy is getting on my nerves. Like he has any idea of what it’s like to be me.

I can see Luca getting itchy beside me. He’s jumping from foot to foot, ready and waiting to pounce. He’s like a fucking jackal. I wish he would knock it the fuck off.

The doctor begins to take off his jacket. He folds it carefully over a chair after inspecting it briefly. God forbid hegets it dirty. He undoes the buttons of his crisp white shirt sleeves and begins to roll them up. It kills me, but this is just like a scene out of one of those goddamn romance novels Olivia’s been giving me. Corded forearms is all I can fucking think about. My first instinct is to tell her about it so we can laugh together.

“Come on then,” he says.

My head shakes in confusion. “Come on then, what?”

“Hit me.”

“I’ll fucking hit you if one of you doesn’t explain what the hell is going on,” Luca interjects.

“I’m not going to hit you, doc.”

“Hit me. That’s what you want, right? Killing all those men wasn’t enough, so let’s go a few rounds. We’re around the same weight and height, and I have the added advantage that I’m not tied to a chair, unlike your previous opponents. So let’s get on with it.”

“You’re fucking crazy. I’m not going to hit you.”

“Why not?” He pushes the rolled-up sleeves past his elbows for good measure.