Page 120 of A Witchy Spell Ride

I waited.

Breath even.

Heart steel.

He turned back to me, smile wide as salvation. “I’m going to cleanse you. Free you from his touch.”

He took a step toward me.

That was his first mistake.

I moved fast.

No scream.

No warning.

Just steel catching candlelight as I slashed the nylon at my wrists in a single, ugly pull. The cord parted with a hot whisper; blood rushed back in pins. He flinched, surprised, and that half-beat was a lifetime. I shoved my weight forward, heels skidding on concrete, chair legs screeching a distraction as I came up off the seat.

My dress was torn. My crown was gone. But I was fire.

“Selene—”

I lunged.

Blade toward his throat. He got a forearm up by panic and instinct, good for him and hissed when the tip kissed skin and left a thin red line. He reached for my wrist, grip clumsy with shock.

I didn’t stop.

This wasn’t a fight.

This was justice.

I let his hand have me for half a second and then turned with it, spinning the way Ghost taught me, hips, not arms, use your enemy’s grip like a hinge. My knee drove up into his gut, hard and low. He grunted and folded; I caught his shoulder and shoved him into the concrete pillar so hard the candles rattled on their cheap altar. The steel blade slid under his chin and pressed, just shy of puncturing. Close enough to let him feel the truth.

“I’m not yours,” I growled, voice low and lethal. “I never was.”

Blood slid down his neck, a crimson thread over Adam’s favorite color theory. He choked on nothing. The hand not pinned tried to find purchase on my arm and failed.

“I just wanted...” he wheezed.

“You wanted to own me.” I leaned in until he could see everything he’d misread in my eyes. “You watched. You plotted. You came into my home and stole my sleep and called it love.”

He whimpered. “They—They poisoned you.”

“You poison your own head,” I said, blade steady. “You did this to yourself.”

His eyes flicked past me, toward the door, toward escape that wasn’t coming. Good. Let him feel what it is to be small under someone else’s hand.

Outside, the low thrum of motorcycles grew louder, closer. It vibrated through the cinderblock, through my bones. Ghost. Reaper. The cavalry. But I didn’t step away.

Not yet.

Not until he saw it.

Because the woman he thought was soft?

She’d burned.