Page 42

Her mouth was moving.

She was screaming.

Right?

I close my eyes, but now, all I hear is silence.

Remi was gone.

Alex releases my chin like he senses my defeat. But he doesn’t step back, and we don’t break gazes. His thumb brushes my cheek, and I realize I’m crying again. The same hands that pulled me from the fire try to comfort me now.

Hands that forced me to live, when I spent so many years after that wishing I didn’t.

“You should have let me burn,” I say, finally.

A sad smile crosses his lips. “I never will.”

That, I believe. Through all the lies.

“When I left Oregon, I never expected to see you again.” Alex brushes his hand back into my hair, delicately. “Until you walked into Montgomery with my sister, and I thought I was seeing a ghost. The angel of death, dragging me home. ”

My angel.

It’s the only nickname he uses for me because that’s what he thought I was.

“You found me.” He holds the back of my head in his hand. “You pulled me from the darkness.”

“When you ask me why I couldn’t stop this from happening, I’ll tell you it was your fault for caving in on yourself in the direct path of my attention.

” I recite the words from Alex’s journal back to him.

“ You were in flames, and I was shivering. I held my hand over the heat for too long. Held my heart over the destruction. I got lost in you.”

He nods.

His journal entry was about me.

It was all always about me.

“For all I’ve done, I don’t deserve you, Mila.

But there you were. Wandering into my path one more time when I was at my weakest.” He pulls my hand to his chest and holds it over where I know seven marks are carved into his skin.

“You asked me why I kept going after I ended up in a psychiatric ward. The truth is, for a while, I didn’t.

I stopped talking, and I gave up. But then you walked into my room and changed everything.

A girl who would die to try to save her best friend.

A girl with a heart so fucking big I can hardly stand it because it makes you vulnerable.

I was dead in every way that mattered, and there you were, still fighting. ”

“I couldn’t just let it go.”

His lips turn down. “I know.”

“I had to find the man who hurt Remi. I had to find Torin.”

“Torin was already dead, Mila.” Alex shakes his head.

“No, he wasn’t. He walked away that night. I saw him run. ”

“Remember when I told you about my trial? About what went wrong?”

I think back to the story about how Alex got his scars. Someone wanted revenge, and they used his trial to get to him.

My eyes widen. “Torin is the one who snuck in during your trial? The one you fought? The one who almost killed you?”

“Except I killed him.”

I slump against the wall behind me, grabbing Alex’s wrist on instinct to hold myself up. My mind is swimming. Alex and I are bound in every way. I’ve been lying to myself if I thought I could sever us with one simple cut of a string. There are too many.

“If you knew Torin was dead, then why not just tell me that from the beginning? Why let me chase my tail?”

A heartbreaking smile lifts in the corner of his mouth.

“Because I was selfish and couldn’t stand the thought of you hating me.

Not now that you finally saw me. Like I said, Mila, there’s only one thing in this miserable world that scares me, and that’s you.

You’re the reason I kept going. The reason I became a legacy.

You found your way back to me, and I had to find my way back to you. ”

I shake my head, trying to process what he is saying. “We barely knew each other. You met me at my absolute worst moment.”

“In a person’s worst moment, they show you who they really are.

I saw it that day at the carnival, Mila.

Even if it didn’t mean anything back then because we were too young, and I was too fucked-up to understand.

But I saw it… the fight in you. How hard you battle for those you love.

We aren’t all that different in that regard, even if our methods make us opposites. ”

My voice catches in my throat. I don’t know what to say. No one looks at me like he does. No one sees me like he does.

I hate him.

But I love him.

And Patience is right because it hurts like hell.

But Alex was protecting me. Even when I was just some girl he couldn’t figure out. He saved me back then, and he fought for me now. Continues to fight for me. He battled his demons to get out of Montgomery for me .

“What does it say about me that I want to forgive you right now?” A tear slips down my cheek.

Alex presses his forehead to mine. “It says you’re mine.”

With one hand still holding the knife, Alex drops to his knees in front of me.

He trails his hands up my legs, lifting my skirt to reveal the holster strapped at my thigh.

His face is so close that I feel the heat of his breath tickling me where I’m aching for him.

But he ignores the desperation pooling between my legs, dragging the cool blade over my skin until he’s gently sheathing the knife.

His hands cup the back of my thighs, just under my ass, as he looks up at me from his knees. Even after every terrible thing he’s done—every horrible thing I’ve said—he puts himself at my mercy.

Dark-blond hair falls over one of his eyes, and the scars on the side of his neck stretch with how he cranes his head back to watch me.

“I’ve done more than enough to send my soul to a special place in hell when I’m finished here, Mila.” He grazes the backs of my thighs with his hands. “But I’d do it all over again for the heartbeat of peace you offer me.”

“You don’t believe in forgiveness?”

“Should I believe in it? You’re the only goddess I’m willing to pray to. So tell me, will you forgive me for my sins?”

My fingers pause, tangled in his hair. His eyes plead, even if I know he has no intention of getting better. Like he warned me before, there is no healing his form of sickness. There is just existing, and surviving is the hardest part.

Leaning down, I rest my forehead on Alex’s. His fingers tighten their grip at the back of my thighs. We’re holding on like this merry-go-round won’t stop spinning, and he’s my center.

“I don’t want to forgive you,” I whisper. “But you are who you are. I love you regardless.”

“Love isn’t a big enough word for how I feel about you.

” His hands trail deeper until his fingers brush between my legs.

“Obsession.” He slowly starts to lift my dress.

“Fixation.” He leans in to kiss my thigh, and I straighten against the wall, not letting go of his hair.

“My fetish.” His kisses move inward and up.

“I love you, and you are everything. Now let me worship you, my angel.”

At that, his lips land right where I ache between my legs.