Page 218 of Hymns of the Broken

The door to the basement slams against the wall as I shove it open causing Blake to jump. The air down here is damp and cold, but my rage is wildfire. Blake is still chained to his chair. Blood crusted under his nose and along his mouth, but his eyes are traveling all over me, but they freeze on what’s in my hands. And then he grins like he’s been waiting for this moment.

“I told you, Sawyer,” he says. “You’ve always been mine. They don’t know you like I do and nobody ever will.”

My knuckles are white around the papers. I throw them onto the concrete athisfeet—the therapy notes, the photos, the forged license—pages fluttering everywhere like broken wings.

“You sick fucking bastard,” I snarl, voice shaking with fury. “You’ve been watching me. Since before we were even together. Following me. Stealing my childhood items, my fucking baby teeth, my privacy, every secret I ever had—”

He leans back in the chair, smug as ever. “All I ever wanted was you, baby. I know every scar, every nightmare, every ugly little secret. Do you think they can handle that? Think they’d still want you if they knew all the shit I do?”

Riot is at my back in a heartbeat, fists clenched, practically vibrating with the urge to break him in half. Jasper’s eyes are black, but they let me speak.

“How did you do it, Blake?”

He straightens, smug. Proud that he got away with what he has.

“I didn’t need magic, just a dirty cousin from the Bureau and a few envelopes of cash. The rest was copy-paste. I did it because I love you. I loved you the second I saw you in The Hollow Cup. I knew you were made to be mine. And I know everything about you; I’m exactly who you need.”

“You don’t know a damn thing about love, Blake. You never did. All you ever did was lie and steal. You don’t even actually know me.”

Blake’s smile is slow, poisonous.

“Don’t say I don’t know you. I’ve read the files. I know how you break. I know every crack in you, Sawyer.”

He keeps going, pleased with his own rot. “Cute nephew by the way… the one with the dinosaur backpack. Did your sister ever mention police showing up to her house? I made a wellness call, obviously anonymous. I thought a scare from home might put you back where you belong. But apparently not.” He shrugs.

“You’re lying,” I breathe, but the tremor gives me away.

“Check your ‘Digital Evidence’ box again, Mrs. Lewis.” He nods at the scattered pages I threw around the room. “You’ll hear me. I’m on half those voicemails. Spoofed numbers are a beautiful thing.”

He glances at Jasper and Riot, almost pitying them. “You boys ready to clean up the pieces when she falls apart? She’ll never be whole.”

“Maybe I’m broken, and yeah, maybe I have trauma,” I say, “but I choose them, and they choose me. You never get to choose for me again.”

Jasper crouches to pick up the marriage license, waving it in Blake’s face. “All this proves is how obsessed you are. And how dead you are.”

Blake tries to laugh, but it comes out hollow. “You’ll come back to me, Sawyer. You always do, just like your parents did. I’m your husband after all.”

I meet his eyes and let a every old scar flare hot. I have never wanted to be someone who goes back to the same person over and over. I will not be that girl anymore. “You’re not my husband. You’re my biggest mistake.”

I watch the smile twitch across his broken face. That smug certainty that no matter what I say, he’ll always find a way back in.

I step closer until I can see the madness swirling behind his eyes. “You’ll never stop, will you? You’d rather rot in chains than let go. And I know—if I walk away from this, if I let you go, you’ll keep coming back. You’ll keep finding me, and you’ll keep finding my family. My friends. You’ll never let me live. You’ll never letanyof us live.”

I could walk away and call the cops. Collect the boxes and hand over the files, the videos, the forged license, and all the years he carved out of me like souvenirs. I could trust a piece of paper to keep him away. A restraining order. A promise from a system that didn’t stop him when he climbed through my life the first hundred times.

I know how this goes. New number. New locks. New city. Looking over my shoulder in every parking lot, every hotel hallway, every crowd. I see my sister’s front door. My nephew’s backpack. Macee’s laugh going quiet because a strange car idles too long across the street. I see Jasper and Riot sleeping in shifts with a bat by the door while I pretend my hands don’t shake.

He will find a crack. He will make a crack even if there isn’t one. He’s shown now that he always has.

I think about the boxes. My childhood in plastic, my body on a screen, my name on a license I never signed. About the mic in my nightstand, my window left open. About the way his voice has lived in my head so long it sometimes sounds like my own. Am I choosing mercy for him or another sentence for me? For us?

This isn’t about rage. It’s about ending a hunt.

I’m not asking permission for air anymore.

I look Blake straight in the eye, letting him see every ounce of my hate, every scar he ever left. “That’s not love. That’s sickness. You want to keep hunting me? Keep playing your sick games? Not this time. You don’t get to win.”

He opens his mouth—maybe to threaten, perhaps to gloat one last time, but I cut him off.