Page 17 of My Best Friend Is Broken

“What if you don’t come back?”

The question hits me in the chest like a bullet. What if I don’t? What happens to Liam then?

“I will,” I say fiercely. “I swear to you, I will come back.”

But even as I say the words, I know they might be a lie. In my world, promises are fragile things, easily broken by a bullet or a blade.

Liam drops his head back to his knees. “I want to go back to prison,” he whispers.

The words shatter something inside me. “Liam, what the fuck? No!”

“At least there I knew what the monsters looked like.”

I reach for him, but he flinches away from my touch. The rejection cuts deeper than any knife Dante has ever wielded.

“I’m still me,” I say desperately. “I’m still your Nicky.”

But we both know that’s not true anymore. The boy who used to steal donuts and dream of fast cars is gone, replaced by something darker. Something dangerous.

Something that might not be able to protect the person he loves most.

As I sit there on the edge of his bed, watching him fall apart, I realize that Dante was right about one thing.

We do have a problem.

And I don’t know how to clean this one up.

Chapter six

Nicky

For the second time today, I sit on the edge of his bed for what feels like hours but is probably only minutes, watching him fall apart in slow motion. His shoulders shake with silent sobs, his face buried against his knees like he’s trying to disappear entirely.

I left him alone all day, only intruding to deliver beans on toast for lunch and pasta for dinner.

But now it is nearly time to leave, so I’m intruding again and reopening the wound for both of us.

“Liam,” I whisper. “Please look at me.”

But he doesn’t. Won’t. And I don’t blame him.

My phone buzzes against my leg. A text from Dante.Don’t be late.

The words feel like a death sentence. Not for me, though that’s possible too, but for us. For whatever fragile thing we’ve been trying to rebuild.

“I have to get ready,” I say, hating myself for the words.

Liam’s breath hitches. “How long?”

“What?”

“How long have you been killing people?”

The question sits between us like a loaded gun. I want to lie, to soften it somehow, but I’ve done enough lying.

“Three years,” I admit.

He lifts his head then, and the look on his face nearly destroys me. It’s not just horror or fear. It’s grief. Like he’s mourning someone who died.