Page 74 of Mystic's Sunrise

He grabbed my arm gently and turned me to face him, his jaw tight. “Don’t ever say that again.” His voice was low. Fierce. “You aren’t going back to him.”

I looked up at him—this broken man who kept trying to hold all my shattered pieces together while his own were barely hanging on. “You’re right,” I said.

And it was the biggest lie I’d ever told.

“Let’s go to bed.”

Because if I didn’t stop talking, the fear would swallow me whole. And tonight, I didn’t want to remember how it felt to belong to monsters.

I just wanted to feel his arms around me.

And pretend, if only for a little while, that I was safe.

CHAPTER FIFTY

WHEN THE SUNrose, I finally slipped out of my room.The hallway felt different—buzzing with voices, movement, new tension in the air. Something had shifted.

I crossed the common room toward the kitchen, hoping to find Lucy or Brenda.

That’s when I saw them.

New faces. Visitors from other chapters, none of them familiar. There were loud, joking, and seemed to comfortable here. Their vests all bore the same patch—The Devil’s House—but different states stitched underneath.

I paused in the doorway, and then I sawher.

A woman, a stranger, with thick dirty blonde hair pulled into a messy ban. She laughed at something the man, another stranger beside her said, leaning into him, completely at ease.

Her face turned slightly—and my breath left me.

She looked likehim.

The resemblance… it was like my heart dropped through the floor. Same eyes. Same cheekbones. Same mouth and chin.

I froze.

My pulse pounded so loud I could hear nothing else. My hands started to shake, legs stiff and useless. She turned her head again, catching my gaze and our eyes locked. And then I turned—fast—stumbling back down the hall, my shoulder brushing the wall as I tried to breathe. I made it to my room before the tears came.

Not from pain.

From fear.

From memory.

From the way my body remembered his touch even though he wasn’t here.

He’s not here,I told myself, but my body didn’t believe it. A knock hit my door, firm but not hard. Then it opened slowly, and Mystic stepped in, closing it gently behind him.

“You alright?” he asked, voice filled with concern.

I didn’t answer right away. Just stared at the floor, my arms wrapped around myself. “She—” I swallowed hard. “She looks like Drago.”

Mystic’s eyes darkened. He stepped closer but gave me space. “You mean Jaycee?”

I nodded.

“I know,” he said. “Caught me off guard the first time too.”

My voice came out broken. “Is she his...?”