Page 30

I squeeze myself into the narrow pass of the fifth door, the wooden box jammed against my chest, my left arm extended at my side.

Inadvertently, the ends of my fingertips protrude through the opening, preventing the rock from closing over, and in that moment, I lose my calm.

The tunnel is dank and dark, and for a fucking awful second, the memories of all the nights I spent in the pit beneath the Academy return to me, stealing the breath from my chest and filling me with despair.

Too many fucking nights, I fought for my life against whatever vile creature was placed in the pit to torment me.

Too many fucking times, I assumed the blame and became the aggressor so that I would be thrown into the pit instead of one of the other students. Because I knew I could survive it.

Too many times, I used my fists because they were all I had.

My fists were all I had to stop the other students from flickering. Violence became a rescue. To the point where the other students would look to me for it, desperate for me to dish it out because I was the only one physically strong enough to knock a flickering body unconscious.

I squeeze my eyes closed. Tell myself to breathe.

All this fucked-up shit I thought I’d worked through—all of it is streaming back at me, derailing me because of this claustrophobic, dank tunnel.

I can beat it.

I have more than violence now.

With a snarl, I yank my hand inward, daring the darkness to come for me. Daring it to come for my heart and my mind.

I’ll fight it. With whatever it takes.

The moment the stone closes over, the light changes behind my closed eyelids, the rock at my back suddenly feels smooth, and the pressure against my chest is different.

Warm. Soft. Gentle.

Immensely comforting after the fear I felt.

“Striker?” Tender fingertips brush my jaw. “Wake up.”

I recognize Peyton’s voice, and my heart leaps.

Opening my eyes, I find myself lying on my back, tangled in smooth sheets.

Peyton’s warm body presses to mine. She’s draped over me, her eyes luminescent, her lips curved in a smile.

“Hey there,” she murmurs, her brown hair falling past her face and tickling my chin.

I’m disoriented for a heartbeat, uncertain how I got here, but it quickly passes.

I recognize our room at the Academy. We’re staying here right now, a vacation away from work or… something. I can’t quite remember exactly…

“It’s morning,” Peyton says, kissing my lips, and I’m suddenly aware of how naked she is, the softness of her bare skin where my arms rest around her.

The way her eyes close and her smile grows when I run my hands along her spine and tangle my fingers gently in her hair.

“Lucinda said she’d show us the new obstacle course this morning. ”

“Fuck the obstacle course,” I growl, my arms tightening around Peyton’s unclothed form, my palms caressing her skin, my consciousness of her body rising. “It can wait.”

Her lips clash with mine as her breasts graze across my chest and her moan sends all rational thought from my mind.

She pulls back just enough to speak. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

Then her mouth meets mine again, her kiss tearing apart my sense of time and space.

Why does it feel like forever since I’ve touched her?

My perception of where I am and my immediate memories tell me that we spent the entire night together, most of it spent not sleeping.

My knowledge of her body feels intense. Every soft part of her that makes her gasp or moan or scream with pleasure.

Every touch and stroke that she welcomes, every move she makes to draw me closer, the way she wraps her legs around me, straddling me, her back arching as she delays taking me inside her.

And yet…

I feel like I don’t know her at all.

I find myself searching her eyes, pushing back her hair to see her face, questioning my ability to read her wants and needs.

More than anything, I want to take hold of this moment and never let it go.

Don’t move. Don’t breathe. Don’t break it. Don’t ruin it.

I’m filled with a confusing mess of pleasure and need and a deep grief that I can’t place.

She seems to sense my stillness, lifting herself up a little, pushing off my chest, her hands warm against me, her lips parting. “Come back to me, Striker.”

My throat closes over, the pain in my heart only growing, even though I can’t identify its source.

“Hey…” She bends over me, her lips brushing my ear, her voice a whisper. “I forgive you. You know that, right?”

Forgive me? My forehead creases as I try to think of what she could be referring to. I must have done something, or she wouldn’t be saying it.

Whatever it is, I’m fully prepared to account for it. “Tell me what I did, and I’ll make it right.”

She’s quiet for a moment, her lips pursed as she draws back and stares down at me.

I reach up for her, my fingertips brushing her jaw, trying to coax the information from her, but the moment I touch her, I realize that she has a dark bruise right where my hand made contact.

What the fuck?

“How did this happen?” I ask.

Her eyes suddenly fill with tears that chill me to the bone.

“I forgive you,” she says.

Before my eyes, her lip splits, and blood trickles from her mouth. Another bruise blossoms across her forehead. Horrifyingly, the skin splits above her eyes. She starts to wheeze as if her ribs are cracked.

I’m trapped beneath her, afraid to move. Afraid to touch her because there’s nowhere she isn’t bruised.

“Peyton! What’s happening? Who did this to you?”

“You did,” she says.

I’m struck still, suddenly horribly aware that my hands hurt.

My knuckles are split.

I did this?

The illusion around me breaks, and reality rushes in. All of my true memories return.

I’m not here. There is no vacation. No happy ending.

I hurt her.

I turned her into a full Fury, but far worse than that, I did it without knowing if it was what she wanted. I didn’t give her a choice. I made a decision in a moment of horror and fear, and I took the choice away from her.

For that, there is no forgiveness. No coming back.

I was surrounded by horror, backed into a corner, and forced to rely on violence many times, but it wasn’t someone else’s hands that hurt her. It was mine.

I accept the weight. I take the responsibility.

It’s my burden to bear. Not hers.

I want to tell her to hold on to her rage. To be angry for as long as she needs. That her rage is warranted. But I also have no right to tell her how to feel or what to do.

All I can do is account for myself in words that feel so pitifully small against the enormity of the pain I caused her. “I’m sorry, Peyton. You deserved better.”

I’m prepared for the cut of her forgiveness again because it feels sharper than any knife could. I’m prepared for her to rage at me for the audacity of thinking that my apology could mean anything to her. I’m prepared for her to hurt me back in whatever way she wishes.

But she’s quiet. Too quiet.

Before my eyes, her form is fading.

She’s vanishing, leaving the crinkled sheets to settle across my chest, and then she’s gone.

I’m suddenly faced with a truth I’ve been avoiding…

I’m going to lose her no matter what I do.

No matter how I atone for my actions. No matter how well I live my life. No matter the family I choose to keep around me. It doesn’t matter a flying fuck what I do because none of it is about me.

She is free.

What matters is how I react to that.

What matters is that I let her go.

I roll off the mattress and onto the floor, taking heavy breaths of suddenly cold air, breaths filled with loss but also acknowledgment.

The box I was carrying rests on the floor beside me, partly under the bed.

Each of the symbols across its nearest side is glowing softly, including the fifth one.

I understand what it means now.

Acceptance .

It’s beyond hope, beyond accountability. It’s knowing that you fucked up, that you can’t go back, but you sure as hell have to do better.

Scooping up the box, I rise to my feet, taking note of the clothing that reappears on my body, the same jeans and T-shirt I wore into the maze.

I pull open the door, only to find myself looking, not at the corridor outside this room at the Academy, but at a rocky tunnel ahead.

There’s a mound on the ground in the distance, difficult to make out at a distance even with my beast’s enhanced eyesight.

Still, there’s only one way forward, so I approach cautiously until I make out a person’s form.

Peyton!

I hurry toward her, dropping to my knees in the gloom, afraid to move her in case she’s hurt. Her chest is rising and falling, and her hair is splayed out around her head like a crimson halo.

“Striker?” She groans and squints up at me.

For some reason, when she finally focuses on me, her eyes brighten, her cheeks flush, and her lips rise in a smile.

“There you are,” she says. “I thought I’d lost you.”

“Are you hurt?” I ask.

Her forehead creases. “I fell, but I think I’m okay.”

I’m shocked when she reaches for my hand as if it’s the most natural thing in the world for her to expect me to help her, and when she stands, she leans into me as if she trusts that I’ll support her.

She tips her head back, looking at me expectantly, but I’m uncertain of what she wants, and, hell, whatever it is, I don’t want to fuck it up.

She must sense my confusion because her forehead suddenly puckers. She takes another look at our surroundings, the rocky cave walls and the archway filled with light in the distance.

“Oh,” she says, her face falling and her voice flat. “It wasn’t real.”

I wait for her to say more, but she’s quiet as she pulls away from me.

Before I can speak again, a shout sounds in the distance, drawing us both forward once more into the unknown.