Page 56 of Sinful Desires (Sinful #4)

My skin stung. My ears rang. My heart roared with it.

Unhinged. Electric. Free.

And completely fucking broken .

“Théo!”

A hiccup punched out of my throat as I pointed at her clumsily, like the room wouldn’t stay still.

“I’m sorry, Maman . So, so fucking sorry.” I laughed, hollow and sharp, my eyes burning. “You gave birth to a degenerate.”

The word hit the air like acid.

I swayed. The portraits on the wall stared down, their painted eyes burning through me, judging harder than any living soul ever could.

“A child who will never live up to your expectations. Should’ve aborted me when you had the fucking chance?—”

I didn’t even finish.

My father stepped forward, fast and hard, pulling my mother behind him as her sob burst out like something torn from the gut.

“That’s enough,” he said, voice cold enough to stop the blood in my veins. “Don’t you ever dare speak to my wife like that.”

I gulped, throat closing, stomach curdling under the weight of what I’d said.

There’s a special kind of curse in realizing you were the reason the people who loved you most were hurting. That you’d become the monster behind their pain.

Not strangers. Not enemies. But them.

The very two who had taught me how to ride a bike in the garden, who had held my hands through my first words, who’d baked salted caramel cookies because they were my favorite, who had drawn silly cartoons on my lunch napkins every day without fail.

Who had given me piggyback rides through the halls, who’d let me sleep between them without complaint when I cried in the middle of the night.

Who had slowed down and answered every stupid little question I ever asked, who’d thrown a party when I lost my first tooth, who’d built their entire lives around me because I was the most precious thing they’d ever held.

And now I was the one hurting them.

Spoiling it.

Rotting it.

Tears ran down my face, my eyes darting between them, panic rising, disgust curling.

I ran.

Away from them. Away from that room.

I hit the wall on the way out, scraped my shoulder, caught myself before I fell, then stumbled forward. My knees cracked against the stone.

The air outside was wet and rough.

I made it halfway down the stairs before collapsing on the grass, bottles and broken glass crunching under my weight. A pink bra hung next to my cheek. Someone’s lipstick smeared across the stone like blood.

I laughed. Or maybe sobbed. I couldn’t even fucking tell anymore.

I forced myself up. Blood oozed from my knees. I didn’t care. I kept going.

Into the dark.

Into the wild mess I’d made of myself.

“Théo, stop!” My mother’s voice broke behind me, fragile and panicked.

But I didn’t stop.

I tore through the dark, the cold wind biting my face, the grass slick beneath my feet. The only light came from the stars and the fucked-up smile of the moon above me, mocking me.

The rest was shadows. Black, wide, endless.

“Théo, stop, you’re going to hurt yourself!” my father yelled.

I could hear him running now, his pounding footsteps trying to catch up.

I’d been hurting for years, dragging it around like rusted chains, and something inside me snapped, sharp and final. I didn’t want to feel it anymore.

I wanted out. Out of the noise in my skull. Out of my skin. Out of the shame curdling in my blood like poison.

And I did the one thing I’d spend the rest of my fucked-up life hating myself for, the one moment I couldn’t erase no matter how deep I buried it.

I ran across the hilltop, feet slipping on wet grass and broken glass, the sea roaring beneath me like a threat or a promise, and without a second thought, I threw myself into the ocean.

Face first. Arms wide.

The moment my body hit the water, it was like the ocean cracked open.

A cold, godless mouth swallowing me whole.

The current dragged me under so quickly I didn’t have time to scream.

Salt burned through my throat. My chest seized.

The sky cracked wide above, black and furious, thunder pounding like a war drum.

Waves slammed me against jagged rock, my spine bending wrong, ribs bruising, blood leaking from somewhere I couldn’t name.

I tried to breathe and swallowed the sea instead.

And still, for one terrifying second, I felt peace.

Until I heard it.

A scream. Muffled. Warped. Barely there through the rush of water and the roar of the storm.

Then hands. Grabbing. A voice, raw and breaking.

“Théo! I’m here! Try to swim toward me, son, come on!”

My father.

His voice tore through the chaos, cracked something open inside me harder than the rocks ever could.

I wanted to move. I did. But my limbs were dead weight, numb and useless. My head dipped again below the surface. Black. Then light. Then black again.

The waves kept pounding, pulling me back into the mouth of whatever hell I had tried to sink into.

He reached for me. Missed.

Tried again.

“Théo!”

Somewhere above, a beam of light split the storm.

Our yacht.

But it disappeared behind a wall of black water that rose in front of me, swallowing the moon. I barely turned before it slammed into me. It dragged me under.

No breath. No light. My spine cracked against rock, my skull whipped sideways.

I didn’t scream. I couldn’t. The ocean punched the air out of my lungs before I even tried.

“THéO!”

Another wave rolled, higher this time. Angrier.

And then it hit.

It crushed me, split me open. I felt my head whip back, neck slamming against something unmovable. I heard a scream, I think it was mine. Or his. Or both. I didn’t know anymore.

“THéO!” My name again, closer now. My father.

I saw him through the blur, fighting through the current, arms outstretched, eyes wide with terror. A wave slammed him into the rocks. The water swallowed him, and that was the last time I ever heard him say my name.

I felt his hand graze mine, then vanish into the dark.

Then the light hit me again, full force.

The water turned red.

I stopped fighting.

And the sea took me.

I woke to light, harsh and white. It split through my eyelids like blades. My skull throbbed, pain blooming behind my eyes as I turned my head and felt the tug of gauze around it.

My body was heavy and slow. Something cold ran through my veins. My fingers twitched against stiff sheets.

A hospital bed.

Needles in my arm. Morphine in my blood.

I blinked hard, my vision still fogged, and tried to remember how the fuck I’d gotten here.

Then it hit me.

The waves . The rocks . My father’s voice .

I lurched forward, ripping the tubes from my arms, stumbling to my feet. The robe hung loosely off my shoulders, the fabric stiff with dried salt and blood. The room spun. Sharp antiseptic clung to the air, thick and sterile.

White walls. Chrome fixtures.

The window blinds were drawn too tightly, casting hard slats of light across the linoleum floor.

Bare feet hit the tile as I staggered toward the door.

My head screamed with every step.

I threw the door open.

Bright corridor. Walls too white. Air too clean. My breath ragged.

A nurse turned the corner, eyes wide. “ Monsieur, attendez! ”

But I wasn’t listening. My pulse was in my teeth.

And then I heard it.

Screaming.

Not mine.

Cries. Shattered sobs. The kind that made your spine curl.

I turned toward it, heart thudding. And that’s when I saw her.

She was on her knees on the hard, sterile floor, hands crushed against her face as if she could hold the scream in, but it still tore out of her, broken and raw. Doctors stood around her in a loose circle, one of them with their arms around her on the floor.

“No, p-please do s-something, please,” she begged, voice splintering on every word.

One of them looked down, his eyes hollow, clipboard held to his chest like a shield. “ Je suis désolé, madame .”

I stepped closer, sweat pooling in my palms. Every part of me trembled. When I reached her, I turned my head toward the bed and my heart dropped.

Not fell.

Crashed . Dead on impact.

My father lay there, barely recognizable. Tubes covered his face, machines hissing beside him. His arms were tucked under a blanket, motionless.

His skin was pale. Grey. Lifeless. But it was the bandages that wrecked me.

Thick gauze wrapped around half his face, stained with deep, dried blood.

He was breathing. The machines kept him breathing.

But nothing else moved.

Then came the words that split me open forever.

“ Monsieur LeRoy a subi une lésion grave de la moelle épinière . Lors de la noyade, les vagues l’ont englouti, et c’est contre les rochers que sa nuque s’est brisée . Nous avons fait tout ce que nous pouvions …”

Severe spinal cord injury. The chances of him ever walking again were close to zero. Waking up one day? Less than ten percent.

He wasn’t dead. He was trapped.

Buried alive inside a body that no longer answered to him. And they dared to call that survival.

The guilt slammed into me. This was because of me.

All of it.

A sob tore out of my throat, too loud for the sterile silence of the room. Tears blurred everything as I dropped to my knees, choking on my own breath.

My mother turned toward me, her eyes bloodshot and swollen, and she screamed. A raw guttural sound torn from whatever part of her had died with him.

“ Tout ca est de ta faute, Théo . Tu as détruit notre vie! ”

She lunged at me, fury exploding from her chest, but the doctors held her back.

“ On ne te pardonnera jamais . Je te déteste! Tu m’entends? I hate you!”

But she didn’t know the truth.

I hated myself more than she ever could.