Page 92 of Volatile King (The Kings of Wayward Academy #6)

R en

The winter air stung my face, but I didn’t care because it told me I was still alive.

The snow coming down from the stormy grey sky was indicative of how we all felt.

Each of us had shattered into a million little pieces, and we fell to the ground with nowhere to go from there.

The sadness was pressing down on me, and each deep breath carried the scent of disturbed earth and dying roses.

We stood in a circle around the grave…my second funeral in two days. Shoulders brushing, heads bowed respectfully. No one moved or breathed too loud. We were all waiting, dreading what came next.

The shiny white casket with gold trim hung above the hole like it didn’t belong there.

Maybe if we stared long enough, this horrible nightmare would end, and we could wake up.

I was tired of watching caskets being lowered into the ground.

I had buried too many people I loved and had now reached my limit.

Ella had adored bright flowers, so Theo and Blake made sure that roses of all colors stood at the head of the gravesite, while a large pink bouquet was draped over the lid.

I glanced around the circle, and there wasn’t a dry eye to be seen. Everyone here, including Dean Henry, Ivy, and Morrison, had tears streaming down their faces. Ella had touched so many and was loved by all.

Ethan sat in a wheelchair, looking like a shell of the man I knew.

Blake and Theo were by his side, their hands on his shoulders, trying to keep themselves together by being strong for their father.

But I knew under their stoic stares that they were just as broken inside.

Thankfully, Ethan would make a full recovery.

He wasn’t even supposed to be out of the hospital yet, with still one more surgery looming.

But he refused to have Ella lying in a morgue, waiting for him, and had insisted that her funeral be held today.

We’d all pitched in and helped with the arrangements between tears, hugs, and sleeplessness. Each task completed was another check on a list that we hadn’t wanted to make, and one step closer to goodbye.

Lip had alternated between crying and screaming since the attack, and he refused to leave his brother’s side.

Myles had taken to sleeping with him so he wouldn’t scream in terror all night.

His little face was buried in Myles’s jacket, his soft sobs the only thing heard on the breeze.

We’d found him a therapist, but he was so traumatized that I didn’t know how he was going to go back to Golden Oak.

It broke my heart to see the little boy who was never fazed and always had a smile on his face, shaking in fear.

His eyes were wide as he replayed what happened over and over.

He still couldn’t speak about it and cried hysterically if he tried.

Fucking Owen, and Devin, and Christov, and Lawrence, and everyone else who had a hand in this day. Fuck every single one of them.

The priest stood beside the casket, bible in hand, voice steady, and eyes kind. You could see that he felt this loss as much as the rest of us. I hadn’t known that Ella had been so involved with the community. It made her death all the more tragic, and it felt all the more senseless.

The priest cleared his throat and gazed at the wood like he knew she was listening.

“Some people are born as kind as an angel. Some are born with a wildness in their hearts. Others are born to be savage protectors who will withstand any fire for others. Ella was all those things and so much more.”

His voice was warm and soothing, and that only made it worse. The pain that clogged my throat was trying to escape.

“Ella was a woman whose love could lift you from the ashes, while keeping you there safe, if that’s where you needed to be.

I’ve heard countless stories over the last few days about how Ella had become a mother to each of you when you needed it.

When Ren lost her mother, Ella didn’t hesitate.

She stepped in, not because she had to, but because Ren needed her. That was Ella.”

I bit my lip hard to keep from shattering.

Nash linked our fingers and gripped my hand tight.

I’d hated sitting down with the priest and telling him anything about Ella.

It might have been stupid, but it felt like I was betraying private stories from our lives.

Stories that were ours to hold in our hearts.

“Ella was an anchor. A light. A defender. She didn’t love quietly. She loved like a powerful storm…unrelenting, unapologetic, and most of all unconditional. She offered comfort to strangers and family alike and loved them equally, because to Ella…you were all her children.”

I swallowed down the tears, my body shaking despite the numbness that had already taken over.

“She forgave sins most would carry forever. And she protected her boys, all of them, with the heart of a lion…” The priest nodded to the group huddled together.

“Blake, Theo, Myles, and Lip…she loved all of you, whether her blood flowed through your veins or not. That didn’t matter to her, because family is built on more than bloodlines. ”

Lip’s cries got a little louder. I didn’t think it was possible to hate someone so much that you wished they could come back to life just so you could kill them again. But I did. Owen and Lawrence had left scars that ran deep, like a ragged ravine.

“Today…we’re left behind to continue her legacy.

We are the ones standing in the echo of her gentle voice and left to wade through the silence that follows a life lived louder than most. It hurts.

There is no neat ending here, no bow to tie this grief up, or wall it away.

But there is something that we can do. We can promise to carry her light forward.

Live by the example she set. In the way we speak truth, even when it burns.

In the way we love the broken without trying to fix them.

In the way we stay when it’s easier to leave. ”

Ethan gasped and broke into sobs. He covered his mouth as his shoulders shook, and my heart broke for him. Nash let go of my hand to wrap his arm around me, like I was the one who might disappear.

“This is how we honor her. This is how we remember her. She may rest in God’s embrace now, but she lives in every one of you. I will end things with a prayer.”

I closed my eyes and listened to words that I struggled to believe. Why were the good souls stolen so early? Why would a benevolent being want to hurt the kind and let the evil live? The priest closed his bible, and it felt final.

Air refused to move in my chest, like it was lodged there, and my lungs couldn’t remember how to work properly.

The ropes strained as the lone piper played Amazing Grace. The song was haunting as it carried on the air.

The casket was lowered into the ground, but I didn’t make a sound.

I couldn’t. I just stared, heart crumbling in silence.

I wanted to scream—to throw myself onto the coffin and pull her out.

I wanted to beg whatever god was listening to take someone else, someone who didn’t deserve to walk this earth, and to give her back to us.

But Ella would’ve told me to stand up straight and to hold my chin high.

She would’ve told me to keep the people I love closer when the world tried to take them.

To hold them tighter, smile wider, and laugh louder.

She was pure sunshine in a world shrouded in darkness, and I had the privilege of feeling the warmth of her love if only for a short time. I’d never forget her.

So, I stood for her because she would’ve done the same for me.

“Lilya?”

I looked up at my dad, and there was something about seeing the unshed tears in his eyes that made me love him more. Ella had touched so many, and she’d been instrumental in helping my parents, and then my mum, long before I knew her name.

“We are gathering at the O’Brien’s. Do you want to stay here a little longer?”

I glanced around and realized that everyone else was slowly making their way to the long procession of black cars. I swallowed, torn between going with the living and staying here with the dead.

“I want to stay a few more minutes.”

He nodded.

“Marcus and Massimo will stay with you and Nash then. I want to be at the house to help Ethan, and then I’ll take him back to the hospital. I’m probably the only one he’ll listen to right now,” Dad said, and I stepped away from Nash to hug him.

“I love you, Dad,” I said, and he hugged me back.

“I love you, too, my beautiful daughter,” he said, kissing the top of my head before he walked toward his car.

Nash grabbed my hand again, and I looked up into his eyes. We stood like that, saying everything that needed to be said, without speaking. Wordlessly, we walked over and kneeled beside Ella’s grave.

Nash reached out and touched North’s stone. There was no better resting place for his memory than beside the woman who would ensure he was loved. His thumb traced over the name, and I leaned my head on his shoulder. We’d all said so many goodbyes. Even Mya was finally buried with her parents.

Nash had hardly spoken more than a few one-word answers since New Year’s. Not that I blamed him. We were all processing in our own ways.

“I want to say goodbye to Neal before we go,” I said as we stood.

We walked slowly across the snowy grass to the spot I’d chosen under a tree.

It was a private location with a great view.

I knew he was gone, but it was the least I could do for all that he’d sacrificed for me.

The flowers were still set up from his funeral earlier in the day, and I pulled one of the white roses.

“I’m sorry I was such a brat sometimes. I’m sorry that I didn’t see sooner that you were trying to protect me.”

Nash rubbed my shoulder, but nothing helped to warm me from the chill that had settled into my bones.

“Most of all, I want to thank you for choosing me…for being my dad…for loving me and my mum enough to leave all you knew behind to help us. Thank you for all the things that I should’ve said thank you for. I love you, and I won’t forget you.”

I kissed the rose, my tears dampening the soft petals, before I placed it on the dirt mound that now covered his casket.

“I’m ready,” I said.

We made our way to the car and slipped into the back of the limo that had waited for us. As Massimo closed the door, I turned to Nash and touched his face. He looked at me, his eyes searching mine.

“My answer is yes,” I said, and he blinked before his eyes went wide.

“You mean…”

“Yes.”

His mouth curved up as he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out the ring.

“Have you just been carrying this around,” I asked as he handed me the black velvet box.

“Yes.”

I blushed despite everything. That one word and the meaning behind it meant more than he would ever know.

Cracking the lid, I gasped. The ring was like nothing I’d ever seen before.

The center was a large diamond, but there were two other bands attached.

The one in the front had a ring of white rectangular diamonds, while the other had round stones that were a mix of colors.

Upon closer inspection, I recognized the other stones.

The aquamarine, peridot, opal, and ruby repeated one after the other around the band.

It was more stunning than I ever could have imagined.

Nash cleared his throat. “I had another one picked out, but I decided to do something custom for you. You deserve a one-of-a-kind. The stones are for our birthdays. You’re right, we are all in this together, and your ring should represent that despite what the marriage certificate says,” he said.

I slowly pulled the ring out of the box, and Nash gently plucked it from my fingers.

“Let me,” he said, and I held out my hand.

He held it with just the tip of my finger through the hole.

“Ren…I love you. I don’t know when you stole my heart, but it’s yours now.

People think love is diamonds. I think it’s dragging my broken body across every mistake I’ve ever made just to get back to you.

I think it’s looking you in the eye and saying that you make me want to be better, even when I’m nothing but wreckage.

I don’t know how to love soft, Ren. I never did.

But I know how to stay. I know how to fight.

I know how to look a man in the eye and end him for touching what’s mine.

And you…you’re mine. You always will be.

So let me ask you again…not with a ring, but with my fucking soul in my hands. Will you be my forever?”

My heart pounded so hard it hurt. I felt it in my ears, my teeth, and my fucking bones. Nash looked at me like I was the only thing tethering him to this world, and maybe I was. Maybe he was mine, too.

Nash. The storm I never saw coming. The fire I never meant to fall into, and the only person who could destroy me and still make me thank him for the ashes.

Now here he was—wrecked and all raw emotion, a vulnerableness burning in his eyes—asking me to choose him.

My voice broke before I even spoke.

“I love you, Nash. In all the wrong ways, in every way that makes no sense, and every way that matters.” I took a deep, calming breath.

“So yes. It’s always been yes, even when I hated you.

Even when you made me want to scream and hit you, it’s yes when you’re an ass.

Yes, when you’re silent. Yes, when you’re broken, but most of all yes because you’re mine, too. ”

With that devilish grin that could stop a heart, he pushed the ring onto my finger. It was perfect. Different, like us…like all of us.

If there is one thing this cruel life has taught me, it is not to let go of the people you love but to hang on. Hang on for as long and as hard as you can, because you never know what tomorrow will bring.