Page 48 of Promise to Break

"Asshole, that hurts," I complain, but he doesn't let me go.

"Everyone out," Killian barks.

"You need someone to stay with you," I insist.

"Good, and you'll be the one to stay, Maricela."

I gape at him, making sure with the glare in my eyes that he sees what I think about his orders.

From my place on the floor, I look at Liam and Raven. My former best friend is the first to move to the door, the traitor. I glare at her as she mouths, "He won't hurt you. Trust him."

Like fuck, I'll trust him. Not in this lifetime. Rambo and Rocky leave the room as well, leaving me alone with the asshole.

I am so fucked.

Chapter twenty-one

Maricela

The click of the door resonates as loudly as the tick of a bomb. Nothing will stop him now. I know it. He knows it. The people who left this room also know it. I've been left in the war zone to fend for myself.

I get up from my place by his side to stand next to the floor-to-ceiling window, where I peer out, wondering if the glass is the same as the windows in the Fierro estate, where no one can see inside, and hoping it is. The thick grove of trees is surely a bonus, hiding the depravities that take place here. The kinks the Molina brothers dwell in are something they speak about as openly as if they discuss the weather. From the little I can see from here, the party hasn't dimmed. It's as if the queen of the school wasn't assaulted by her fiancé, and no one knows what happened by the pool.

"You're beautiful. You know that?"

From the very first, I was drawn to his voice. It has a magical, calming effect. One that shouldn't be part of a man like him.

"I do." My beauty is an unarguable fact by social standards. I've been called beautiful, stunning, even breathtaking. I've heard it all, and I hate each and every single remark about my looks. It wasn't enough that I stole my mother's life; I had to take her looks as well.

I see how Serena stares at me sometimes, with longing and maybe a little bit of resentment. I remember the last curse my father bestowed on me just two days before his death, as if not able to give me any semblance of peace even after he was gone.

"You will never know what happiness is, and even when you think you get there, something will happen. You stole a life, and you will not live it as you hope. Your mother's ghost will take care of that."

Each word had been singed by the stench of cheap alcohol and haunts me to this day.

Serena chose a calm life. She took happiness by the horns, and she holds onto it with a child on the way. And me? I keep getting myself into situations such as this. My stubbornness and my attraction to danger don't afford me the near prospect of a peaceful life. And my looks only add to the poisonous mix.

I wait for him to say something about my arrogance or pretentiousness. He doesn't. He and I are the same in this regard. He's very handsome, and he knows it. The difference between the two of us is that Killian uses his looks to his benefit while I try to downgrade them. But then, that's not what makes people like us bad. No, what makes us evil and merciless are our actions. I try to stay out of trouble, even when trouble comes after me, whereas Killian lives by the laws of disorder. Anarchy is his purpose, his life, while I want nothing to do with it.

He says nothing more until the silence becomes too much to bear. "And that's the reason you can't let me go?" I ask. "Do you want my beauty? I can give it to you. Take it. You can do to me what you did to Lila." I try to sound as sarcastic as possible, failing miserably through the exhaustion and my chattering teeth. I haven't even graduated college yet, and I'm already so tired of it all that I don't want to think about what comes next.

"Your beauty is one of the reasons. I'm not blind, and I want you all to myself," he admits, ignoring my jab.

"And let me guess. What I want doesn't matter. You'll take me no matter what I say."

"Not against your will. You know that."

"At least you're honest." I consider turning to face him but don't and continue to look out the window, seeing nothing. "And what if I never succumb to your charming personality?"

He chuckles. "You will. You're on the precipice already, Wild Child."

He's right about that. I've been there since the day we met. This boy who acts and looks like a man is right, and I'm about to relinquish control.

Raven assured me he wouldn't hurt me. Yet, I think she forgot that harm is subjective. Physical harm can be terrifying, but you learn to endure it, anticipate it, and function around it. Cuts and breaks and bruises eventually heal. The pain is physical, and you can lie to yourself and tell yourself that it doesn't touch the only thing that matters. Your heart.

What can disintegrate someone like me is the ruin of the soul. The same soul I've tried so hard to shield from the constant violence. My beating organ is already bruised and battered. Still, I know I will let him pull away every well-built wall as if it's made of thin paper instead of the bricks I intended to put in place. My strength crumbles at his presence alone, the smell of toothpaste and pool water almost taking away his aroma of mint and foreign spices, but not quite.

"I'm not honest," he says, and I hear the dip of the bed before he comes to stand behind me. I'm so small, so fragile against him, so protected. It always comes to this. This feeling that I'm safe in the arms of the man who has done me the most harm of all. I'm sick. He just told me he hasn't been honest with me, yet I don't walk away.

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