Page 136 of Stalked By Seduction and Shadows

I was so hung up on Rune ripping my idealistic, naive heart from my open chest that I nearly missed the information he’d revealed.

“Crescent Haven is your home?” I asked. I frowned, wiping the tears away as horror struck me. “Stumbled upon me… how long have you been stalking me?”

I thought about those times I’d felt watched, the strange sear on the back of my neck. I’d never connected what I’d felt in Crescent Haven to Rune, because why would I? It wouldn’t have made any sense for me to think he’d been the one watching me back then. But I’d sensed that same familiar scorch a handful of times, even as a child.

Anger swelled in my veins, and it was a welcome reprieve from the waves of grief.

“But you pretended you didn’t know me?” I choked out, thinking about all the times Rune had seemed to see me in a way no one else had. The way he’d intuited information about my childhood, my family, my hopes and fears. “Did you sneak me your blood when I was a child?”

Snow made her own shocked gasp, grabbing my wrist as she stepped back.

“No,” Rune snapped. “Of course not.”

I laughed bitterly, without an ounce of humor. “Oh, well that’s noble of you. I’m glad you waited until I was an adult before you forced your essence inside of me without my fucking knowledge, let alone my consent.”

“It wasn’t like that,” Rune said, irritation in his dark eyes. “You fascinated me, so I liked to make sure you were alive and well during my visits every year or two. I now understand I was only ever interested because of your succubus gravitational pull.”

“You lied to me,” I said. “You—you took advantage of me. My beliefs, my wounds, and my dreams. The things about me you shouldn’t have known.”

Rune scoffed. “Out of all the ways I imagined this going, you making yourself the victim was not one of them.” His branches twitched, razor sharp thorns vibrating with magick. “Though it’s exactly what I should’ve expected, isn’t it?”

He stepped closer to us.

“Don’t fucking move,” Snow growled, still clutching my wrist.

“Everything about us was a lie,” I said, hating the way more tears had pooled. I wanted to stay in the comforting fire of my anger. I didn’t want to slip into the depths of heartbreak that awaited me, ready to suck me under the waves as I drowned.

“Correct.” Rune searched my eyes. Something uncertain flickering before his features hardened back up. “Consider yourself unclaimed.”

A sharp stab, a twist of the dagger.

“You are nothing to me.” His words were laced with power and fury, vibrating off the walls.

My lip trembled, my knees threatening to buckle, my world beginning to fade away into darkness.

“You never meant anything to me at all.”

I bled anguish and terror, and Rune did not stare at me with concern or pity, only unshakable wrath and utter coldness. He did not mirror my pain. He let me bleed out on the hardwood floor as he looked on.

“I cannot stand to look at you a moment more,” he said. “Do not leave Lumina. Better yet, don’t leave this fucking apartment. You will tell me exactly who you’re working with and everything you know about your origins when I come back for you. I do not think I need to tell you what will happen if you are anything less than cooperative.”

I fell apart in Snow’s arms, just a crumpled shell of a person. Of a demon. If I was a soulless monster, why did I hurt so damn badly? Sociopathy would’ve been a welcome reprieve from the hollowness that stretched on and on, filled only with waves of crushing pain, each one taller and mightier than the last.

Eventually, I’d sobbed more than I thought it possible to cry in one single session. I settled into a heavy blanket of numbness and disbelief. I quieted, and Snow finally spoke.

“You had no idea, did you?”

“About which part?” My voice came out scratchy and raw. I cleared my throat. “The answer is no, about any of it.”

“Tell me everything, Scar.”

I lifted up, moving to sit opposite her with my knees pulled to my chest. I stared at my tear stains on her shoulder.

“Why haven’t you left? You defended me, even knowing what I was.” You let me cry in your arms, I thought, but didn’t vocalize.

“Because I love you!” she said, shaking her head at me. “You are my friend. I don’t give a fuck who your parents are, Scarlett. I care about you because you are my friend. I will repeat myself as long as it takes to penetrate your stubborn skull.”

I told her everything. I told her about Rune, about our beautiful love story, his writing and the humanity he saved only for me. Apparently, I had not, in fact, finished crying, stopping to take several breaks before I could finish the tale in its entirety. I told her what I’d read in Isabella’s diary, and I even told her all the times I’d felt different. I explained the way I felt in Odessa, surrounded by sex and violence—as if I belonged there more than I ever belonged in Crescent Haven.

---