Page 78 of Beyond Reason

A knife wound.

I—

Gunshots and a knife… and desperation clawing through my chest to go back, because I’d lost it…

I’d lost…

Images started to play in front of my eyes like a movie I wasn’t sure I was ready to watch. It didn’t matter, though. I’d avoided it for as long as I could, apparently. And this was the only thing left.

The only thing to remember.

The one thing I suddenly realized I wanted to forget.

Fuck you. Fuck, you don’t think about anything but yourself, do you?

Axel had sounded so angry. We’d been fighting because he was afraid that I was going to get hurt, and I’d been so furious that he didn’t think I was untouchable.

We’d been fighting because he wanted to settle down. Because he’d asked me…

He’d asked…

My hand flew to my chest, up to my throat. There’d been a chain there. A chain like the one Axel always wore.

It’s different now.

It’s not.

He’d looked so hurt.

“Xavier?” I was being too obvious. I stood with my shirt still held up with one hand, and the other on my throat. Seth was looking at me with wide, concerned eyes. But it was Axel’s touch on my bare skin that made me jerk violently.

“Then just get the fuck out, Xavier.” I parroted the words that were playing in my mind, and he froze. If I’d needed proof that he’d said them, it was written across his face in ribbons of guilt that left him pale, that tried to strangle him.

“Xavier, I—”

“We fought, because we always fought. And when I pulled a knife, you tried to take it… and I…” He jerked his hand from my side like my skin was on fire, but we were both looking at the same place.

The same slash on my skin.

The knife wound that he’d left behind.

I’d looked at the damn birthmark a dozen times over and hadn’t remembered until just now.

Fuck. I hadn’t wanted to remember. I still didn’t want to remember.

The person you love. And fuck, it had been love that killed me, hadn’t it?

“Xavier, please?” I wasn’t even sure what he was asking, or why he was asking it. It didn’t matter, because I was still remembering.

I remembered storming out and going to the building, meeting Kade there.

Going in.

I remembered finishing the job and the desperation I felt when I realized I’d lost it. Running back inside.

And I remembered the man that Axel’s father had sent to kill me.

I’d managed to kill him, but not before he’d done what he was sent to do.

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