Page 110 of Say You're Mine

I collapse against her, careful to keep my weight off her stomach, and bury my face in the sweat-dampened curve of her neck. She cradles me close, her fingers combing through my hair, her heartbeat gradually slowing beneath my ear.

"Don't leave," she whispers, so softly I almost don't hear it. "Stay with me. Just for a little while."

I lift my head, searching her face in the darkness. The plea in her eyes, the vulnerability and the desperate, aching love, nearly undoes me.

"I can't," I rasp, the words tasting like bitter ash on my tongue. "It's not safe, Cara. If Elaine finds out-"

"I don't care." Fierce. Defiant. So fucking brave it steals my breath. "I need you, June. We need you. Please."

My resistance crumbles like a house of cards. I can deny her nothing, this woman who holds my heart, my soul, in her gentle hands. "Okay," I whisper, pressing my forehead to hers. "Okay."

We shift and settle, our bodies fitting together like puzzle pieces, my front to her back, my arm draped protectively over her waist. I splay my hand over the swell of her stomach, marveling at the life we've created, the tiny spark of hope amidst the darkness.

"I'm going to fix this," I promise her, my lips brushing the shell of her ear. "I'm going to make it right, Cara. For you, for our baby. I swear it."

She laces her fingers through mine, holding me tight. "I know you will. I believe in you, June. I always have."

We drift off like that, tangled together, clinging to this stolen moment of peace. But even in sleep, the specter of what’s to come haunts me. The knowledge of what I have to do, the sacrifices I have to make, weighs heavy on my soul.

I dream of blood and fire, of bullets and blades. Of Cara's screams, high and terrified, as they rip our child from her arms. I dream of Elaine's face, twisted in a cruel mockery of a smile, as she watches me burn.

I wake with a gasp, cold sweat beading on my brow, my heart slamming against my ribs. Cara stirs beside me, her sleepy murmur of concern soothing the jagged edges of my panic.

"It's okay," I whisper, pressing a kiss to her bare shoulder. "Just a dream. Go back to sleep, baby."

She subsides, her breathing evening out, and I lie there in the darkness, staring at the ceiling, my mind a whirlwind of fear and determination.

I can’t fail. I won’t. Not again. Not when the stakes are this high, the potential for loss this devastating. I'd burn the whole fucking world to ash before I let Elaine take what’s mine.

But I can't do it alone. I need allies, resources, a plan so airtight not even my sadistic bitch of a mother can slither her way through. And that means calling in every favor, cashing in every blank check, until I have an army at my back.

Carefully, I extract myself from Cara's embrace, every cell in my body screaming in protest. I dress in silence, the slide of fabric against my skin a mocking caress. At the window, I pause, looking back at the woman who holds my entire existence in her hands.

"I love you," I mouth, the words a vow, a covenant. "Always."

Then I’m gone, slipping out into the night, a wraith once more. The city sprawls before me, a glittering whore, full of false promises and sharp edges waiting to draw blood.

But beneath the neon and the filth, in the hidden places where the lost and the damned make their homes, I will find what I need. The tools, the weapons, the wolves willing to go to war for the sake of one man's vengeance.

Elaine thinks she’s broken me. Thinks she can twist me to her purpose, a puppet dancing on strings of lies and manipulation. She has no fucking idea.

She’ll learn, in the end, the true meaning of the word regret.

Chapter thirty-three

Cara

The moonlight slicing through the curtains paints silver stripes across my swollen belly. I trace the stretched skin, marveling at the life growing inside me - June's child, our miracle. A soft kick flutters beneath my palm, and for a moment, the ache in my chest eases.

But the emptiness of the bed beside me is a gaping wound, bleeding loneliness into the quiet night. I close my eyes, willing sleep to come, but all I see is June's face - haunted, desperate, beautiful in its brokenness. The memory of his touch burns like a brand on my skin, a bittersweet reminder of what I can't have.

A whisper of movement outside my window has me bolting upright, heart thundering against my ribs. Fear and hope war in my chest as a shadow detaches itself from the darkness.

June.

He slips inside like smoke, all lean muscle and coiled tension. The moonlight catches on the planes of his face, throwing the new hollows in his cheeks into sharp relief. My breath hitches at the sight of him - my warrior, my protector, looking more like the hunted than the hunter.

"Cara." My name falls from his lips like a prayer, reverent and raw.

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