Page 142 of Loving the Liar

Block.

Release.

“Atta girl. Look at you, baby.” He caresses my hair. “You’re such a good girl for me.”

I nod against his chest. “I won’t do it again.”

He pulls me away, looking in my eyes. He caught the lie. I can see it. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

More tears roll down my cheeks. I feel like I’m being torn apart. “I don’t know what to do.”

“What you’ll do is the next time you take a step toward hurting yourself, I want you to call me. It doesn’t matter what time of day it is. It doesn’t matter where you are, who you’re with, what you plan on doing. If you think it’ll hurt, you call.”

He kisses my lips, hard and violently. “Do you feel this?” he growls against me. I feel like my body is only alive in the places he touches me. “What you’re feeling when I hold you. That matters. That’s what you focus on.” He presses a hand on my heart, and it beats steadier for him. “And this.”

He kisses me again. Roughly, as if to keep me in the present.

“Where is the rest? Show me, baby.”

I move to the side, showing the cabinet behind me, and I open the door. Instead of giving him anything, I hold the box of one hundred razor blades to my chest.

“Don’t look,” I sob, but it’s more like a shout. “Please, please, don’t.”

He pries my arms away. “It’s okay. I won’t judge you.”

“I don’t know why,” I repeat. “I don’t know why I do it.” And it’s true. All I know is that it happens, and it feels good, but my mind is never clear enough to understand what’s happening.

“I understand.” He takes the box from me, and when I dare to look at him, his face is paler than I’ve ever seen it, but he still gives me a small, reassuring smile. “It’s going to get better.”

And I thought I was going to shake my head and disagree with him, but I catch myself nodding, a desperate plea leaving my lungs, “Do you promise?”

He bites his trembling lower lip, taking a deep breath through his nose. “I promise you I’ll be there to make it better.”

The relief that washes over me like a wave is short-lived.

“Get the fuck away from my sister before I blow your brains out.”

I love you

If it takes until the day I die to fix this, I’ll work tirelessly every single day I’m alive. All I want is to see your beautiful eyes shining with love before I close mine for eternity.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chris

I’ll Make You Miss Me - Artemis

Ican see the way Ella comes back to reality. It’s instant. The second her brother’s voice reaches us, the haze is cleared, and her hatred for me comes back tenfold.

I’m starting to think that keeping her captive in my house isn’t that crazy of a solution. I could just cut her off from the rest of the world. That spell she succumbs to when she lets me take care of her would never lift. That’s what we need. Time, just her and me.

Or is that too much?

She pushes me away, but I struggle to let go. Please, don’t make me let you go. I just want to make it right.

It’s only when I feel the muzzle of a gun at the back of my head that I start considering stepping back. It’s not for me. It’s because I wouldn’t want her covered in my brains and traumatized forever.

“Els, are you okay?” Luke asks, panicked. I’m sure the blood isn’t helping my situation.

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