Page 246 of Pretty Little Lies

It was the end of a love story, fuckfest, being in each other’s company—whatever you want to call it—burning alive with each stroke of the pen and I felt every lick of flames singe and threaten to swallow me whole with them.

I hate myself.

I loathe the adult decision that I had to make. I wish I could take back what I said, the vile things I mentioned to Reeve about his sister, but he wouldn’t leave.

He wouldn’t fuck off.

And I knew I had to get him where it hurt to make him shut down and cut me off altogether.

It was cruel, and he was the last person I would ever want to sever so deeply, to ever believe he was fucked up and twisted.

But I did it.

And I’m fully aware that I’ll never be able to come back from that.

Ever.

With the marriage certificate in hand, my meeting with Emilio was meant to be short, quick, and to the point.

There really isn’t anything else to say.

Not only am I rescuing my loved ones, but I made more enemies around me. Everything that Levi and I tried to do backfired with my ex’s help.

Assistance that, one day, I will watch him bleed from.

When striding inside the boujie mansion, everything that lies in this house will haunt me forever.

Memories of Torin and I in the library. The words that he spoke in the foyer about never leaving me alone and always looking to make me pay for the loss of his brother.

His grief will hopefully one day die, but it’s too raw, too fresh, for him to be able to forgive me just yet.

If he ever does.

I hate that I don’t know the answer to that.

As much as he hurt me, ripped everything out of my life, I still care for him. I still remember how he looked at me with those tawny eyes and conveyed that he was falling for me. That he’d go to war with me. Our relationship was a combination of petty, greed, and lust, flawless and strong as we went at it with each other. All wanting the last word, always right, and never backing down.

With Reeve, it was mellow and euphoric. He was true, and reckless, the kind of relationship that, if it wasn’t too careful, it could burn the other.

And I’m the one holding the fucking lighter.

I’m brought to Emilio’s office by one of his butlers. The red wallpaper with gold print dawning the windows along two of the sides and a few bookshelves scattered here and there only makes this more cryptically accurate that Emilio is just as gaudy and shitty as ever.

It’s not until I feel the heaviness of being watched that I glance over to see Emilio first, leaning up against his desk with a glass of something dark inside. In his perfected gray suit, he watches me step deeper into the room and that’s when I notice the shift in the air.

My eyes catch the movement of Ramsey, dressed in a white button up and black slacks, but it’s not him. He just vibes me agitated with his furrowed brows that mean nothing to me.

However, it’s the first time I’ve ever seen much emotion out of the man, so whatever.

No, it’s when he moves that I see the black tee and jeans. Where my eyes make out the even darker tattoos along the flesh of another man’s arms, disappearing underneath his shirt and travelling upward to his neck.

Equally raven hair covers some of his face, longer at the top, kinda like Cairo, but the stranger in the room keeps it in his face.

Purposely maybe.

His pitless eyes stare back at me, and he doesn’t move. Like he’s part of the wall and I was never supposed to know he was there in the first place.

A precariousness falls over him that immediately drapes over me, travelling to my head, flicking my brain on to high alert.

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