Page 80 of Cruel Lies

My hand shot out before common sense could process in my brain, and I watched, disconnected from my own body, almost,as my long fingers wrapped around her throat and yanked her around to face me.

"What the fuck did you just say?" I snarled, all rage and jealousy and not an ounce of sanity or civility left in me at the thought that she’d had her lips around other men. That they’d taught her how to suck a cock this well.

The ways they’d likely defiled her to turn her into this blowjob goddess?—

Hands that didn’t feel like mine shook her by the throat as she bared her teeth like the dog I’d just equated her to, nipping at my outstretched finger that wagged dangerously in her face. I’d dropped the leash in the little altercation somewhere, and now the only thing holding her here was my own grip.

"Youproudof being a whore, Harpie girl?" I dragged her to the broken mirror in the corner of my room and spun her around as she clawed desperately at my hand and rasped for me to let go. "Here. Go ahead and take a look in the mirror at what you’ve become."

My free hand grabbed her hair again, and unlike last time, there was no love lost in the way I dragged her face up to look into the shattered remains of our shared reflection. Just two broken souls, both trying desperately not to get attached. Wanting more than what the world would allow them.

"You’rebroken,Harpie. The world chewed you up and spat you back out in a mockery of your old self." I shook her again, wanting her to understand. Needing her to see what I saw every day. Maybe then she’d understand why she couldn’t get close to me, why I couldn’t have her. "A bunch of jagged edges, all looking for a body to dig into and bleed dry."

I wasn’t sure who I was talking about anymore. The way my own reflection mocked me had me seething with rage. "Look at it, Harper.Look at yourself."A malicious laugh left my throat as I released her, the sounds of her gasps digging into my brain, promising to haunt me until the day I died.

She scrambled for the door, so desperate to reach freedom that she didn’t bother to look back once.

The door slammed shut on her, bathing me in darkness and shattered fantasies. I laughed again, but the sound was mournful this time—a mockery of my newfound loneliness.

"Broken. Just like me."

THIRTY-FOUR

HARPER

Broken.Just like me.

The words lingered long after I’d fled Nash’s room.

I’d always known I was broken. That a part of me had been wrong since the moment I became Hannah Flagg. Since I was dragged from the river and nursed back to life by an old, grizzled fisherman who just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

Some days, I wished he’d let me drown instead.

If I hadn’t been fished from the cold, dark waters . . .

What if it was all different?

Nash might not be so broken.

Angel might not hate his kinder side.

Rowan wouldn’t carry the secret for seven years.

Was I causing more damage than good, being alive in the first place?

Anxiety had me spiraling once more, the crash from subspace, something I hadn’t experienced in a long time, overwhelming me.

I had an ex once who was into that. All that dominant-submissive bullshit, the rough touches, the demanding orders, the praise and degradation. When he was in a good mood, he could make me feel like a piece of shit and then bring me back up to the tops of the clouds, all in one go.

Nash was different. Nashaimedto wound. He didn’t greet me at the bottom of a crash with kind words, reassurance, and praise. He didn’t care for me when I needed it most.

Instead, I was left to deal with the crushing anguish and emotional pit of despair on my own, alone in this sea of solitude as his mocking, cruel words echoed in my skull even when I closed my eyes and prayed for it to stop.

Broken.

I found myself in Rowan’s bed, though it lacked the comfort I sought without him in it. Rowan had never been a comforting person, anyhow. He was more of a protector, awall of brick between you and the rest of the world when you couldn’t handle it anymore. He was a born leader, a commander of troops. In another world, he might’ve been a fucking politician or a president. But life dealt him a shitty hand, and now he was in charge of his brothers and a ruthless, twisted killer, just like the rest of them.

"You’re broken, Harpie girl."

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