Page 114 of Cruel Games

She froze like a deer in headlights, the color draining from her face as her gaze rose to meet his. “Yes,” she said simply, the bag falling to the floor. “I know.”

And then, just like that, things all fell apart, and she slumped against Coyote, a fiendish cackle erupting from her lips, unending and more unhinged by the second.

She barely stopped to breathe between laughs. She didn’t move. Only her chest moved up and down as she sucked in a breath and kept cackling into Coyote’s shoulder as he lifted her into his arms and carried her into his room.

I didn’t breathe until I heard the sound of water running, and only then did I turn to the asshole on the floor.

“Talk.”

FORTY-THREE

COYOTE

My fierce fighter was broken,her laugh a horrifying echo ofthe usual one she launched at us on the regular. The despair in the tone, the raw emotion she choked on as each sound was torn from her throat, it destroyed me.

Just like I knew it would.

I could see this coming, knew the devastation she would endure when she realized that her perfect memory was nothing but a sham. I hadn’t wanted her to find out like this.

But I’d been too scared to let the others tell her, either. And I couldn’t find the words, no matter how much I tried.

This was all my fault.

I’d done this to her.

By hiding the truth from her, I had damned us to this emotional trauma, created a vast uncrossable chasm between us. In keeping silent, I set her up for heartbreak from the start.

Perhaps it was destiny; maybe this was how the world had decided she needed to know.

But all it did was hurt me to see her like this.

I turned on the water in the shower and set her on the counter, tugging her upright just enough to slip the straps of her dress off her shoulders.

Her laughter didn’t stop. But when I lifted her chin and stared into her eyes, it was like she couldn’t see me. Like I wasn’t even there.

She looked right through me.

“Ivy,” I choked out, desperate to hear her talk again. Only one of us was allowed to be silent. Only one of us could be a quiet, withdrawn, broody asshole, and that was me.

She didn’t respond, though she did hold still for me as I stripped her dress off her torso, letting it pool around her waist as she laughed and laughed and stared off into the distance over my shoulder.

Still, even broken and unhinged and hollow, shewas beautiful. Her shoulders sloped perfectly, collarbone dipping into the hollow of her chest, making me want to put my lips there.

Splotches of blood hit on her skin beneath her dress, and now that I could see them, I felt compelled to check and make sure she wasn’t injured. I found a gash on her left hand, across her palm in a circular pattern, but no other injuries, thankfully. She didn’t cringe away as I poured rubbing alcohol directly on the open wound, searching under the counter for the sewing kit I’d stashed here the last time I got injured on the job.

I wasn’t the best stitcher, but I’d learned when Dingo got stabbed while Doc was out of town on a mission of his own. Between Lilly and myself, we managed to piece him back together, but neither of us had a very steady hand, so we’d set out to learn to do better. After a few lessons with Doc, I could at least stitch in a straight line.

“This might hurt,” I murmured, bending over her palm with a needle in hand, wincing like it was my hand as the metal slipped through her skin like butter, dragging a length of thread through the edges of the wound. I breathed a sigh of relief when the job was over, relieved to not have to hurt her any more than she’d already been hurt.

But she needed to get warm and get clean. There were chunks of what looked like brain matter, for fuck’s sake, clinging to her hair.

“Can you shower on your own?”

All I got in return was more laughter, though it sounded almost hoarse and weak now.

“Ivy, you’re scaring me.”

Still laughter. But her eyes found mine, and they looked almost . . . sad.

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