Page 36 of Wraith

The words barely registered. All I could hear was the echo of our last fight, the venom in my voice as I threw her betrayal in her face, the way she screamed back, desperate and panicked. The texts, the pictures, thefucking lies—it all came rushing back with dizzying force. She had cheated on me. She had been lying to me for months. And in that final, vicious moment before my death, before I felt the world slip out from under me, she was the last thing I saw.

Lilith rocked against me again, her breath hitching, her fingers threading through my hair. “The more youhurt, the hotter I get,” she admitted, her tone drenched in sadistic pleasure. “It’s intoxicating, Lucian. Watching you unravel like this.”

I clenched my jaw, forcing my focus back to Emma, to the way she looked—so small, so broken, sofucking lost. Her eyes darted wildly around the chapel, searching, desperate, as if she thought someone—anyone—would stand up for her.

No one did.

The weight of that crushed something inside of me.

Lilith dragged her lips down the side of my throat, sinking her teeth into the flesh of my collarbone. I shuddered as I felt the sting, the sharp edge of pain coiling around the pleasure in a way that made my stomach churn.

“Stop,” I growled through clenched teeth, but she just sighed happily, rolling her hips again like she could coax me back into her rhythm.

“You don’t want me to stop,” she whispered, licking the mark she’d just left. “Youneverwant me to stop.”

I did. Idid.

But my body—thefucking betrayalof my body—was already reacting to her again, even as I tried to drown in the rage consuming me.

Emma was gone. Hauled out the door like a criminal.

My parents sat in stunned silence. My friends stood in helpless disbelief.

And I?—

I was trapped beneath a monster, powerless, as she claimed me again and again, savoring every inch of my torment.

And worst of all?

Somewhere deep inside me, buried beneath my fury,I could feel myself breaking.

Twenty-Six

The second thecops dragged Emma out of the chapel, the air felt…wrong.

Not just heavy.Suffocating.

Like something in the atmosphere hadshifted.

I should have been paying attention to the chaos in the front row—the murmurs, the shocked gasps, Kael arguing with the officers—but my gaze waslockedon the back pews.

Becausehewas there.

Lucian.

Naked.

And he wasn’talone.

My mind tried to reject what I was seeing, tried to explain it away, tried torationalizethe impossible—but Icouldn’t.

Because Lily wasstraddlinghim, her nails digging into his chest, her hips rolling in slow, deliberate movements. Her long black dress was bunched up around her thighs, her pale skin faintly translucent, but unmistakablyrealin a way that made my head swim. She moved like sheknewshe had full control,like nothing—not death, not morality, not the weight of reality—could stop her.

And then?—

I sawCiaran.

Watching.

---