Page 202 of Deviant

“Everything hurts but my heart, so better.”

The tension in my shoulders relax with his remark. Though there are a few things we still need to address, that might bring all that stress back to them.

“You scared me, you know?”

“I’m a pretty scary guy, Roe. You’ll need to be more precise than that.”

“The day that Andy died… I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like that.” I chew on my bottom lip nervously.

“You’ve seen worse. You just can’t remember it because at the time you were dealing with your own shit. When Nora died, I thought I would go fucking crazy with grief. Everyone told me that it would get better, that I’d learn to live with it, but it was all bullshit. I felt that pain for months… until I saw a doe-eyed girl try to jump off Grove Bridge.”

I pull away and look at him stunned.

“You saw me?”

He nods.

“I don’t understand,” I say flabbergasted. “I didn’t think anyone even used that bridge anymore.”

“It was just bad luck, or maybe it was fate… depends on how you look at it,” he explains, tugging a stray hair behind my ear. “When I saw the pain you were in and the guilt that you were carrying, I knew, right then and there, that Nora didn’t die from an accidental suicide. You must have had a hand in what happened to her, and your father, being the sheriff and all, covered it up.”

I swallow hard, not believing my ears.

“So I started following you.”

“Following me?”

“Maybe not following… more like… light stalking.” He laughs, then groans, his bruised ribs reminding him that laughing is no longer on the table for him for the foreseeable future.

“You never said anything to me… not until that night on the bridge after your mother’s wake.Why? Why didn’t you say something before then?”

“Because I wanted the same thing you did. I wanted you to die.”

There was a time when those words wouldn’t have hurt me. I’d probably would have rejoiced in them, basking in its malice. But now… they hurt so much that I feel like my heart is breaking.

“You wanted me dead?” I stammer, feeling like the world just flipped on its head.

“And you wanted me to kill you, remember?” He hikes a brow, paired with a sad smile.

It’s true.

Up until a few weeks ago, that’s all I wanted. To die by his hand.

How can just a few weeks change a life so drastically?

“Roe,” he says softly before grabbing my chin lightly with his thumb and index finger. “That isn’t how I feel anymore. That version of me doesn’t even exist anymore. He’s gone. I’m what remains of him. Me.”

I stare at his midnight blue eyes and read the truth in his words.

“Now my question is simple, are you the same girl I saw on that bridge or is this version in front of me the real Roe?”

“What are you really asking me, Elias?” I croak, knowing exactly what his next words are going to be.

“Is this life so bad that you no longer want to live it?”

I stare into his eyes and take a fortifying breath, before answering.

“No. I want to live. Even as we find ourselves smack in the middle of The Scourge, and death is but a certainty, I still want to live. Because… of you.”

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