Page 88 of The Beautiful Dead

He was one wrong answer away from killing me.

“Who are you working for?” His voice was jagged, more a snarl than words.

“I—I’m not… I…” Black spots exploded across my vision. My body spasmed from lack of oxygen.

“You found what?”

His face blurred. Distorted. My pulse slowed—each thump heavier, duller. “O-on the… PC… when… B-Brielle…”

Then, like the snap of a leash?—

“Fuck!” Domino roared, ripping his hands from my throat.

I collapsed. Air flooded my lungs like fire. I coughed, my body wracked with tremors, my throat searing as I gasped for breath. Every inhale felt like swallowing glass. I barely had time to process what was happening before Domino’s fingers tangled into my drenched hair and wrenched my head back.

His face—wild, ruined, monstrous—hovered inches from mine. His teeth were bared, his breath ragged. “Are you telling me the truth?” His voice sliced through me, cutting down to the quick.

I met his gaze, forcing myself to stay steady despite the tremors running through me. “I would never lie to you,” I rasped. “I know what she means to you.”

A crack. A fracture. It was barely there, but I saw it. His resolve wavered. The cracks deepened, spider-webbing across his face, breaking apart the mask he wore like armor.

Emotion bled into his eyes—agony and rage swirling together, battling for dominance. And if I wasn’t this close, I wouldn’t have noticed the tears. They built along his lashes, lost to the rain before they ever had the chance to fall.

“Kill me,” I whispered. “If that’s what you have to do.”

His face shuttered. Wiped clean. Every trace of emotion buried. But the tears still fell.

And watching that? Watching the god I worshipped fall from the sky? It was irrevocable. Haunting.

“In the drawer where I keep my supplies,” I whispered, barely audible over the rain. “There’s a folder with her name on it. Everything is in there.”

“You’re lying.” His voice was brittle, a broken child-like thing.

“Lies are for people who think they have nothing to lose and everything to gain,” I exhaled.

My breath hitched when the blade pressed deeper into my skin. Warmth trickled down my throat.

“I have nothing to gain,” I choked out. “And everything to lose.” A tear slipped past my lashes, cutting a cold path down my cheek.

I’d never feared death before. Never had anything worth living for.

But now?

Now I knew the weight of his devotion. Knew the depths of his sickening obsession. At that moment, I realized a terrifying, undeniable truth.

“I love you.”

Domino stilled. A muscle ticked in his jaw. His lips curled back, a snarl carving his face into something vicious. “I thought you didn’t lie?”

“I’m not.”

His fingers twitched. The blade dug in further. Blood pooled at my collarbone, warm despite the cold rain.

“If you kill me now,” I whispered, vision blurring, darkening, collapsing inward. “My only sin… will be that I never set you free… like you have me.”

The darkness swallowed me whole. The last thing I heard was the sound of Domino’s roar. It shattered through the night. A primal, agonized sound.

Then—nothing.

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