Page 178 of Ink Deep Devotion

Anders jumps off the dresser and follows, but Nova comes closer. She takes my hand, squeezing it gently.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Then shake me off.” She challenges.

I don’t. Don’t ask me why.

“Mila is strong, Dash. She’s out there and we will find her.” One more squeeze, a lingering look from her cold grey eyes, and then she follows Titan out.

???

“I’ll go alone,” I tell them as I pick the lock to her apartment.

“We can come—” Titan begins.

“Alone!” I snap.“I don’t need Leo and Avery fucking on the bed or Nova’s boot up my ass.”

“What about me?” Anders taunts.

I push the door open and slam it shut. My gun is out but not raised. I already know the apartment is empty; our infrared sensors told me that much.

Mila chosethisover me. It’s so small and old. The air is stale and moldy. The only window in this shit hole can’t open fully. There’s a small twin bed, a chair, a dresser and no table.

Did she eat in her bed?

The kitchen consists of a counter not big enough for a turkey dinner, a mini fridge, and an open cabinet with mismatched china.

A shiver runs down my spine as I glide my fingers over the counter. There, I touched something my wife did. How recent was it?

There’s a small dresser I walk towards, but I stop at the window and look outside to see what her view is. It’s just a small alleyway with endless windows. A flapping sound fills the air as the clothing hangs on lines to dry. Filling the air like flags of individuality.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. I lean against the wall, holding my head as I try to forget my headache.

“I just want you back. I want to redo it all. I want to go back to that day we met and,” I shake my head,“I’m not strong enough or good enough to regret meeting you. I’d do it again, but I’d change the ending. I’d tell you to wait for me even if death claimed me. I’d beg you to wait. I would have returned from Initiation 101 and bent a knee to you. I would have taken the crown off my head and given it to you because you were always the better person. I would have been your knight and not the king that imprisoned you.”

A cry from an alley cat has my hand dropping as I look out the window.“Mila would have let you in and fed you; even if you scratched her, she would still allow you to stay. She was kind hearted like that. Foolish. But she loved monsters; she tried to tame them.” The cat meets my eyes; it must know how much of aprick I am. It doesn’t bother jumping up to the window for food; instead, it prances down the street looking for a more gullible fool.

Turning, I walk to her bed and lay down on it. My hands grab the sheet, and then I roll over, pressing my nose into her pillow.

Skip! Thump!

My heart skitters.

I can smell her. It’s faint, but it’s the distant note of her flesh, sweet and salty like untouched ocean mist and coconut.

One inhale gives me hope as I stand. She’s close. Then my hope vanishes when I see what is sitting on the dresser. I grasp it; the cold metal warms under my touch. The wedding ring I gave her sits there, abandoned.

She…took it off.

If someone had taken her, they would have sent this to me.

She left. She did this. She gave up on me. Again, just like she did when I was forced to go to Initiation 101.

“We will find her,” Titan says gently.

When did he come in? Are they all watching my demise?

I feel his eyes on the ring. I don’t want him to look at it. My failure, my last vestige of my wife. I push it onto my pinky finger, forcing it over my knuckle till it sits next to my band.

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