Page 65 of Traitor

Then, without a word, he lets go of his wounded shoulder and reaches out. His fingers touch my throat.

My skin burns under the warmth of his hand, but it's nothing compared to the sensation that follows. He traces the scar there, slow and reverent. And fuck — he leaves a smear of blood in its wake.Hisblood.

I shudder with rage, but before I can shoot him again, he lets his arm drop.

I expect him to say something, anything. But when I look into his eyes, I see it. His eyes are misting over.

I almost recoil because I don't know this version of him. I know the man who showed me eight months of bliss. And I know the ruthless man who branded me and then watched as I was dragged to my own personal hell.

But this? This is something different.

His breathing turns ragged, his broad chest rising and falling unevenly. And then his gaze drops lower. Lower.

To my right arm.

Tohismark.

TRAITOR.

Or what's left of it. Reborn into something tragically beautiful.

I see the second it guts him.

His Adam's apple bobs, and his fingers twitch like he wants to touch that too. Like he wants to trace over what he did to me.

He doesn't.

Instead, his voice comes out low, wrecked and raw.

"You took my ugliness and made it into something beautiful." His throat works again. "Exquisite, just like you."

I don't move. Don't breathe.

Because I can see him break and I have no idea how he's going to react next.

But he just turns around and walks away.

I'm going to fucking destroy him. I need to make a plan.

14. Breaking

Bones

Idon't remember leaving.

One second, I'm staring down at Ely's arm, the next, I'm tearing out of her house like the walls are caving in.

I can't fucking breathe.

I don't feel the pain in my shoulder, don't register the warm, wet spread of blood soaking my cut. All I see is her throat. That scar. A wound I didn't put there, but one I might as well have.

Jinx did that to her. Because of me.

The weight of it crushes me.

I stumble into the night, my vision blurring. Not from pain, but from something worse. There's wetness on my face. It takes me a second to understand what it is, why my breath is hitching, why my chest is breaking open like something feral and clawed is ripping through it from the inside out.

I haven't cried since I was ten years old.

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