Page 171 of Seeking Shadows

For a second, there's only silence.

Then she collapses to the ground, sobbing, hands slick with blood. Her eyes are wide, her breathing erratic.

"Don't kill him. No. Please, Father." Her voice cracks, a desperate, broken sob that tears through the air and slams into me harder than any blow could. "I know you don’t care, I know you never cared... but please—please don’t kill him."

Her words hit me like a physical strike.

Every syllable is laced with raw desperation, with terror that cuts through me in a way nothing else ever has.

Everything slows, and for a moment, I’m not here in this hellish place.

I’m seventeen again.

Katie is begging for my life.

But this is different. There's no hesitation, no uncertainty in Mia’s voice—just a pure, unfiltered, primal fear that I’ve never heard from her before.

She’s not just pleading for me. She’s begging for her own survival, for her own reason to keep breathing. She’s begging for us both.

I can understand this feeling, because I feel it too. This love, it’s not the kind of love you dream about, it's the kind that claws at you, that consumes you whole.

She consumed me whole.

Her hands shake, her sobs racking her body. "Please, Father. If you kill him, I’ll... I’ll lose everything. I’ll lose myself. I can't live without him. I can't..." Her voice breaks, and I hear her fall to her knees, her face twisted in agony. "Please. Please don’t take him from me."

The sound of her cry rips through my chest like a jagged knife, a pull that drags me down into the depths of her madness.

I look at her, and it’s like looking into the abyss.

There’s nothing left but her—no sense of time, no reason, no escape. Just her, bleeding out in front of me, and me—helpless.

But Mia's not helpless. She’s a force of nature, fierce and untamed, and yet when I look into her eyes... that fear, it destroys me. It shatters my heart in ways I can’t even put into words. I should be the one protecting her, the one standing strong for her, but instead, I'm the one breaking.

"Mia..." I try to speak, but the words catch in my throat, too choked with blood and pain. I want to say everything. I want to tell her that I love her. That she doesn’t have to beg, that I won’t let her fall apart.

But all that escapes my lips is a whisper: "I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. I love you, baby."

Her gaze locks onto mine, wide and wild, her breaths coming in ragged gasps. "Don’t you dare leave me," she sobs, her words frantic, frenzied. "I can’t do this alone. I can’t breathe without you. I’ll die if you die. I’ll... I’ll kill myself if you die. Please don’t make me face this world without you. I can’t—"

The terror in her voice, the weight of her words, crashes over me like an avalanche. She’s not just asking for me to live. She’s asking for her own salvation. For some thread of hope to keep her from falling into the same darkness that’s been following us both all our lives.

My heart breaks.

"Mia, stop. You’re not going to lose me," I whisper, though I know the truth. I might not have the strength to promise that. But I’ll be damned if I don’t try.

Her tears fall freely now, her chest heaving, her body trembling. She’s unraveling in front of me, every shred of her control slipping away. "I love you," she gasps, her words torn from the depth of her soul, the kind of love that consumes you. "I can't—"

Nico’s laugh cuts through the rawness of the moment, but it feels like the last thing in the world that matters.

He’s watching this destruction, this fracture of us, like a sick joke.

But this isn’t a joke.

This is her soul screaming for the only person who ever made her feel whole.

And I can’t let her go. I can’t let them take me from her.

"I’m not leaving you," I say again, this time louder, more forceful, as if trying to anchor her to me. "I won’t let you be lost. I’ll survive, Mia. I’ll survive for you."

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