Page 99 of Deviant

No, now we can both end this in peace.

It wasn’t meant to be like this. To end like this.

What the fuck went wrong? Why the fuck did he have actual bullets in his gun?

He was meant to scare her, to play pretend. It was meant to be a test, to see if she really was loyal or whether all this newfound obedience was merely an attempt to trick me.

Of course the man had to die. I had to silence him quickly before everyone else realised what this really was. It won’t help anyone to know that he’s not a real assassin, least of all the dying woman in my arms.

But as I carry her, as I realise that ultimately, I’m responsible for this, I feel fear for the first timein my life.

Fear that I’ve done something undoable. Something unfixable. Something truly unforgiveable.

She’s smiling, staring back at me in a way that suggests she’s almost content to die. And she keeps repeating that same bullshit over and over, that it’s okay. But it isn’t. It is not okay. How dare she think she’s allowed to leave me now?

And then she gasps out words I’d never believe. That she’s happy to die, happy to sacrifice herself for me.

My hands tighten around her bloodied body, my feet slam into the ground as I run as fast as I can, as desperately as I can to get help. Not even my own brother would run in front of a bullet for me. No one would show me such loyalty. And yet the woman I’ve hurt the most has done just that?

I can’t fathom it. I can’t comprehend it.

‘I’m better than that. Better than you.’

Those words ring out my head once more. Words spoken in hate. Words she spat at me so long ago and I realise now that she is right, she was always right. She is better than me. Nobler. Braver too. She offered her life for mine like it meant nothing, like she was worth sacrificing.

But she isn’t. She will never be worth losing. Someone like her, loyalty like that, it’s unheard of. It doesn’t exist beyond the wilds of your foolish imagination, and yet this woman just proved herself as just that. The rarest of rare creatures; something a man like I could never believe was real.

God, I can’t lose her. I can’t—I hate that pathetic, weak, desperation crawling beneath my veins, making me panic more. But I can’t lose her. Not now. Not fucking ever.

The doctor comes rushing out of the house as I reach it and he’s immediately taking over, demanding I lay her down, that I relinquish her care, as if I’d do such a thing.

Instead, I carry her to the medical bay, still shouting, still calling for everyone to get here, to save her.

And then I stand there, covered in her blood, refusing to leave her side, while my mind continues to somersault over and over at what just happened.

She jumped.

She did it.

She literally launched herself at who she thought was my assassin.

Her affection for me cannot be feigned. Cannot be false.

She’s as loyal as they come. More loyal than all my servants, my family, every other person on this very earth.

I gulp, considering the implications of this, of what I now have to do.

I expected her to seize her chance. I expected her to reach out and take what she believed to be her freedom with no hesitation whatsoever.

But she chose me.

Shechoseme.

No, Liliana has proven in one act that she’s more valuable than all the gold in my vaults, all the jewels and antiques and all of it, all my family’s legacy, all my family’s namesake.

I can’t ignore that fact.

I can’t.

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