Page 112 of Ruin My Life
I place a hand on his shoulder. The other brings the knife up—just a whisper of steel against the pulse at his throat.
“And you should know that excuse doesn’t work on me,” I say, my voice low and measured.
James lifts his chin, locking eyes with me despite the swelling. “Not all of us have the strength to fight against the people who saved us.”
My hand freezes.
The blade pauses against his neck as the weight of those words hits bone-deep.
The Songbirdsdofeel like saviours—at first. Especially to the desperate. Especially to boys like me.
I was fifteen when I first walked into their world. My mom was sick. We were two weeks away from losing the shitty little apartment we called home. I was working illegal jobs under the table, getting cheated out of every dollar I earned—hauling crates with a broken wrist, delivering packages across town on my bike. Nobody gave a damn about some kid trying to save his mother.
And then Xander showed up.
Grinning. Flashy. Confident. Full of promises.
All I had to do was join up. Work for his father. And the money rolled in.
Enough to pay rent.
Enough to put food in the fridge.
Enough to line her cabinet with the medication she needed.
Enough to pretend, for a little while, that I wasn’t selling myself off in pieces.
But the Songbirds don’t offer charity. They offerchainsdisguised as freedom.
To earn with them, you bleed for them. And eventually... you forget where your soul ended and theirs began.
I shove the memory back where it belongs—deep, caged, behind the locked door where the rest of my past waits with claws and sharp teeth.
I slip the mask back on. Flash James a smile.
It doesn’t reach my eyes.
“Doesn’t take strength,” I murmur. “Just a big enough catalyst to make you jump—no matter how hard you know the landing will be.”
Then I bury the knife in his throat.
It’s fast. A clean puncture to the carotid. Probably more mercy than he deserves.
Blood erupts in a sharp arterial spray, hot and thick as it splatters across my shirt and pools at my boots in a dark crimson puddle.
James jerks once. Then again.
His body slumps, still bound, eyes glazing over as his mouth tries—and fails—to form one last plea.
I hold his gaze until the life drains out of his eyes.
Only then do I look up and find Connor watching me.
“You good?” he asks, his tone flat and unreadable.
“No.” I wipe the blade on my bloodstained sleeve, not bothering to hide the truth. “I wish it was someone else’s blood.”
Connor’s grin flares, quick and brief, like a match struck in the dark.
