Page 264 of Ruins
I step back, taking my position in the middle of the room.
Romeo and Luca grab Jude by each arm and drag him forward. They drop him at my feet.
His knuckles turn white around the handle of the knife.
“I-I don’t want to,” he stammers.
I shake my head. “Die like a man. Or die like a coward. Either way, you’re dying tonight. Stand up.”
Jude’s hands tremble, but his eyes burn with fury. He rolls his injured shoulder, setting his stance.
“You’re so upset,” he says as we begin to circle each other. “You think she’s yours. But she wasminefirst.”
His eyes stay locked on my hands.Smart.Watching for movement. Trying to lure me in.
I shake my head. “She was never yours.”
He smirks. “Two years together. That’s history she can’t forget.”
My teeth grind together, heat rising in my chest. “You were in Seattle for most of it. Now shut the fuck up and fight.”
Jude shrugs, smirks. “One year I had her to myself. Did she tell you that? Every.Single.Day. What do you think we did?”
I know he’s trying to get to me. And I refuse to give him the satisfaction.
I chuckle knowingly. “You did nothing.”
Jude’s jaw ticks. Anger. Frustration.
“Just because you got her to bleed on your sheets,” he sneers, “doesn’t mean we didn’t doeverythingbut.”
He lunges.
I see the knife coming too late. Steel slices through my arm, tearing fabric, spilling blood.
Jude grins, backing up a step, his blade streaked with red.
“She’s a weak spot, huh?” He licks his lips. “Does she moan when you kiss her too?”
The thought of his hands on Vasilisa overrides everything—even the fact that she told me I was the first to ever touch her body.
His smug fucking face blurs. My control slips. I see nothing but red.
He can’t talk about my wife like that. Can’t mention the sounds she makes. Can’t compare the longevity of their relationship to the minuscule time she’s spent with me.
She’smine. She’llalwaysbe mine.
I don’t register that I’m on top of him. That my fists are breaking his face open. That the knife in his hand is swiping at me until it clatters to the ground—until hands are prying me off him.
When my vision returns, Romeo is strapping a bloodied, barely-conscious Jude to the chair. His eye is swollen shut, bruises blooming across both cheeks. His lip—split wide open—drips blood down his chin. His teeth are stained red when he smirks at me like an idiot.
Luca releases my arms. “He got you good. You’re bleeding.” Luca’s voice is sharp, urgent.
I look down. My shirt is in tatters, blood trailing from wounds down to my hands.
I take a breath, mentally assessing the damage. Nothing feels lethal.
I shrug him off. “I’m fine.” I step toward Jude. I ask him which hand he used to hit my wife.
