Page 38 of You Were Always Mine
My hands are shaking, my throat raw, but I drive the blade deeper, because I need to hurt him like he’s been tearing me apart piece by piece.
‘Stop acting like you own me. Stop acting like you care. You don’t — you never did.’
The words hang heavy in the air, vibrating with everything I don’t mean and everything I do, and for a heartbeat he looks like I’ve gutted him.
The silence lasts one beat too long — long enough for me to believe maybe I’d finally cut him deep enough to make him leave.
Then he moves.
Fast. Brutal.
His hand slams against the wall by my head, the crack making me flinch, and then he’s in my space — chest to chest — his other hand clamping around my wrist and pinning it above me.
‘You think I don’t fucking want you?’ His voice is a growl, torn raw, like he’s bleeding it out of himself. His breath scorches my cheek, his forehead pressed hard to mine, shaking with fury.
‘You think I can breathe when you look at someone else? That I don’t lie awake at night replaying every time you smiled at him instead of me?’
His grip tightens on my wrist — not enough to bruise, but enough to remind me he could if he wanted to. His body cages mine, his lips brushing close without taking, his whole frame trembling like he’s barely holding himself back.
‘I don’t get to just be your brother any more, Scar,’ he hisses, voice breaking. ‘You ruined that. You fucking ruined me.’
And for the first time, I see it — the crack beneath all his cold. The truth he’s been trying to bury — raw, violent, trembling right in front of me.
The words hit harder than his grip, harder than the wall behind me. My chest caves before I can stop it, my mouth twisting, the anger breaking into something uglier — something I can’t hold down any more.
Tears spill fast — hot, blinding — and I hate it. I hate that he sees me like this: ruined, small, weak.
‘Kai…’ My voice shatters, and then I’m sobbing, my body trembling against the wall he’s pinned me to.
His whole expression changes. The fury stays, but it twists — gutted — like my tears are worse than any blade I could’ve driven into him.
‘Fuck, Scar…’ His voice breaks, low and sharp, and suddenly his hand is off my wrist, dragging down to my face. His thumb brushes under my eyes, wiping away the wetness even as more spills over.
‘Don’t cry for me,’ he whispers, fierce, his breath hot against my mouth. ‘Don’t fucking cry, Scar. I don’t deserve your fucking tears.’
But his hand won’t stop moving — tracing my cheek, catching every tear — like he can’t help himself. His forehead presses harder to mine, his jaw tight, his chest heaving with the same wreck I feel tearing through me.
I choke on another sob, and he curses again under his breath — his thumb dragging over my lips this time like he wants to swallow the sound.
For a moment I think he’s going to break with me — stay pressed against me until I fall apart completely. His thumb trembles on my lips, his forehead branded against mine, his breath ragged like he’s choking on something he can’t spit out.
Then — suddenly — he’s gone.
He rips his hand from my face like I burned him, stepping back so fast the air feels like it collapses around me. The loss knocks me harder than the wall ever did.
His chest is heaving, his fists clenched at his sides, his eyes wild and hollow all at once. He can’t even look at me.
‘Fuck,’ he mutters, dragging both hands through his hair, pacing once like he’s going to punch the wall butdoesn’t. ‘I shouldn’t—’ His voice cuts off, jagged, then sharper: ‘I can’t?—’
I’m still shaking, pressed against the wall, tears streaking hot down my cheeks, my throat raw from sobbing. My body screams for him to come back even as my mind begs for distance.
Finally, he spits the words like poison, his voice low, hoarse.
‘This — whatever the fuck this is — it ends here.’
He doesn’t wait for me to answer. He doesn’t even glance back. He just storms out, slamming the door so hard the frame rattles — leaving me alone in the silence, my body still trembling with the ghost of his hands.
Scarlett
