Page 10 of You Were Always Mine
I just didn’t want her — because while she sat on my counter, swinging her perfect legs and giggling into my ear, all I could think about was Scarlett upstairs: hair loose, mouth sharp, eyes that cut me open every time she looked at me. All I could hear was the echo of her door closing, the phantom sound of her breath catching when she saw me in the hall.
Ava could’ve stripped bare in front of me and it wouldn’t have mattered. I’d already chosen my ruin, and she has no idea.
None of them do.
They see Kai Everly and they see a smile, a body, a distraction. But Scarlett? Scarlett sees the monster underneath — and still, she lingers.
I can’t stop picturing it.
Scarlett walking into a café, black dress cutting sharp across her thighs, lips still stained red. Him waiting for her — some faceless bastard sitting at a table, grinning like he has any right. She’ll slide into the chair across from him, tilt her head the way she does when she’s pretending to be interested, tuck her hair behind her ear while he makes her laugh.
I hate him for it. I hate her for it — because I know how she looks when she laughs: head thrown back, throat bared, eyes lit like a dare — and it kills me to think of her giving that to anyone else. I know how her legs cross when she’s nervous, how she fiddles with her rings when she’s lying, how she bites her lip when she’s trying not to say what she wants. He doesn’t know any of that. He doesn’t deserve to.
My hands clench into fists at my sides.
Will he lean across the table, touch her wrist, brush histhumb across her skin like he has the right to claim it? Will she let him? Will she smile back at him like she doesn’t have a monster at home who’d burn the world for her?
I see it too clearly — his hand sliding higher, under the table, fingers skimming the hem of her dress. Scarlett’s breath caught; her thighs pressed together.
The thought makes my chest burn, my vision blur.
No.
No one touches her. No one laughs with her, no one whispers to her, no one gets close enough to breathe her air.
If he tries — if he even looks at her the wrong way — I’ll put him in the ground.
Scarlett thinks she’s walking free, thinks she’s safe in the sunlight, thinks she’s clever slipping out with her secrets. But there’s nowhere she can go I won’t follow. No friend she can hide behind who won’t bleed for daring to stand too close.
Scarlett isn’t theirs.
She’s mine.
Even if she doesn’t know it yet.
The spiral burns too hot, my pulse hammering in my throat until it feels like it’ll split me open. I can’t sit here and wonder. I can’t picture her with him and not know.
I drag my phone out of my pocket, thumb swiping across the screen until the familiar app opens — the one she doesn’t know about, the one I installed months ago when she borrowed my charger and left her phone unlocked. Just a minute was all I needed — a minute to tie her to me forever.
The map loads slowly, each second a knife twisting deeper, and then her name lights up on the screen — a little red pin, pulsingsteadily.
There she is.
I zoom in until the streets sharpen, until I can see exactly where she’s going, exactly where she’s planning to meet him. A café two miles away, tucked on the corner with enormous glass windows and too many shadows. I can almost see her already, sliding into a chair, tossing her hair, licking that red lipstick off her mouth while he watches.
My grip tightens around the phone. My jaw aches from how hard I’m clenching it.
He’s not going to touch her. He’s not even going to get the chance.
I grab my keys from the counter, the metal biting into my palm, and shove my phone back into my pocket — her location still glowing in my mind like a beacon.
Scarlett thinks she’s sneaking off to see her friend.
What she doesn’t know is that I’m already on my way.
Scarlett
The café hums with low chatter, the clink of cups, and the hiss of the espresso machine. Sunlight spills through tall windows, dust motes spinning in the air, and I tell myself this is normal. I’m normal. I’m just a girl meeting a friend for coffee — nothing more, nothing less.
