Page 114 of Pray for Scars
I think she knows how to break my fucking heart. How to make sure that no matter how close we get, no matter how our hate might twist into a fucked-up kind of love, she’ll never be tied to me in any permanent way.
But as I clasp her hand in mine, and I feel the pain of the binding mark on my palm, I know that no matter what, she already is.
She might not know it. She might not understand the significance ofCoagula, but it means that only death can separate us.
And there’s something else, too.
She might not know how to love me. But as I pull her onto my lap, her arms going around my back, squeezing me to her, letting her tears fall against my skin as I draw circles down her spine, I know that I already know.
“I love you, Sid,” I whisper against her ear, “and I don’t need to hear it back. But I need you to know it. I might not be very good at it, but I love you, and I think I always have.”
She nods her head and wraps her arms just a little tighter around me, as if she really won’t ever let go.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Two Weeks Later
“Why’d it stop?”I take a sip from my drink, wished it burned down my throat. But it’s just plain ass water.
I feel him glance at me but then he stares back out at the woods beyond his—our—fence, past the screened in porch. Inside, behind us, his friends are here, the music is loud—Little One,Highly Suspect—and the drinks are flowing.
Normal things that happen when two people get married.
But we’re not normal.
So even though we’re the newlyweds, we’re not inside.
“Why didwhatstop, Sid?”
The way he asks the question, I know he knows what I mean.
Fuck it. I finish my drink, set the plastic cup beside me on the little glass table by the railings before the screen of the porch.
“Your stepmom.” I don’t look at him.
He scoffs. “Why’d your foster dads stop?” he counters, anger in his words. Spite, too.
They didn’t. Not until I killed them.
But if he wants to play this game…
“It was too much work.” I keep my eyes straight ahead.
There’s a beat of silence and then,“What.”
We haven’t spoken much about it. We should, but I haven’t wanted to. Neither has he. He knows though, all of the men that tarnished me. He knows, because he saw the records. Saw I killed some. And the rest…well, their bodies were hanging in that warehouse. His doing.
I shrug. “How did you know about that anyway?” I ask, switching gears. “Before, with…” I trail off, not mentioning Jeremiah.
He hates Jeremiah.
But he knows what I’m talking about.
“Fuck how I know about it. What do you mean,too much work?”He mocks me, and I can hear the anger building in his question.
I don’t say a word.
“Lilith,” he manages to say, voice thick with emotion. “Look at me.”
