Page 204 of Boy of Ruin
Me, Jeremiah, Lucifer? We didn’t get that. We never got any of that.
“How fucking could you?” I ask him again, my grip on the knife sweaty, my heart thundering beats of agony in my chest.
Maddox just stares at me, his lips growing pale too.
“You just gave me up?” I ask him, my voice breaking. “You gave me up, and you let them…” I take a shaky breath. “You let them keep Jeremiah in that…that fucking cage?” I search his eyes for any sign of regret. Remorse.
And I think I see it.
His features seem to soften, his brows raised, mouth pulled down into a frown instead of a sneer. His hold on me doesn’t let up, and that gun is still to my belly, but he seems to be…breaking.
“Did you ever regret it?” I whisper quietly, because I have to know. Before one of us dies, I have to know if all that pain he caused me, caused Jeremiah…all in the name of some pedophile ring for a cult with too much fucking power that still felt the need to corrupt the only people that can’t fight back, I need to know if he ever got a bad night’s sleep over it. Over me. Jeremiah. “Ever wish you could take it back?”
He stares at me for a long moment.
I think I know the answer by the haunted look in his eyes. With my hand on his arm, the other on the knife still hilt-deep in his chest, this close to him, I wonder about his own life. Who made him? Was it as bad as who made me? As bad as him? Worse? Where did the 6 start? Did they always want to be monsters, or did they want to change the world once upon a time? When does power corrupt? Is it from the beginning, or does it fester like a slow-moving poison?
How does it ruin?
When?
All these questions racing through my mind, I don’t notice for a second that he’s moved the gun from my belly. I don’t notice until he brings it up to his head and pulls the trigger.
I jump back from him, a scream leaving my throat as I turn away, warm flecks of blood over my face and neck, that knife left behind in his chest.
My stomach cramps are worse, the pain as bad as the pain in my head, in my chest as I try to catch my breath. Arms come around me, and I inhale pine and nicotine, my chest heaving with dry sobs that don’t come out as more than a gasp. No tears, because I’m beyond them.
And not just for Maddox.
But my stomach hurts so bad.
So fucking bad.
I think I might be bleeding, something warm and wet between my thighs and—
“This is all your fucking fault.”
Jeremiah’s words make my blood run cold. I freeze in my husband’s arms as they tighten around me.
I pick my head up, trying to breathe, taking in shallow inhales, panting exhales.
Jeremiah is behind Lucifer, his eyes on me, hard and cold and full of hate. He doesn’t step closer, but I still tense in Lucifer’s arms, my hands balled into fists against his chest.
“This is all your fucking fault.”
And then he moves.
I see him let go of her. Push her to the side.
My pulse is pounding in my head.
I clench my fingers around the knife. Sid thinks she’s the only one who ever went without one.
We both know that pain. The panic of always looking for the next attack. Terror over even the idea of being backed into a corner you can’t get out of.
I won’t let that happen to me again. Or her.
And Maddox might’ve put himself down like a fucking coward, but this asshole is still here. And he’s going to try to take her from me again.
