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“I didn’t think I wanted to know,” he says, finally. “Havoc Boys…we’re all in this for the power—the status—that’s really the only reason anyone does anything in life. I didn’t think I cared where the lines got drawn, as long as I got what I needed out of it. But ever since you showed up, I can’t stop thinking about things that used to be easy to ignore. You make them impossible to ignore.”
When he stares at me again, my body reacts with primal intent. His gaze lingers over the bruises on my face before trailing down the outline of my body under the blanket.
There is fire in that gaze.
My skin heats, my heart speeds up and there is absolutely nothing I can do about it. The butterflies in my stomach have razor-sharp wings.
It hurts when he looks at me, but I don’t want it to stop.
I have to steel myself against the rising tide of emotion because it’s a trick. It has always been a trick. “You humiliated me.”
“I humiliated Olivia,” he counters with a sigh.
“It’s the same thing and you know it.”
“Playing that video wasn’t even my idea.”
“If you think that makes any difference, you’re not the guy I thought you were. Instigator or bystander, you were still a part of it.” I struggle out from the under the blankets, kicking them away so I can sit up. If we’re going to have this conversation, I will not do it while lying in bed like a weakling. “I’m not the talking cricket on your shoulder and I don’t want to be. Grow a conscience or grow a pair, whatever it takes. I’ve fucked up in about a dozen different ways, but I’m here to do the right thing because that’s the kind of person I want to be. Who the fuck are you going to be, Drake Van Koch?”
He abruptly stands from the chair, putting his face in the shaft of moonlight coming through the window. Light briefly shines on his face like the glow of an angel’s halo.
Or the blinding heat of demon fire.
But that’s the eternal question, isn’t it?
How do you tell the difference between righteous vengeance of an angel and the deceitful manipulation of a demon?
In the end, intent is the only thing that matters.
I take a shaking breath, silently willing him to be what I know he can be. “I know you want the truth as much as I do. You can help me. We could do this together.”
Drake abruptly stands, towering over the bed as he stares down at me like some wrathful god. Then the angry expression on his face cracks into something else. I catch a glimpse of the little boy who was born innocent before the world forced him to become something stronger and darker.
He stands on the edge of an abyss, faced with the choice to retreat or cast himself into the void and be transformed.
I might want vengeance, but what both of us truly need is redemption.
As I watch, his expression closes down into the cold, familiar mask. It’s the same mask he wore when that video of Olivia played on the wall behind him and he called me a slut in front of a hundred people. The tenderness that I’d seen flash through his eyes is locked away as if it never even existed.
I blink away angry tears as the door slams shut behind him.
Chapter Three
The moment that the door closes behind me, I collapse against the wall. My knees give out and I struggle to keep myself upright. A swelling rush moves through my chest, making it nearly impossible to breathe. The world around me narrows into a pinprick.
I’ve never had a panic attack before, but I wonder if this is what the start of one feels like.
It took every ounce of my willpower to walk out of that room, to listen to her beg me for help and just walk away.
Evangeline cannot go back to St. Bart’s.
And the only way she’ll leave is if she thinks there’s nothing left for her there.
It’s such a fucking cliche and I know it. After all the things I’ve seen and heard that haven’t gotten under my skin, seeing Evangeline like that is finally what makes me say enough. Her victimization shouldn’t be my damn kryptonite when I’ve already overlooked so much.
But that doesn’t stop it from being true, even if I’m more than a little disgusted with myself.
I think I might just be in love with her, which is why she has to believe I feel anything but that.
