“No.”
My head jerks up.
“No?” I repeat hysterically.
“You have to push past the fear.”
Fear?
Fear?
My laugh rings hollow, unhinged even to myself.
“Where are my meds?” I scream. My voice ricochets off the padded walls. “Where the fuck are my meds?”
Tears blur my vision. My hair falls into my face as I bend forward, shaking so hard the restraints creak.
“I can’t do this,” I sob. “I can’t. I can’t.”
I hear Ms. Jonas’s heels clicking lightly on the tiles before she kneels before me.
“Look at me, Serenity.”
I can’t.
My bodyguards linger outside the closed door. I never want them to see me like this. Shattered and broken in the mind.
Weak.
Fractured.
“Nico has no idea who I really am,” I whisper through ragged breaths. “He thinks I’m strong.” My chest caves inward. “I’m not. I’m fucked up in the head. I’ll ruin him. I’ll ruin everything.”
“Serenity—”
“I can never be with him.” Fresh tears slip down my cheeks. “I don’t know how to make him understand that loving me means blood and graves and dead children.”
The room tilts.
My skin feels stretched tight over my bones.
Then—
“Serenity.”
The voice cuts through the chaos.
Deep.
Familiar.
Real.
“Serenity,” Javier says again.
I blink hard.
The padded room fades.
