My temper ignites so fast it almost feels good.“You don’t get to decide that.”
“It’s the middle of the night.”
“And vampires famously keep banker’s hours?”
Knox’s nostrils flare again.“You’re exhausted.”
“I’m involved.”
“You’re recovering.”
My vision goes red at the edges.There it is.That fucking word again.
I set the water bottle on the bar very carefully.Too carefully.“Say that one more time.”
His brows draw together.
“Say it,” I dare.“Tell me I’m recovering.Tell me I’m fragile.Tell me I should go home and drink my tea and lie in my soft little bed while all of you big scary monsters handle the ugly things for me.”
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
“It’s exactly what you’re doing,” I accuse.
“I’m trying to keep you alive.”
“I am alive.”The words burst out of me, loud enough to echo through the empty bar.
Knox goes silent.
My chest heaves, my hands shake, and this time I don’t hide them.
“I am alive,” I say again, quieter but no less furious.“Not because someone put me on a shelf.Not because someone wrapped me in blankets and told me not to think about the dark.I am alive because I endured it.Because I survived them.So don’t stand there and treat me like survival made me useless.”
His face changes.Pain moves through his eyes, raw enough to make me regret nothing and everything at once.
“I don’t think you’re useless,” he says.
“Then stop acting like I am.”
“I think you’re human.”
The words are careful, but I hate them anyway.
“And there it is.”
His head tilts.“What?”
“The thing everyone is too polite to say.”I spread my arms.“I’m human.Breakable.Weak.The poor little thing all the monsters have to protect.”
Knox moves before I can blink.Not toward me.To the side.
His fist slams into the brick wall beside the hallway, and the sound cracks through the room like thunder.I jump, and he freezes instantly.
Dust drifts from the wall.A small crater marks the brick where his knuckles hit.Blood beads over the white tape around his hand.
His breathing turns harsh.“Fuck,” he says under his breath.
I stare at the wall.Then at him.He closes his eyes like he can’t bear whatever he expects to see on my face.Fear?Revulsion?Proof that he is exactly the monster he believes himself to be?
