"I'm not."
"You're lying. You're trying to make me stop hunting. You're trying to—"
"I'm trying to save you."
She grabbed my wrists, her grip surprisingly strong, and pulled me toward the chair.
"Look at this. Look at what he did to us. Look at where he brought us when we stopped being useful."
"That's not him. That's—"
"That's exactly who he is. Who he's always been. A man who takes and takes and takes until there's nothing left, and then he moves on to the next one."
"You don't know him."
"I know him better than you ever will."
"You're lying."
"Maybe."
She released my wrists and stepped back.
"But I'm not the only one who's been watching you. There are others. People who want what you know. People who want what you've become."
"What do you want?"
"I want you to stop hunting a ghost. I want you to face the truth. Gabriel is dead. He died in a fire. And you've been killing people for nothing."
No.
The word echoed through my skull, bouncing off the walls, drowning out everything else.
No.
He wasn't dead.
He couldn't be dead.
He'd said he'd come back.
He'd promised.
"You're ready."
For what?
For this?
For finding out that everything I'd done—every kill, every body, every morning I'd woken up with blood on my hands and no memory of how it got there—had been for nothing?
"He's dead."
Rue's voice, echoing.
"He died in a fire."
"You're lying."
