Page 133 of Shattered In Darkness

Brody goes stone-still. Not one muscle moves. Even the blood at his temple freezes, thick and black. He doesn’t speak. He just stares, through me, through the wall, through the years we lost. His fists are tight enough to crack bone.

He turns, like he might put it all through the wall, then stares back at me. “You never had to prove anything to me. I should have known. I should have burned the world down for you sooner.”

My voice comes out a ragged whisper. “I thought you’d hate me.” The rest is just breath. “I thought if I told you, you’d hate me.”

Brody’s not listening to that. He kneels, grabs my face in both hands and put his forehead to mine. Skin to skin, eyes to eyes. His hands are big enough to blot out the world.

“I don’t hate you. Not anymore. I hate him. And I hate myself for ever believing it was you. For walking away.” He takes a deep breath. “You survived what would’ve killed anyone else. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you then, but I fucking swear, no one’s ever touching you again.”

He pulls me in. There’s nothing left to hold back. His chest is all heat, and I press my face into the fabric and just let go. The tears are silent; I can’t breathe around them. I tremble in his arms, breaking apart, but Brody just holds tighter. Like he could squeeze the poison out of me.

He smooths my hair back, fingers shaking, blood and snow and tears mixing together. His mouth is at my ear. “My Lola. My Bambi. Mine.”

He kisses me. It’s not sweet. It’s what’s always been between us, the violence and the heat and the need. He wipes my cheeks with his thumb, then checks the gun again. He’s bleeding worse than before, but he pays it no mind.

I can see through a crack in the wall, out into the blue-black dark.

Brody holds me there, both arms tight around my ribs. Nothing gentle. Nothing safe. Just the promise of ruin.

“You’re my Bambi,” he says into my hair. “My eternal light. The only good thing in this rotten world.”

His arms stay locked around me, so tight I can’t tell where the bruises end and the comfort begins. I can feel his breath, rough against my ear, his body trembling with the violence he’s holding back.

Outside, snow rips sideways across the world. Obliterating all traces of blood, tracks, what we were before this moment. Inside, we are the only thing left alive, two animals clinging to each other, desperate and wild.

He pulls back just enough to stare down at me, his face a map of pain and hunger and longing. Blood spatters his cheek, matting his hair, but there’s nothing human in his eyes. Just that endless dark, the look of a man who would burn down heaven for a single taste of salvation.

I reach up, tracing the bruise at his jaw, fingers shaking. “You’re hurt,” I whisper.

He catches my wrist, presses my palm to his mouth. “Not enough to stop me. Not for you.”

I want to tell him to let go, to run, to save himself. I want to tell him he’s become everything I feared and everything I craved. But my mouth won’t open. The words die, strangled by hope and terror both.

Brody’s hands wander. Over my throat, my collarbone, my ribs, as if checking for breaks again. As if making sure nothing has been taken from him. He kisses the hollow of my neck, teeth grazing, tongue rough.

“You’re mine,” he chokes out. “I will never let him touch you again. I’d kill a thousand men before I ever let you go.”

The heat of him devours me. I pull him closer by his shirt.

He crushes his mouth to mine again. His kiss is savage. I kiss him back like I’m starving, like I’ve been dying for this all my life. His hands slip under the coat, palm flat against my bare skin. I gasp, not from cold, but from the way he holds me. Possessive, worshipping, as if he could anchor himself here and never drift again.

He drags his mouth over my throat and bites down hard enough to leave a mark. “I should have killed him sooner,” he says, voice breaking. “I should have burned this world for you.”

I arch into him, trembling. “You did. You’re here.”

He shudders, his whole frame wracked with it. “Nothing will hurt you again. Not while I breathe. Not while I’m alive.”

His hands find mine, our fingers lacing together, tight enough to hurt. Our bodies tangle, desperate, hungry, as if we can make something holy out of all this devastation. He buries his face in my neck and I feel the wetness of his tears, the weight of all those years lost. For this moment, there is no one but us. The rest of the world can drown in snow and silence. Only Brody’s voice matters.

“My Bambi. My Lola. Mine.”

I believe him, because loving him has always been an act of survival, an act of damnation. A darkness I’ll never outrun.

We don’t talk about what Marcus made us do, and what he did to us in that warehouse. We don’t need to. Those memories will be painted into our skulls for the rest of our lives, and we have to live with it.

But, we are free, and that’s what matters.

Outside, through the broken boards, a pair of headlights knifes through the darkness. Closer, closer. Twin points of judgment, crawling across the snow.