Page 23 of Grim’s Angel

I nod.

He returns to the chair beside mine, close enough that his thigh presses against me.

I set the cold pack on the table and answer the call on speaker.

Alan starts shouting before I speak. His voice pours through the phone, loud enough to fill the meeting room. Cyrus Rivers has threatened penalties. The deed will never be released. Mom cannot stop crying. Dad’s blood pressure is dangerously high, although Alan has never displayed enough medical knowledge to locate a pulse.

“You need to go back,” he says. “Call the driver and tell him where you are.”

“The driver tried to kidnap me.”

“You signed the agreement.”

“I changed my mind.”

“You don’t get to change your mind after the money’s been paid.”

The words settle into a cold place inside me.

Then my father takes the phone.

He asks how I could do this to the family. He tells me the house is all they have and that my mother has spent the last hour sobbing. He says Alan made a mistake, as though a mistake is something that happens once rather than a lifetime of choices everyone expects me to repair.

The old ache opens inside me.

For most of my life, I have confused being useful with being loved.

Grim says nothing. He places his open hand on the table between us.

The choice is mine.

I slide my fingers into his.

“Alan gambled away the house,” I tell my father. “Alan gave strangers my photographs, my medical information, and a price for my body. I am done sacrificing myself for the son you refuse to hold responsible.”

My father calls me selfish.

Grim’s hand closes around mine.

“If choosing my own life makes me selfish, then I am selfish,” I say. “This life belongs to me, and I am keeping it.”

I end the call.

For several seconds, I cannot breathe around the grief.

Grim waits.

When I lean toward him, he pulls my chair closer and gathers me against his uninjured side. His arm closes around my back while my face presses into his chest.

“I wanted them to choose me,” I whisper. “Just once, I wanted them to love me too.”

His mouth brushes my hair.

“They taught you to earn love by bleeding for it, Angel.” His voice moves through his chest and into mine. “Their failure to love you right does not make you difficult to love.”

The words break something open.

I grip his shirt and let him hold me until the shaking stops.