Page 95 of Roses & Ruin

“Dee?” Hayden looks up at Delia, and he stiffens. The most heartbreaking cycle of emotions ripple across his face. Betrayal. Agony. And unmitigated wrath. “You’re fucking with me.” He struggles against the handcuffs. The metal links groan, but they don’t break. He’s too weak from the holy water. “You’re not serious right now. This is a sick joke.”

Delia drops slowly to a squat, dark mirth twitching on her face as she grabs Hayden’s chin and pulls his face close. Steam rises where the holy water touches her, but she barely flinches. I don’t want to know how many humans she’s drained to get this powerful.

“I assure you, Hayden,” she says, cold and silky. “This is the most serious you’ve ever seen me. You took away Nico, and, well”—Delia’s eyes slide over to me—“an eye for an eye and all that.”

“I’ll kill you.” Hayden breathes raggedly as he fights his handcuffs. His fangs flare, and the metal edges of the cuffs dig deeper into his wrists until I see a white flash of bone. “I’ll fucking kill you, Delia. I swear on all of Rose’s graves, I—”

Delia throws her head back and laughs. Outside the church, I hear the snowstorm gather into a blizzard, the wind shockingly loud.

“If you kill me,” Delia says simply, “all of Rose’s reincarnations end. Her fate is tied to mine. Kill me, and you kill her too—forever.”

Hayden goes still, his face clouding, horror dawning. His eyes snap to me, wide with terror. “No,” he rasps. “Delia, no. Please.”

“Ah, begging.” Delia’s eyes fall shut, savoring. “Who knew you did it so well?” She squints an eye open at me. “You ever get him to beg?”

Having one of Delia’s eyes on me jolts me back to life. I fling the knife across the stone floor, scrabbling back from Delia, awkward and one-handed. She faux pouts, tutting, like I’m a naughty child who’s just shoved away her vegetables.

Delia rises to her feet, eyes steady on me, and for a moment, I’m sure she’s going to fly to the knife and bring it back to me. What she does is much, much worse.

Rosie, says her voice in my head, go pick up the knife.

I squeeze my eyes shut, my hands flying to my temples. I have to fight it. I have to. But my heartbeat’s suddenly flying. Every muscle is cramping. All I want to do, all I have ever wanted to do, is go pick up that knife.

Ooh, look at you fighting it, says the delicious voice in my head. I’m impressed. But you’ll feel way better if you just go pick it up. Come on, it’ll fix everything if you go pick up that knife.

When I blink open my eyes, I’m standing in front of Hayden, gripping the knife in my hand. Delia crinkles her nose delightedly at me. Hayden’s looking up at me, shaking his head, terrified.

I tell myself to drop the knife. I try and make my hand relax, my fingers splay. I can’t do it. My body won’t obey me.

Rose, says the voice in my head, slice open your cheek.

“Hayden,” I grit out, my hand tremulous as I bring the tip of the knife to my face. “Don’t look.”

Hayden’s eyes are huge, panicked. He gasps raggedly, writhing against his cuffs so hard, I hear a sickening snap that is certainly either tendon or bone.

“Please, Delia,” he whimpers. I’ve never heard his voice sound so desperate. So broken. “Please, I swear to god, I’ll do anything. You can do whatever you want to me, but please, no, not her—” His pleas break off into a scream when I sink the knife into my cheek.

Every cell in my body, every atom of my existence is raging like a bucking bull to unseat Delia’s control on my mind. My nails dig into my palm so hard I’m breaking skin. I can feel the warm wet of blood filling my hand, filling my mouth from how hard I’m biting my tongue.

But it’s not enough.

In a painstaking, halting drag, while Hayden watches and screams, I slice open my own cheek.

“Rose,” Hayden sobs. “Rose, I’m so sorry.”

“Aw, you hear that? He’s sorry.” Delia sidles up next me, brushing my hair tenderly out of the sticky heat of my blood.

I can’t talk. Can’t move. The knife’s shaking where it’s still buried in my jaw, the pain terrible, exquisite, but somehow, not as bloodcurdling as Hayden’s broken pleas to Delia.

Hayden pushes himself up to his knees, blood pooling on the stone from his ankles and wrists, his eyes burning.

“Come on,” he grits out through his fangs. “Name it. It’s yours. What do you want, Delia?”

Delia stares at him, a venomous glee bleeding into her features.

“Excellent question,” she murmurs. “What do I want? I thought it was to end this. Tonight. Now. Be done with it. But this?” Her dark eyes flick between Hayden and me. “This is delicious. Gourmet. I could feast on this for years, Hayden, and still be hungry. So I’m thinking…let’s see how long we can keep this sick little trio going, shall we? Maybe I’ll have her cut off her fingers, one knuckle at a time—what do you think, Rose? Maybe I’ll reattach them. Have you slice them off, Hayden. Maybe I’ll let you heal over and over until your face is unrecognizable, until you have no arms or legs or ears or nose or lips. Yes, that’s what I want.”

“You should know something, Delia.” Hayden’s voice is cold. The pleading is gone. “Nico? Yeah. He died like a little bitch.” Hayden’s fangs are bared, all trace of terror gone: a change in tactic. A risky one.