Page 400 of Power Play

Charm shoved my chest. “You make one terrified moment bigger than everything else we were.”

I caught her hand before she could do it again. “It was big enough to kill everything we were.”

“You decided that.”

“You confirmed it.”

“No, Ryan. You needed one person to love you perfectly because everyone else failed you, and the second I proved I was human, you turned me into another name on the list.”

“You want to call what happened human? Fine. I’m human too, Charm. I get to have a point where love isn’t enough.”

“You get anger and rage. You get to kiss me just to hurt me, fight your best friend, disappear, choose a city because I’ve never touched it, and call all of it survival. I froze for one moment after twenty-three years of being trained to obey my father, and you call it betrayal.”

“It was betrayal of the worst kind.”

“And what do you call what you did to me in this lodge?”

“Consequences.”

“A punishment.”

“Yes.”

“Say it.”

“I punished you.”

Her eyes burned into mine. “Did it help?”

“No.”

“Did it make you stop loving me?”

“No.”

“Did it make you trust me again?”

“No.”

“Then what did it do?”

“It made you hurt.”

Her palm cracked across my cheek, snapping my head to the side. The lodge went silent except for our breathing.

Charm stared at the red mark spreading across my face like she couldn’t believe she’d done it. I turned back slowly, the sting from her hand mixing with the bruise already beneath my eye.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Don’t.”

“I shouldn’t have—”

“Don’t you fucking apologize now.”

“You said you wanted to hurt me.”

“I did.”