Page 76 of Godless Saints

I’m coming to Aster.

Moonshine, please pick up the phone.

Tell me where you are.

Please.

Missed calls. Another one vibrating hard against my palm right now.

My hand shook so badly I almost dropped the fucking thing. I answered on pure instinct, pressed it to my ear, heard his wrecked voice growl.

“Moon—”

and hung up like it hurt me. Tears welled hot in my eyes. Fuck. Fuck.

I started typing with shaking fingers.

Goodbye.

Stared at it. Deleted it. Typed it again.

Goodbye.

Sent.

Then I blocked his number. Deleted him completely. My thumb hovered over the chat. His stupid Korean practice. The proof I let him in. I deleted the entire thread, blocking the only person who ever made me stop performing while my chest cracked open.

Aleksei’s warning slammed back into me.

Stay away from him.

The only place my body ever stopped bracing was in his arms. That wasn’t real. The second anyone looked too closely, he would choose me in the most public, most catastrophic way possible and drag both our names through the fire.

I needed to wake the fuck up.

I locked the phone. The screen went black. No more late night texts. No more sneaking around. No more Cillian.

A tear slipped down my cheek. Fuck. Why am I crying. Blood crusted under my nails. His name burned behind my teeth.

I opened my bedroom door. Aster’s dead quiet closed around me. Then I went inside alone and locked the door before I could run back.

CHAPTER 19

CILLIAN

Six weeks. Three days. Nine hours. My thumbnail had carved grooves into the chair arm, matching the ones Moon left under my skin. Misha noticed on day forty-five.

“That makes you look unstable,” he said around a mouthful of toast.

“You stole my phone.”

“Lesha stole your phone.”

“You fucking helped.”

Misha rolled his eyes and went back to his breakfast.

I leaned forward, elbows on my knees, and smiled the kind of smile that made people nervous. “For the record, that makes you legally responsible for whatever happens next.”