Page 230 of Breathe Like Hell

It looked like a bomb had gone off inside Mason’s apartment.

Black smoke singed every surface, jagged lines of onyx seared into the floors, all the furniture broken. Dust hung in the air, illuminated by dull shafts of light coming through the covered windows. I slowly shut the door behind myself, pushing it back against the splintered frame.

The couch had been ripped open, the coffee table in pieces, the walls battered, glass all over the floor, crunching under my boots as I walked.

“Hello?” I called out quietly.

I crept past the kitchen, staring in horror at the granite slab lying on the floor. It was half of the countertop on the island, snapped clean off. Cabinet doors hung from their hinges and ceramic dishes were nothing more than shards littering every surface. The door of the fridge had been ripped off and bent in half.

Maybe they’d been fighting.

My fingertips brushed a smoky line on the wall, blacker than the paint.

“Mason?”

I continued down the hallway towards his bedroom, tentatively pushing the door open. He was sitting on the end of his bed, surrounded by more wreckage, staring at the floor.

“Mason?”

No response.

I approached him. He was completely motionless, not breathing. And I had no idea how long he’d been like this, how much power he’d accumulated in his body, how strong he would be now.

But I wasn’t weak anymore, wasn’t a breakable human. I was Sigeian. I could help him until Micah got back—or I could try.

I didn’t know how to do it, and I was scared to try, but I wanted to help him if I could. Nervously, I attempted to feel for his emotions, focusing my reach on his skull, standing silently in front of him.

One second, I’d breached his wall, and the next, he was on his feet with his hand around my neck, slamming me against the ground.

I screamed as my skull hit the wood hard enough to dent it, grabbing at Mason’s hand tightening around my throat, every bit of air in my lungs knocked straight out of me. All it took was that one instant inside his head, and I understood more about him than I’d understood over the past many months. It was indescribable.

And I needed Micah. I couldn’t fucking handle Mason alone. Not like this.

“Mason, stop,” I choked out.

“Do you think you can fucking replace him?” he shouted. “Just like that? You’re going to invite yourself into my head and see if you can control me? Guess what, you fucking can’t. You’re never going to be strong enough to do it.”

“I just wanted to help you,” I cried, struggling against the force of his palm on my throat. “Just until Micah gets back, I thought I could try. I thought you would be—proud. I thought⁠—”

“Until Micah gets back? Until Micah gets back?” His voice got louder, his expression more unhinged, his eyes darker. “Micah is dead.”

“What?” I barely breathed out, my eyes wide.

“How do you think you’re still alive? You think he can breathe his entire life force into you to save your life, and the universe is going to let him live through that? He is dead.”

Breathe his entire life force into me?

“He can’t be dead.”

“He can and he is. He died, Dakota. I watched his body burn.”

“No.” I shook my head, tears blurring my vision. My mind kept waiting for the end of the sentence, the part where Mason said something that made sense. “No.”

Mason stood up and stalked away from me. I sat up.

There had to be another explanation.

Micah was hurt.