Page 141 of Cold Mercy

“Elizabeth!” I shout in disbelief.

“Oh, relax, I’m married now, the only thrill left in my life is living vicariously through yours.”

I roll my eyes. “If you really need to know,” I say dryly, “I didn’t bring a ruler, but I’m comfortable saying around ten inches.”

Elizabeth just stares at me for a second, slow and deliberate. Then her mouth curves into that dangerous, delighted smile.

“Damn,” she says. “Girl… how are you even walking?”

I groan, covering my face. “Please stop talking.”

I fall backward onto the pillows, clutching my stomach as laughter steals the air from my lungs.

“You’re insane,” I manage between breaths.

“I’m insane?” she shoots back. “Honey, Thomas Reed is insane. In the best way possible, and from the look on your face, he delivered a life-altering religious experience.”

I hide my face again, but she gently pulls my hands away, softer now.

Her hand curls around mine, warm and steady. I rest my head on her shoulder, letting the warmth settle deep.

✽✽✽

By the time I pull into my driveway, the sun has dipped just enough to cover everything in that strange, late-afternoon gloom. The boxes inside my house wait exactly where I left them. Some are sealed, some are half-open, a mess of my life spilling over the edges like I couldn’t decide what to keep and what to burn. I drop my keys on the counter and sink onto the couch, letting the silence fold around me.

His goddamn letter is still in my pocket, but it’s the bracelet I reach for first.

The silver band slips perfectly across my palm, warm from the heat of my skin. I want to believe him. I want to believe every word he wrote, every stupid promise. I intend to believe he’ll show up at my door in a month, luggage in one hand and certainty in the other, ready to choose me. But Thomas is a master of leaving right before things get real. He’s built of exits and unfinished sentences, of slammed doors and things he can’t talk about. His whole life is an escape route, and I’m so tired of being the girl who waits for someone who’s already gone.

The bracelet curls into my palm as I close my hand around it.

The house feels too big for me again, too hollow, too haunted by everything that almost happened and everything that might never happen.

I want him to come back. I really do.

Count the minutes, count the days, lost inside a lonely haze. He’s the poison, he’s the blade, the only home that you have made.

CHAPTER 36

THOMAS

Grace slides into the passenger seat with that same smug confidence she’s worn for years, fingertips tapping the leather like she owns the air between us.

“What do you have for me?” she asks, voice clipped, efficient, already assuming I’m still her loyal dog.

My fingers tighten on the steering wheel while I turn my head slowly, and she finally catches the look in my eyes.

“Do you know,” I begin, tone low enough to scrape bone, “what the only real advantage was of spending half my life on the streets?”

Grace blinks, thrown off.

“Not living under my name, not having a future. Not being allowed to be anything but a weapon on your leash.” I let the words sink in, watching the blood drain from her face. “I’m not talking about the shit you already know, I’m talking about contacts.”

Her brows pull together. “Contacts?”

“Gang families, crime syndicates. People who buy senators and bury federal agents without leaving a fingerprint.” My voice doesn’t rise. “I have connections you don’t want to know exist.”

Grace shifts in her seat. “Are you feeling all right, because—”