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Chapter ten
Him
Toofuckingclose.
He had almost lost her, and for the first time in his memory, something livid lay breathing in his chest. Emotions weren’t something he felt, but he was feeling. Mainly, at himself for not finding her sooner, for taking so long to wrap up loose ends. Also at her, for thinking he would let her go, for even contemplating that she could and he wouldn’t bring her back from the jaws of death itself. It couldn’t have her, nothing could have her, until he released his claim.
If their past had taught them anything, it was that time meant nothing in their relationship. He would wait years for the right time with her, but the fact that she hadn’t had the patience told him two very important things—she was broken more than he had estimated, and he needed to do whatever it took to make her alive again. If she didn’t feel again, the world would cease to be.
Her life wasn’t hers to take.
He looked at where he’d strapped her in the chopper, flying over the city and the fields to the east, taking her where she should have always been.
She moaned in pain, the sound clear in his earpiece through hers, and the vibrations of the sound rippled down his forearms, the sweet aftertaste filling his mouth.
He had missed that. He’d missed her. And he'd almost lost her. That wasn't okay. That wasn't in the vicinity of okay.
As he flew over the dark fields below, he realized what a close call tonight had been—in more ways than one. Tristan Caine had been there, too close, with the rest of his people, and he wasn’t ready for her to go yet. He knew what would happen if she was gone too early. She would find her family, find people who loved her endlessly, find a man who would heal her with love, probably that dog of Dante’s who’d been on her scent for months, or maybe someone else. And maybe they would quieten her demons for a while. But the demons would return. None of them would understand that, understand her, her hell, because none of them had even seen it, much less lived through it. She needed to feel safe to heal, and no one would make her feel safer than he would. Because they had conscience, morals, ethics, and he? He had her.
She could never be anyone else’s. She’d been claimed by a devil in the shadows long before anyone could bring her to light.
And even surrounded by all the love, she would find herself feeling isolated, alone, and wondering if she was too broken to be okay. And he wasn’t okay with that. He had known for a while she had a disposition for self harm, mostly in her thoughts. She hadn’t acted on it as far as he knew before tonight. That had been one of the reasons he’d always dangled the one thing he knew she wanted more than anything—her answers—in front of her as incentives for living, and it had worked for a while. He had to give her something to live for again.
She wasn’t ready to meet her past yet, her mind probably wouldn't be able to handle it all at once, but one day she would be. And that day, he would lay the truth at her feet.
Handling the chopper easily with years of flying experience, he turned right toward the mountains that lined the land before the sea gaped open, heading to the home he had built for them over the years. Flying was one of the only things, beside playing with fire and stalking her, that he enjoyed.
“Am I dead?” the object of his obsession muttered, and he looked back at her, to see her blinking before she passed out again, her short hair sticking out around her beautiful face.
He knew why she’d cut it off, just like he knew why she’d ripped his roses. In her conscious mind, a part of her hated him. But her heart was soft, and it was starved for him, and he would do whatever it took to make her feel for him again.
After what she’d been through at the hands of The Syndicate, after what they'd done just to draw him out, he didn’t blame her for her hatred. But he couldn’t have come out even if he could have found her. It would have unraveled years of careful planning and putting the right pieces in the right spot. One impulsive move from him could have undone it all and gotten everyone, including the family she didn’t even know about, killed.
No, he’d had to choose, and he hadn’t chosen her in the short-term, but she had always been his choice. Everything he’d done for the last six years had been for her, so she could live one day freely without looking over her shoulder all the time.
And after what they had done, The Syndicate was going to fucking burn.
