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I’d freed her before I could hurt her far, far worse.
Instead, my bones ached as if they’d splinter.
My eyes stung as if they’d bleed.
And in the end, the sickness in my veins, the sickness of what my family had run from, and the sickness of wanting what I couldn’t have all swelled to fever pitch.
I barely made it to the railing before I threw up.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
*
Nerida
*
(Sea in Korean: Bada)
“NEEDLESS TO SAY, I DIDN’T BELIEVE him when he text me that night. I did what he asked and deleted the messages so my parents would never see, but I didn’t delete what I knew was true between us.
“I let him believe I bought his lies. I didn’t text him back. I waited until Aslan and my parents returned home, gave him a friendly smile and awkward hug, and pretended things were exactly like they always were.
“My parents were none the wiser. Aslan was utterly confused. And I hummed inside because, before he’d been an idiot and tried to convince me he wasn’t in love with me, he’d already confessed his true feelings.”
“By saying he ached for you?” Margot murmured.
“Exactly.” I smiled sadly. “He ached for me.” I shivered just as violently as I did the first time I’d read those words. “You can’t say that to someone and hope to take it back. You can’t say you dream of someone, ache for someone, and think you can rewind time and stop a heartsick girl from tripping into those words. It was already far too late.
“I had no idea, back then, of why he tried to push me away. Of course, I do now. I understand his reasonings and even pity him that he wasn’t successful in convincing me that he wasn’t in love with me because if he had, we both might’ve avoided unbearable pain. But back then...I was young, fanciful, and naïvely hopeful. In the short timeframe from telling me he ached for me, to then rushing to say he wasn’t in love with me...well, I’d already planned our wedding and put on my boxing gloves to take on any bureaucrat who dared get in the way of me having the only boy I ever wanted.”
Dylan cleared his throat, wrenching me from the past with a bone-jarring jolt. “You sound as if he eventually convinced you, though. That he made you believe he didn’t want you.”
“What makes you say that?” I raised an eyebrow.
“Your tone is tight again. Your eyes are dilated.”
I laughed stiffly. “You are rather insightful. Annoyingly so.”
He grinned. “I’m paid to sniff out the truth. I can see yours plain as day.”
“Oh?” I cocked my head. “And what is my truth?”
Dylan glanced at Margot before lowering his voice and murmuring, “I think there’s a lot more to come. I think...I think something happened to you that stole the rest of your childhood. And I think something happened to him. Something that changed both of you.”
Goosebumps cloaked over my entire body. “Like I said. Insightful.”
Dylan leaned back, rubbing his beard-covered jaw. “So...what happened?”
“Don’t rush her,” Margot snipped. “The story has to unfold the way she lived it, not leap forward.”
I smiled at the eager girl, wishing I could pause my tale and live in that intense, skin-scratching newness of angst and want. Instead, the months had passed, the years had followed, and tragedy had come for both of us. And as much as I wanted to rewrite our history, I couldn’t erase what I’d lived through, suffered through. I couldn’t put out the fire that’d burned everything to the ground because then I wouldn’t have risen from the ashes, even if I wasn’t the same girl as before.
“I appreciate your commitment to the full events, Margot, but Dylan is right. Things happened. Things that irrevocably broke both of us. And they’re just around the corner. The easy parts are over, unfortunately. I suppose I have to say goodbye to the light and tread deeper into the darkness that follows.”
“Oh God, you’re going to break my heart, aren’t you?” Margot rubbed her nose. “Is it rude of me to ask for the easy version? The one where Aslan returned, realised he was being an ass and was ridiculously in love with you, took you to his bed, and then announced to the world to do its worst because you were together now and that was all that mattered?”
Dylan rolled his eyes. “There you go again. Making me worry that I should have you committed to some Romance Readers Anonymous. You need help, Margot.”
