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WHENHEWOKEUP, there was violence coursing through his veins. Black heat and fire, and the terror of what was to come.
And somewhere, in all of that, something cut through.
I love you.
I love you.
And he looked down and saw his mother, broken and bleeding on the floor.
I love you.
That was the last time he had heard those words. That was the last time. And it tore at him. It made him feel like his chest was nothing more than a bloody wound. It made him feel like nothing in his body was his own.
Except for the pain. The pain was his.
The loss was his.
And in that vision he saw his brother, he saw his father.
And he turned on them.
How dare you!
How dare you trust the wrong people. Look at what you’ve done. Look at what you’ve done to her.
There was pain in his chest and there was nowhere for it to go. There was nothing. Because then he was in a dungeon, and he could not afford to show weakness to his captors. He could give them nothing. He could show no pain. He could never let them know.
No. He could never let them know. And so he pushed everything down. The grief. The pain. The rage.
But it didn’t work. The rage still bubbled over.
He was not in control at all anymore. The years of it melting away as if it had never been.
It was as he’d always known.
Love made him so very weak. Love made it so he could not hold back the tide of pain that lived in his soul.
And he grabbed something, something heavy, and he threw it toward the part of the room he saw his father and brother in.
But then dimly, he heard a voice. The same voice that had said I love you. Not his mother’s.
“Riyaz. Please. Please.”
And he realized it was her. And he wasn’t back with his parents. He wasn’t back in that day. In that space. He was with Brianna.
She had said that she loved him.
His father had failed a woman who loved him. His brother had likewise failed a woman who loved him.
Riyaz had not. Not yet. But it was in his blood, his DNA.
You already have failed her.
You’ve taken her prisoner.
He was holding her in that cell with him, for he had concluded he was still a prisoner. Of all that had come before. Of all the pain and grief and death, and now she was here with him, instead of in that normal, beautiful house she wanted.
He had proven that in fact he was his brother.
