“I don’t think you can.”
“What?”
“It’s not about fixing things, Asher. You can’tfixpeople, you know.”
“I know.” I do. I’m proof enough of that. So’s Vlad, though I’d say Grant…
Grant has changed him, maybe. He’s not fixed anything about Vlad, not really.
“I want to help him,” I say.
Iris smiles. She lifts the needle away and sets it down, examining the tattoo for a second. When she raises her patch, I hold perfectly still.
Magic surges over me, moves through me, and my blessing rebels far less than I know it can, as though it’s as invested as I am in hearing her answer.
“That’s something I think you can do,” she says finally. “I’m glad you’ve found someone to care about.”
Chapter Ten
Quinn
BythetimeImake it back to the pack house, I’m in a full-on spiral. Knowing that doesn’t help. If anything, it makes it worse because what if someoneseesme? What if they see the bruises I can feel throbbing under my skin?
I hold my breath when I open the door to the building. I can’t hear anything, but my flat is a couple of floors up, and I can’t trust my senses right now.
They’re getting worse.Everythingis getting worse.
I swallow a whimper and try not to focus on the way my eyes are burning. Should I have let Asher walk me home? Absolutely not. I was seconds away from breaking down on him as it was. He’s already seen me lose tonight. I don’t want him to think even worse of me.
The first set of stairs jostles my ribs, which I know aren’t broken but still hurt. I pause at the foot of the second. I can just about hear voices that are no doubt coming from Kieran and Lucien’s flat. Drew, Sam, and Adam have the one next door, and Ophelia and Dante are across the hall. I think the one they’ve just bought further down will be Vince and Dax’s once they get things together and mate and move in.
That just leaves me at the end, near the stairs going up to the next floor. I suck in a breath and let it out slowly, trying to calm my heart. No running. Sam will already know I’m in the building if he’s here. But if I move with purpose, I might make it inside before anyone thinks to come out of the flat.
On the next breath, I move. I take the stairs quickly but without running or tripping, then stride down the hall, trying to keep all my movements even. My key is already in my hand, and my hand shakes as I push it into the lock. Sweat prickles my scalp. What if Drew comes outside? What if Kieran—
The door to my flat finally unlocks and when it swings open, I let out a sob. I rush inside before any more sound can escape, then shove it shut behind me. I just have to lock it and get to my bedroom because that’s as far away from everyone else as I can be.
That or the bathroom are the only two rooms where I’m absolutelycertainthey can’t hear me.
I lock the door and make it into my bedroom before it really starts. Misery overcomes me all at once—the pain of those hits tonight, sure, but it’s more than that.
I lost. I lost, and Asher saw, and that somehow hurts more than anything else. I shove my face into a pillow, body shaking with each desperate sob. It’s not that, either. It’s all of it. Asher was right. I haven’t told the pack what I’m doing because they won’t understand. Kieran will ask me to see a doctor again and talk about what I went through.
What I went through. Talk about watching my parents die. Talk about how my dad told me it wasn’t my fault seconds before Tamesis tore out his throat. Talk about how my mum sobbed and couldn’t get a word out, and even though I was there, I didn’t say goodbye—
How will thathelp? Tamesis is dead. And talking about how Hale taunted me about it, how he told me I should have made Drew stay, that all my suffering was because Hale had been scorned… That won’t help me, either. He’s dead, too.
They’realldead. Except me.
I roll onto my side. Tears leak down to my ear. That’s the worst of it, sometimes. Why not me? Hale only killed my parents to hurt Drew—he didn’t give a fuck about me. None of them did. So why didn’t he have Tamesis kill me, too?
At least if he had, I wouldn’t be feeling this now. This sick, trapped, desperate need, and I don’t know what it’s for or what to do with it or where—
Someone knocks at the door. The front door, at least, and something in my soul settles that I hear it all the way in the bedroom, but I don’t know if that means that whoever’s there can hear me crying, too.
I put my hand over my mouth, trying to quiet down. I won’t calm, not for a while yet.
Then I hear him. “Quinn?”
