“Who did this to you?” he growled, low and guttural — like it was pulled from the deepest part of him.
I didn’t have to answer. He already knew.
He looked over me — the bruises on my arms, the faint bloodstains on my sleeves, the raw marks from restraint straps — and his jaw clenched so tight I thought it might break.
I reached for him, finally, clutching his shirt like it was the only thing tethering me to the world.
“I thought— I didn’t think anyone was coming,” I whispered.
He pulled me into his arms without a word, holding me like I was something precious. Like I hadn’t been used, or broken, or nearly erased.
“I would burn the world for you,” he murmured into my hair. “Don’t you ever think otherwise.”
And for the first time in days, I let myselfbreathe.
Because I wasn’t alone anymore.
And the storm had finally come for me.
Noah
I wasn’t just angry.
I was beyond rage, past reason, walking straight intoruin.
I stood in the hallway outside the room I just pulled Liz from, my fists still bloodied, gun back in hand, breathing like a man who barely had a hold on himself.
I had never wanted to kill someone more in mylife.
Every mark on her body burned into my memory. Every bruise he put on her. Every injection. Every tear.
He hurt her.
He touchedwhat was mine.
And now I was going to make him bleed.
I checked the mag, reloaded, racked it with a snap, and turned toward the far corridor—toward the place he was hiding like the coward he is.
I didn’t hear her footsteps until she was behind me.
“Noah—wait.”
I turned, and there she was, still pale, eyes red-rimmed from crying, but standing tall in that tattered gown. She looked like a storm that had survived the sea.
“You don’t have to do this alone.”
“Yes, I do.” I stepped toward her. “Because if I don’t finish this—if I let him walk—then what he did to you, what he tried to turn you into, willneverbe over.”
“Noah, please—”
“He hurt you, Liz,” I snapped, the words like shards of glass in my mouth. “You have no idea what it did to me to see you like that. I thought—” My voice cracked. I swallowed it down. “I thought I’d lost you.”
Her eyes softened, and she stepped closer.
“I’m coming with you.”
“No,” I said instantly. “You’ve been through enough.”
