The sensation slams into me like a tidal wave.
My breath hitches. My head spins. It’s there—his soul, his essence, whatever the hell you want to call it. And it’s so much more than I expected.
It’s not cold. It’s not empty.
Itburns.
I gasp, my grip tightening involuntarily. I brace myself for darkness, for something cruel and jagged—like his murder count, his manipulation tactics, the way he looks at me like he wants something he shouldn’t. But that’s not it at all.
His soul isn’t monstrous.
It’sfurious.
Not just anger. Not just vengeance. No, this is the raging, biblical, fire-and-brimstone, entire-city-gets-smote-from-the-sky type of wrath. The kind that’s been burning so long it doesn’t even know what calm feels like anymore.
And buried within that wrath, in the very eye of it—
Grief.
A deep, aching grief that should’ve faded a long time ago but still hasn’t. Because Nathaniel can’t let go. He can’t forget. And somewhere inside, he’s still that boy who lost his mother. The boy who thought he could make a difference, only to find out the people meant to save lives were the ones taking them. The boy who once believed in something, before it all fell apart.
I feel every bit of it.
And it feels like drowning.
I rip my hand away, staggering back so fast I nearly fall. My whole body shakes. My breath is ragged. My chest hurts—phantom pain, impossible pain because I don’t even have a heart anymore and yet somehow it’s hammering in my ribs like it’s trying to escape.
Nathaniel is still standing there, watching me. His face is unreadable, but his fingers twitch at his sides, like he’s debatingwhether to reach for me again or just let me marinate in whatever the hell I just experienced.
“Did you see it?” he asks, voice smooth, too damn collected for a man whose soul feels like an open wound.
I don't answer. I don't knowhowto answer. Did I feel his crimes? What I felt didn't feel like crimes at all. His karma is negative, sure, but… it wasn’tugly.
“Well?” he prompts.
How the hell can he be so goddamn collected when inside he's a walking tragedy?
I drag in a breath, force myself to focus.
He’s a bad man, Skye. He trapped you against your will.
“I saw… you,” I admit. “But I took my hand away so fast, I…”
Something flickers across his face. There, then gone.
“Try doing it again,” he says. “From afar.”
I shake my head, trying to push past the residual ache in my chest.
“Give me a minute. That was—” I cut myself off, rubbing a hand over my face. “That was a lot.”
“I bet there’s more where that came from,” he says.
I freeze. Excuse me?
That sounded suspiciously like a joke.
“It’s not funny,” I argue.
