Her mouth parts, she blinks, repeatedly. I’ve shocked her.
Then she laughs, and it shatters all thought, and when it fades, she’s smiling at me—at me. I will carve that memory into stone.
But too soon, it’s over.
She catches herself, her lips dropping into their natural pout.
“It’s so hard to stay angry at you.” She looks away, and the warmth she emits cools. Her admission makes my entire body ice-cold.
I don’t know how to respond, so I don’t.
She looks back, searches my face, and I wait patiently for her to continue.
“Why did you hate me so much?” Her question is so quiet I could’ve easily missed it. “When we first met, all those times afterwards. You were always so... cruel. I thought that was just the way enforcers were, but now…”
“I didn’t hate you, Jasmine. I never did.” I never look away, make sure she hears my sincerity. “You believed we were a threat to you and your family.” She nods. “And I believed you were a threat to mine.”
“A threat?” Her brows furrow, she sets her cup down. “How?”
“I thought someone had planted you.” Her brows hitch up at my honest words. “To find someone like you, in a random club, it seemed too coincidental.”
The urge to touch her, to check she’s real, that she’s here with me, that we truly found her that night… it hits so sudden and so hard I slip my hands into the front pocket of my hoodie to restrain them. She notices, but quickly looks back up at me.
“We have many enemies, Jasmine. Each of us.” She swallows at my words. “I’m always wary of anything new, and I always assume the worst. Which is what I did of you.”
“So when you said you’d kill me, you really did mean it?”
The pain those words cause is indescribable. The ache in my spine returns, like my darkness is punishing me for ever letting those sickening thoughts in.
“No,” I say. Her face lines with confusion. “I said it to my unit, I said it to you, but I never… I could never...”
It’s the truth.
I remember my unit’s first heated argument over Jasmine, when I suggested a vote to kill her. Julien and Sai were furious, even then, when we didn’t fully know what she was, even suggesting it filled them with rage.
It made me feel sick.
I had to force the words out, but I refused to let her in, to let this person affect our unit—threaten myfamily. And now…
“When you said you’d kill my family... August.” She watches me when she says that wolf’s name.
Knowing how close they were, feeling his heat on her skin, his scent in her hair—those moments were the worst. When I had to convince myself I didn’t care. Didn’t want her. That she was nothing but a distraction. A weakness.
How wrong I was.
“You said you’d kill the queen, that you’d slaughter everyone…”
“I would have,” I admit, never looking away from her vibrant stare as her eyes widen. “I didn’t trust your family. They were lying to you, they’d kept you hidden, never tried to seek help.”
Her face softens again.
“I thought maybe they were the reason for your mark. I was convinced if you told them that we had removed some of it, they would replace it, give you another…” The thought still makes my darkness stir. “...or hide you from us again.”
“You’re saying that every time you threatened to hurt someone, or kill them, it was because—”
“Even though you were a threat to everything I loved, I would have done anything to stop you being harmed.”
The silence that follows those words will stay with me for eternity.
