“That’s right,” I said. “Camille didn’t scream. You know that, don’t you?”
He looked away.
I crouched.
Close. Closer.
“She stayed silent. Even when you made her bleed. Even when you showed her the fire.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t touch her.”
“You didn’t stop it either.”
I reached for his wrist. He tried to pull back. I didn’t let him. The knife carved a line from his palm to the crook of his elbow. He screamed. Not loud. Not enough. I stood.
“But Cloe,” I said. “Cloe screamed.”
He whimpered. His head hung low. Then he lifted it. Just a little.
“She didn’t scream,” he said, voice shaking. “She—she hummed.”
I froze. My grip on the knife tightened. He looked up. Terrified now. But honest.
“She hummed like it was the only thing she had left,” he whispered. “Like it was the only way to keep from begging.”
The room stopped breathing. I turned my head. Just slightly. And I felt it. The collar, still warm in my coat. The echo of her hum in my chest like it had never stopped.
I stepped forward. Knelt beside him again.
“She hummed,”I said.
Now I believed it. Now it lived in my ribs like a second heartbeat. He tried to speak. I didn’t let him. I leaned in, voice low.
“That was the only sound she had left.”
Then I drove the blade into his side. Slow. Measured.
He didn’t scream. Not at first. But when he did, I didn’t stop. Breath was all she had. And now it was mine to take.
Barron
I stood in front of the wreckage of the Lawlor building.
Red and blue lights painted everything in emergency.
Sirens wailed in the distance. The sky hung low, heavy with smoke and the taste of blood in the back of my throat.
Emergency crews rushed in and out through the broken glass and steel, voices shouting names, demands, vitals. But I didn’t move.
Loyal was propped against an ambulance, oxygen mask forgotten in his lap, face pale but eyes still tracking every shadow.
And beside me?—
Royal. His coat was torn. Blood soaked through the left side. But he stood tall. Not a word between us. Not at first. Because there wasn’t anything to say when your empire crumbled around your feet.
Camille’s ledger felt heavier than it should have. I opened it with shaking hands. Page sixty-seven. Halfway down. Marked with a small star in red ink.Continuity.
That was all it said. One word. No amount. No recipient. But I knew what it meant. Continuity meant insurance. Legacy. The idea that what was built wouldn’t end even if the people who built it did. Camille wrote that word like it was a curse.
