1: plated food left waiting too long at the pass, going cold and ruined.
2: watching the woman you love fall apart on the other side of the glass.
So that’s the question. Will you help me?
Fuck, I’ve never sounded so pathetic in my whole fucking life. But what am I these days if not a pathetic man? Everything I’ve ever worked for has been ripped away from me, one bit at a time, and all that’s left is a raw, bleeding mess where Bastian Hale used to be.
And now, that raw, bleeding mess has found itself standing in front of one of its greatest mistakes and asking—no, begging—no,groveling—for her help.
She doesn’t answer. Not right away. There’s a silence between us that carries a different quality than any of the silences that we’ve ever shared before. This silence hasfangs.
And in that silence, I look at her.
Eliana stands with her back against the door, one hand still gripping the frame like it’s the only thing keeping her upright. The charcoal button-down she wore to my funeral hangs open. The thin white undershirt beneath it is damp with sweat and hangs too loosely on her frame. I see the hint of her rib cage, like a starved alley cat. Her hair, longer than I remember and much wilder, falls around her face in dark waves that she hasn’t bothered to tame.
But it’s her eyes that destroy me.
They’re open, staring somewhere past my left shoulder, unfocused. The rich hazel hue I used to get lost in has gone cloudy at the edges, milky in a way that confirms what I already knew from watching her navigate the apartment as I stood in the darkness and waited for her: She can’t see me anymore.
The ninety days have passed. The blindness won, just like the doctors said it would.
She looks so thin. Exhausted. There are shadows under those unseeing eyes that speak to sleepless nights and stress I can’t begin to fathom.
And she’s never looked more beautiful.
Or more breakable.
Christ. What the hell have I done to her?
She still hasn’t spoken. The more time that passes without a reply, the more I hate myself for ever even asking the question. What was I thinking?How dare you,she asked over and over, and she’s right—how dare I? Haven’t I taken enough from this woman? When is it too much?
It became too much a long fucking time ago,sneers a vicious voice in my head.You knew that then, and it didn’t stop you from doing what you always do: taking more, more, more.
Finally, Eliana releases an exhale that signals the end of this godawful purgatory of silence. I watch her throat bob as she swallows. With trembling fingers, she combs flyaways out of her face.
I don’t bother hoping. I gave that shit up the day I embraced my brother at the foot of Project Olympus. But I do wonder if maybe there is a way out of the darkness. A way into the light. If she’ll give me her hand and show me it can be done.
But as soon as the first syllable leaves her lips, that not-a-hope gets snuffed the fuck out.
“No.”
She might as well have stabbed me in the gut.
“No?” I breathe back stupidly.
“You heard me,” she says. “It’s a word you’re awfully familiar with, isn’t it? No. N-O. I’m not standing here and letting you manipulate me again, Bastian. I’m sick of your lies. More importantly, I’m done with them.”
“This isn’t manipulation. Sage is?—”
“Stop.” She holds up a hand that freezes me dead in my tracks. “You think you can just show up here, after everything, and I’ll fall in line because you need something? Because you’ve decidednowis when you need my help?”
I open my mouth to argue, but she’s not finished.
“You made your choices, Bastian. Every single one of them. Youchoseto work for your brother. Youchoseto kill that man. Youchoseto fake your death and let me mourn you.” Her unseeing eyes are all the more haunting, because she still sees everything that matters. “And now, you’re choosing to drag me back into your mess because it’s convenient for you. So, no. No, no, no. The answer is no a million times over.”
“If you’ll just let me explain—” I try again. “Aleksei left me no choice. Sage’s life?—”
“I don’t care.”
