“Aurora! Wait!”
I go to follow but a hand stops me, gripping my wrist in an iron hold.
My fucking father.
Aurora was devastated that hers passed away. I’m devastated that mine is still alive.
“Let me fucking go,” I snarl.
“How does it feel, losing the woman you love? You never learn your fucking lesson Severin. You’re such a disappointment. I gave you everything! EVERYTHING! And what did I get in return?”
I yank my hand out of his grip and get in his face. “My childhood, my friends, my mother, and my wife. That’s what you got in return! Is that not enough for a selfish bastard like you? But you just can’t leave me alone, can you? God knows I’ve tried to forget you exist and leave you in the past but you finally messed with the one person you weren’t supposed to. You daredto come near my Aurora… You dared to talk to her, to breathe her way and for that? For that…I’ll fucking destroy you, and I’ll do it using your own methods. I’ll apply every valuable lesson you imprinted into my skin from the early days and won’t rest until I burn everything you love and hold dear to your heart. I won’t stop until you are left without a single penny.”
“Go ahead, try, you ungrateful piece of shit,” he spits in my face. “I’ve already lost what I loved most five years ago. And it was because of you. You killed her!” His roar bounced off each stone wall. “You killed my Nastya. You made them give her heart away before she was pronounced brain dead. You gave it toher.” He points his shaky finger to the door where Aurora disappeared.
I step up until we almost nose to nose, look him dead in the eye. “Stop with the fucking theatrics and pointless manipulations. No one in the right mind would believe you loved Nastya. A snake can shed their skin, but a narcissist won’t even try.” He dares to glare at me. “Oh, and I’d do it again and again and again. I’ll skin the whole world alive if that’s what my girl needs. So, stay the fuck away because I’ll make a snake out of you first.”
A whole commotion erupts in the hallway afterward, but I couldn’t care less. The only thought—need—that’s coursing through my blood is to find Aurora. To explain. To make her listen to me. But when I run outside, she’s long gone. None of her sunshine is peeking through the nighttime Manhattan and panic seizes my throat.
I know she’ll go back home to Emett, but I need to find her now. I need her. I wanted to keep her safe from the truth when Ishould’ve told her a long time ago. I just couldn’t bear losing her. And now, I might anyway.
I’m just reaching for my phone to call the driver and start searching for her when it rings in my hand.
Denis’s name flashes on the screen. “I don’t have time for—”
“She’s on the corner of Central Park and West 63rd Street,” he speaks over me, and I immediately understand he means my Aurora.
What I don’t understand is how he knew she ran and followed her.
“How—”
“I told you, Severin, not everything is as it seems,” Denis says ominously and ends the call.
I curse under my breath, promising to get to the bottom of this later.
Way fucking later.
Stuffing the phone in my pocket, I take off north toward Central Park, people and cabs flashing around me like bugs on a summer evening.
I should’ve told her everything sooner. It should’ve come from me, but I didn’t even know where to begin.
Well, you better fucking figure it out right now, Severin.
Street after street blurs through my vision until I reach 63rd and stop dead.
There she is, crouching against the brick wall inside a small courtyard. Her head in her hands as her fingers fisted into the blonde strands of her long-ruined hairstyle. Soft cries carry across the street toward me, and they break yet another piece of my jaded heart.
My sweet Aurora. My lychik.
I fucking hate when she cries because of me.
She doesn’t even notice as I approach. Doesn’t look up at the sound of my footsteps hidden amongst New York noises, so lost in her own mind.
I crouch in front of her, catching a wayward strand of her silky hair between my fingers but she doesn’t jerk away or gasps at a sudden touch because no matter how much she might hate me or not want to see me, her body knows it’s safe here. She knows she’s mine even when she doesn’t want to be.
She knew I’d chase after her.
She knew I’d find her.
