Callista stepped closer. Her eyes, once soft and familiar, were hard now—resolute. “I have to protect you from him, Seph. You’ve been blinded. You don’t see it. You can’t.”
“Then why do I feel safe with him?” I snapped, the words tumbling out like broken glass. “Why does it feel like I can breathe for the first time in years when I’m with him?”
Her laugh was sharp and bitter, cutting through me like ice. “Safe?” she echoed. “You think this is safe? You’re in the eye of the hurricane and you think the silence means protection? He’s dangerous, Seph. He’s always been dangerous.”
She paced the space like a caged animal, her fury building with each step. “This isn’t some tragic romance where love saves the monster. He’s not broken and waiting to be fixed—he’s a predator who’s gotten exactly what he wants.”
Her words struck deep, but they couldn’t erase what I knew. The way Hades looked at me like I was the only thing tethering him to sanity. The way he held me like letting go would kill him. The way he touched me with reverence, like every inch of me mattered.
“He would never hurt me,” I said, but the echo of my own doubt bounced back, hollow and unsure.
Callista stopped pacing. She looked at me with something like pity and rage tangled together. “He already has. Maybe not in ways you can see—but he’s taken everything from you. Your freedom. Your choices.”
I shook my head, but the panic was creeping in, slithering under my skin.
“If I can’t save you from him,” she said, voice quieter now—calmer, but colder, “then I’ll end it myself.”
“What does that mean?” I asked, even though I didn’t want to know. My heart beat faster, like it already knew the answer.
She took a step back. “I tried to do this the gentle way. I thought if I could just make you see—” Her voice cracked before she pulled it back into something sharper. “But you’re too far gone.”
“I’m not—” I tried to say, but she cut me off.
“You are.”
The words landed like a slap.
Her gaze burned into mine. “And if this is what you call love? Then I’ll burn it down before it devours you.”
I stood frozen, pulse thundering as the air thickened—like the walls themselves were holding their breath.
This wasn’t protection anymore.
This was a threat.
And for the first time in my life, I realized: my sister wasn’t here to save me.
She was here to destroy him. And if I didn’t find a way out?
She’d take me down with him.
Panic punched through my ribs like a battering ram the second Clint hesitated. His gaze ping-ponged between me and Callista, like he couldn’t decide which of us he was supposed to save. Like he thought there was still a version of this where we all walked out alive.
There wasn’t.
Not with her.
Callista stepped forward, unnervingly calm, like we weren’t standing in the middle of a goddamn nightmare. Her fingers curled around a gas canister, and she dragged it out from the shadows like it had always been waiting there. Like this had always been the plan.
“No!” I screamed, my voice tearing raw from my throat. “You can’t—Callista, stop!”
But she didn’t even blink. She unscrewed the cap and began pouring it out like she was watering flowers, graceful and terrifying. Gasoline splashed onto the concrete, swirling into sick little puddles around her boots. The stench hit me hard—chemical, caustic, final.
“Callista, please!” I twisted against the restraints cutting into my wrists, steel biting into skin.
The chair groaned beneath me, but it didn’t budge. Smoke slithered in from the back of the warehouse, curling like it was already tasting the air for heat.
“Clint!” I shouted his name like a lifeline, like maybe if I said it loud enough he’d remember who the hell he was. “Do something! Stop her, please—we can’t let this happen!”
