I held his eyes, wondering if I should rebel against such an order.
After everything that’d happened today.
After all the things we’d said and felt—
But in the end, I accepted defeat and left.
I also took that awful knife with me...just because he told me to.
Chapter Thirty-Three
I STOOD ON THE ROOF OF the highest tower.
Rain soaked into my clothes as I held my face to the sky. Below me, the braziers and torches of Cinderkeep burned in perpetuity, thanks to Brimstone Industries’ patented volcanic energy.
I’d feared I would live here until they either broke me, cloned me, or I died of natural old age.
But...I finally had hope.
That delicious, sickening emotion I’d completely forgotten about now burned right alongside the pain of the vitalsync core.
Except...hope somehow hadhername.
She was meant to be nothing more than a tool. A blessing I hadn’t expected to find that could somehow quiet the static in my head, ease the fire in my blood, and give me just enough strength to get the fuck out of here.
But she kept confusing me,choosingme...
Was she telling the truth that she wouldn’t trade my secrets for money? Was it real when she got angry on my behalf?
Or was it fake?
Because having her defend me? Hearing her confess that she wouldn’t betray me...
Fuck, that did something to me.
If shewasreal—if she truly was on my side—she was quite possibly the most terrifying thing to ever happen to me because what if I began to believe it?
Only for it all to be a lie?
I could already feel my sanity threatening to crack.
The despair she delivered each time she did something nice for me made me beg for Marcus to have given her to me sooner—to never have known how awful life could be all by myself.
But it also paralysed me because if I got used to her—if I started tofeel...and it all turned out to be nothing more than another game...
Fuck.
I should get rid of her myself.
I should kill her, so she never had the opportunity to hurt me.
Out of everyone who’d ever abused, tortured, and controlled me, she could be the worst.
I couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Couldn’t stop wanting things, needing things, craving things—
She’s dangerous.
