“I said no!” She’s crying now, full-on sobbing while still keeping pressure on my leg. “You’re not doing this. You’re not trading yourself. I won’t let you.”
“He’s a person, remember, Parker. He gets to make his own choices,” Aria says.
The room is spinning. Blood loss making everything feel distant, unreal.
I look at Parker. At her sea-glass eyes filled with tears and fury and desperation.
At Charles, my boss, my friend, the man I’ve served for years.
At Jace and Cal, my brothers in everything but blood.
At the life I thought I could have. The family I thought I could be part of.
“Silas,” Cal says quietly. “Don’t.”
“You have thirty seconds,” Aria says. “Then I trigger it anyway and we all lose.”
Parker’s hands tighten on my leg. On the gun she’s still holding on Aria.
In my head, that familiar voice starts talking. The one that’s been there since I was seven. Since my parents put me in the pit against a neighbor kid for more liquor money. Since they decided I was too broken to be anything but a weapon.
This is what you’re good for. This is all you’ve ever been good for.
I look at Parker. At her sea-glass eyes meeting mine. At the trust there despite everything. At the woman who looked at all my damage and loved me anyway.
At the family I thought I could have. The boys I love even though they’re not mine biologically. The brothers who’ve stood with me for twenty years.
And I know what I have to do.
The only thing I’m actually good at.
Being expendable.
“Firefly,” I say.
“No.”
“You have to let me go.”
“No!” She’s looking at me now, her expression fierce despite the tears.
Fuck. I hate her tears.
“Aria,” Jace says, his voice going soft, dangerous. “You trigger that switch, you die here. Right now. All of us might die but you definitely do. Is that what you want?”
“What I want is recognition,” Aria says, and there’s real emotion in her voice now. Raw and painful. “What I want is to matter. To be seen as more than Dominic’s trophy wife. More than the pretty blonde everyone dismisses. I deserve it! Power. Respect. And I want Silas because he’s the only one who ever looked at me like I was worth something.”
“I looked at you like a fleshlite,” I say, my voice rough. “Nothing more.”
“Stop lying. You just don’t know what love is supposed to be because of Parker,” Aria says.
I know what love is because of Parker. It’s brutal and mind numbing. It debilitates you, chains you in place and forces you to embrace your darkness. It allows you to believe with renewed strength that you don’t need to prove yourself, don’t need to be someone other than who you are for anyone but you.
It chases out all the demons and all the sunshine because she’s the warmth that sparks the dark coal where my heart should be until I’m burning. All my sins turn to ash and disintegrate into nothing at the sound of her laugh. All the ghosts of those I’ve killed glide toward the golden glow of the clouds when she’s in my arms.
“I’ll do it,” I say.
Parker turns to me, dropping the gun before falling on top of me, arms around my neck clinging to me. “No, no, don’t do this.”
