—MISSY ARMITAGE, GET OUT
Ifelt like I was underwater. I drifted into the bedroom, closing the door softly behind me.
Mike was dead.
I hadn’t even known he was an angel. Tears welled as I found myself slipping back in time to that night in my apartment, celebrating alone with the brownie he had given me. I remembered how his kind gray eyes crinkled in pride when he handed me the little to-go box.
It had made me wonder for a minute if that was what it felt like to have parents. Was that what it was like to have someone in your corner? Someone who was rooting for you?
Now, I would never know because Mike wasdead.All because he had been trying to helpme.
A hot tear slid down my cheek, and I took a deep breath. My fingers brushed against the hilt of the blade Ramel had gifted me. The familiar impulse to cut myself pulsed through myveins.
It was like a steady build of pressure. A painful, anxious swell of emotion that I knew could only be released in the form of blood through a slit in my skin.
I took a deep breath, working as hard as I could to force the impulse down.
Cutting myself was against the rules.
I eyed the chains that remained fastened to the large four-poster bed and shuddered. I didn’t want to be a prisoner again. If I gave in to the impulse, Ramel and Shem would definitely put the collar back on me and tie me up.
I shook my head, trying to ignore the building pressure, and made my way to the wardrobe I knew Ramel kept my belongings in. I resolved to take a shower, change into something comfortable, and crawl into bed.
With shaking fingers, I pulled open the door to the wardrobe and found that all the clothes I had packed the night I had tried to run were hung up neatly in a row. My gaze flitted to the top shelf, and my attention snagged on a small cardboard box.
My heart sank.
Holding my breath, I reached up and pulled the tiny package down. I choked on a sob when I realized what it was. Pulling back the packing tape, I opened the box and pulled out a tiny silver spoon that said‘Best Chef’on it.
All thoughts of fighting off the urge to cut myself flew from my mind. I collapsed, dropping the tiny spoon with a harrowing wail.
My heart felt like it was literally breaking in my chest. I lost minutes as my mind disassociated. The trauma from living through so much death and suffering so much loss hammered through me, and I suddenly found myself on the ground, leaning against the wardrobe in nothing but my sweater and my thong.
Ramel’s dagger was clutched in my right hand. I couldn’t remember unsheathing it, but that didn’t matter. The bare blade glinted green in the firelight, and I felt my body move as if it were stuck on autopilot.
Pressing the edge of the knife against my thigh, I slid it across my flesh, shivering as my skin parted and crimson blood exploded from the split seam.
Normally, the pain helped, but I couldn’t even feel the cuts as I continued to drag the blade across my thigh. I frowned at the wounds. Typically, I didn’t bleed this much;Maybe I was cutting too deep.
It was hard to tell. I was so numb. Too numb… Why couldn’t Ifeelanything?
“Lilith!” A voice roared as if from miles away. I blinked slowly and looked up just as Ramel exploded into the room in his Reaper form.
The door slammed against the wall, the thick black wood cracking with the force of the impact. I met Ramel’s panic-filled eyes and was barely able to process what was happening. He vanished from where he stood at the door, only to reappear on his knees before me. With an ink-black hand, he tore the blade away from me. Blood sprayed off the edge of the knife, splattering us both with scarlet rain. Iblinked again, looking down at the alarming amount of blood that was still streaming from my thighs.
I had cut too deep… way too deep.
“What the fuck are you doing!?” he shouted, though he didn’t sound angry, he sounded terrified.
I looked up at him, my lower lip trembling. Swallowing past the painful lump in my throat, I tried to answer him, but my voice came out as a whisper.
“Mike… he’s dead… because of me…” I choked on a sob and curled my bloody legs up into my chest, burying my face in my hands as my grief consumed me. “Everyone who tries to help me dies. It’s my fault,” I sobbed. “It’s all my fault.”
Gentle hands wrapped around my wrists, pulling my hands away from my face. Ramel was looking at me with such a tortured expression that I wondered for a moment if he was in physical pain.
I stared at his inky hands on my wrists and sighed, moving to stand up. He tightened his hold on me and growled.
“Where are you going?”
