I grab Cosmo’s face, his cheekbones sharp against my fingers.
He doesn’t loosen his hold on my throat, but it isn’t harsh as he catches his breath. It’s almost as if he is steadying himself.
I press my thumbs to the corners of his mouth. I want to carve his smile into his skin. I want to feel his flesh against the nails I have left.
“Who would you choose?” I ask quietly, my voice hoarse. It sounds as if it is a floating thing, disembodied from myself. Drifting upward to the ceiling, where I would very much like to be. “If you had to, you said it was always me. Is it me now?”
Her fingers curve against my spine. Not painfully so, but I wish it was. It would feel more grounding than this tentative touch.
“Leave her out of it.” Cosmo’s words are raw from where I almost fucking killed him. I feel his bones move as he speaks, my hands still touching his face. His own are around my neck and he squeezes, but in a way that isn’t meant to be fatal. It feels like a reassurance, like a nurse has done to me once before.
I open my eyes.
His are like neon, eerie in the cold lighting.
He is staring right at me from beneath dark lashes.
“How?” I demand. “She is all of it.” I swallow hard, never looking away from him. His smooth skin and covered body. He has been inside her, and it eats me alive. “Who?” I call out to her. “Pick one of us, Karia. Or I’m not letting him go.”
“It’s not a choice between you two,” she says in a hushed tone. “I don’t know what you’re asking. There are different things. You are different people to me, this isn’t… I’m not in love with both of you. I…”
Cosmo’s lips press together and I wonder if this is news to him.
It enrages me more.
I glance at the floor, where I heard the clatter.
There is a kitchen knife. Black handle. Silver blade.
“Karia.” I lift my gaze back to Cosmo’s even as I say her name. The stitches along my abs feel tight, itchy, hot. I am sweating despite my nakedness. I try not to think of it. To forget how much she can see of me. I try to be anywhere but here, and yet I meant what I said to Cosmo.She is all of it.“Would you choose me now?”
Her palm comes to my spine, not just her fingertips.
I shake a little, at the contact.
The desire to spin around and press her to my chest is bright.
“I am here. Isn’t that proof enough?” So innocent, her voice. So placid.
I smile at Cosmo.
He is not smiling at me.
I take a breath.
Then I swipe the knife from the floor.
But the second between releasing him and gripping the weapon to gut him, Karia places herself between us. Her palms are held up to me, her eyes lined with red and shadow, the brilliant blue of her irises stark against it all.
Cosmo is at her back, his hand on her upper arm where I know she is hurt, even though she acts as if she isn’t.
“Karia, move?—”
“It’s you,” she says to me, interrupting Cosmo. She glances at the knife in my hand, my palm slick with sweat around it. “It’s always you. I’m here. I haven’t left your side, since…”
“Since he drugged us both,” Cosmo supplies, his eyes narrowed, face a mask of quiet, controlled anger.
I smile, staring at Karia. “It’s true,” I tell her. “I did. And I will do much worse.”
