I'm shaking when I speak. "I'm sorry."
It's inadequate. I say it anyway.
Then I reach inside and find the bond.
It's woven through everything—bones, blood, years of loyalty knotted into something that was supposed to last. I grab it and I pull.
The pain is immediate and total. Ragon fights it—he doesn't let go, doesn't make it easy, and that's the difference, that's what makes it tear instead of break clean. Everyone knows this. Subordinate alphas almost never try a forced break precisely because of this, because when the lead holds on you feel every second of their resistance before the bond gives. I'm going to be sick for days.
I knew that going in.
Something fractures and my vision whites out. My knees buckle and I lock them and through the roaring in my ears I hear Ragon make a sound I've never heard from him—low and broken and not quite human.
The emptiness where the bond was opens up immediately. A hollow that radiates outward.
Ragon is on his knees in the middle of his own living room, one hand pressed to his chest, breathing like a drowning man. The most controlled alpha I've ever known, undone.
I walk past him.
Eli is still in the doorway. Our eyes meet in understanding and grief. He's staying because someone has to, or maybe just because he's not ready, or maybe because Eli has always been the one who sees things through to the bitter end. I don't have a word for the look on his face. I'll probably think about it for a long time.
Neither of us speaks.
I walk out.
Three blocks away I have to pull over.
The nausea hits in a wave so complete I barely get the door open. When it passes I lean my head against the steering wheel and breathe.
My knuckles are split. My jaw throbs and my ribs ache. The emptiness in my chest is worse than all of it.
I loved him. I still do. Love doesn't stop because you leave. It just stops being enough of a reason to stay.
I lift my head and look at the rain-blurred street.
I have to find her. I have to tell her I'm sorry. I have to ask if there's any part of her that still wants me, after everything we did.
If she says no, I'll accept it.
But I have to ask.
I wipe my mouth and drive into the rain.
Chapter 13
Vee
I open an eye to something being set on the nightstand.
Rhys is hovering next to the bed. All six-foot-something of him, barely fitting in the space between the nightstand and the wall, holding a glass of water with the careful concentration of a man defusing something.
He sets it down without a sound.
Looks up and finds my open eye.
"Morning," I say.
He nods and points at the water.
