I thought I knew what it felt to loseeverything. Even hope. But the cold expression on Nicholas’s face makes me finallygive up. I’m done. I don’t even care how they do it anymore. I just want not to be here looking at his stony face. It doesn’t even suit him.
Maybe I deserve to go. It took so long to figure this out. This is why nothing made sense once we stopped the missions.
I don’t belong. I’llneverbelong.
“You’re right,” Dominic sighs, retracting his claws. “But do it quickly. This bitch isn’t as helpless as he—”
Nicholas shoots.
Chapter Thirty
Claws, Cover Ups, and Concerned Friends
Elliot
I wait for the pain to tear through me and put me out of my misery.
It never comes.
Then I hear a heavy thump behind me. I turn with wide eyes and catch Dominic’s limp body slumping to the ground.
“Wha—” I try to form words, looking back at Nicholas. But he’s still avoiding my gaze.
He paces towards me, closing the distance between us. Then bypasses me completely and leans down to look at Domonic. He checks his pulse. “He’s gone,” he says mechanically.
He pulls out a piece of cloth from his pocket and uses it to pull Dominic’s gun from its holster. He places it in Dominic’s hand.
I hear footsteps on the floor above us—more than a dozen people.
I must have made a sound because Nicholas comes around and stands in front of me. “It’s the LAPD,” he says, still looking everywhere but at me.
“Fuck it,” he breathes out and pulls me into him. His lips land on mine in a ghost of a kiss. My body sags into him, allthe fear, pain, and doubts draining out of my body. He’s solid and safe.
But then the warmth is gone. I open my eyes to him standing far away.
A flurry of people burst into the room. Too many noises all at once. Are they going to arrest me? No, Dominic said something about human police not being after me. Then why are they here? Why did Nicholas save me? Is he cruel enough to save me just to watch me rot in prison?
I look for him in the sea of bodies swarming in the small room. But he’s gone.
“You should sit down,” a woman in a pantsuit says to me. “I’m Detective Serena Vargas, Nick’s partner. The paramedics are on their way. You’ll need to go to the hospital. But do you want to give your statement right now?”
It doesn’t look like Nicholas has told his partner the whole story. She’ll want to know why Domonic abducted me, and I can’t answer—
She gently guides me back to the chair I’d probably spent the last two days on. “Where did Officer Adler capture you?” she asks, pointing at the limp body behind me.
I’ll just follow her lead then. “He came to my house. Said he needs to talk to me about Nicholas. He was in his uniform, so I got worried and opened the door for him. He hit me in the head, and I woke up here,” I say, my voice comes out scratchy like I’ve been screaming for hours.
I feel more and more stupid with every word. I already knew Nicholas was looking into my cases, and I still trusted an officer who used his name to lure me out. How fucking hopeless am I?
She nods, her face completely devoid of any judgment. “Did he say anything about why he did that?”
I shake my head. “He didn’t say much. Just that he was going to enjoy killing me,” I tell her the half-truths.
She scrunches her nose. She looks cute even with the whole hardass cop look she’s got going on. I wonder if she ever had a relationship with Nicholas that was more than justpartners. They’d look cute together.
I taste bile at the back of my throat at the thought.
“We can continue later if you want,” she offers.
