Page 32 of Villainous Rise

“And yet here I am, commenting. Kidnapping, even.”

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Annie’s voice cracked. “You didn’t kidnap me to save me from Valor. You did it to torment me.”

“Torment? That’s a bit dramatic.”

“Is it? Look at you!” She gestured wildly at me. “You’re gloating.”

She wasn’t entirely wrong. Seeing her this angry, this alive, it was intoxicating after months of emptiness. Each flash of her eyes sent electricity through my veins.

“You orchestrated this whole thing,” she continued, pacing behind the desk. “You’ve been watching me, sending me food, and now you’ve got an excuse to get me alone.”

“If I wanted you alone, Sparks, I wouldn’t need an excuse.”

Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “Don’t call me that.”

“Would you prefer I call you what Valor calls you? Sweetheart?”

“At least he’s honest about using me,” she shot back. “Instead of pretending to care.”

That stung more than I wanted to admit. “Keep going,” I said. “Get it all out.”

“You think this is therapeutic? That I need to vent my feelings at you to move on?”

“I think you’ve been bottling up how much you hate me. So let it out, Annie. Tell me exactly how much you despise me.”

“Fuck you.”

“You already did. Repeatedly. Enthusiastically.” I leaned closer. “And I remember every single time you begged me for more.”

Annie’s eyes blazed with a fury I’d never seen before. It was fucking glorious.

“You think I don’t know what you did?” she spat. “You sacrificed me. You were willing to let me die to get what you wanted.”

“Let you die?” The words exploded from me, raw and jagged. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

I crossed the room and Annie scrambled back until she hit the wall.

“I wasn’t willing to let you die. I fucking came to save you!”

Annie flinched but held her ground.

“You think I didn’t know what Dread was? What he could do? I watched him tear through Supers during the season. What you saw him do at the Season’s opening night? That was fucking child’s play for him. I knew exactly what I was walking into.”

The memory of that night flashed through my mind. The shadows writhing around Dread like living weapons, the knowledge that I might not walk away.

“I stepped between you and those shadows knowing full well what would happen. I felt them tear through me. I felt my own blood pouring out while you tried to hold it inside me.”

Her eyes widened slightly, something shifting in her expression.

“I died for you, Annie. I fucking died.” I leaned closer, close enough to see the flecks of darker blue in her irises. “So don’t you dare stand there and tell me I was willing to let you die. I would burn this whole goddamn world to the ground—I would literally die—before I’d let anything happen to you.”

Annie’s eyes hardened, her jaw tightening as she stared back at me.

“You have the fucking audacity to stand there and pretend what we had was about something more than just trying to get your dick wet?”

“Are you serious right now? You think I let myself get impaled for a fuck?” Heat crawled up my neck, my hands clenching into fists so tight I felt my knuckles crack.

“You think I did that for sex?” I slammed my palm against the wall beside her head. “I could get my dick wet anywhere. I wouldn’t bleed out for it.”