Page 418 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘Let me go.’

‘No.’

‘You have to let me. There’s only minutes left.’

‘Lee will have killed the Knot body by now.’

‘I knew that wouldn’t work.’

‘What?’

‘I needed to send her away.’

‘Why?’

‘She’s the only one who would have stopped me.’

‘I’m stopping you, you arrogant prick!’

‘You can’t live without him.’

Kade looks away, can hardly see through the rain.

‘I’d try,’ he says through gritted teeth, ‘if you told me to.’

Silence holds. Rain falls. Thunder growls.

‘You would?’

‘For you, yes. I’d hate it and I’d probably dig my fucking way down into hell just to bring him back, but I would stay alive for you if you told me to, Riley. I stayed when we were both dying. I didn’t let go.’

‘You remember?’

‘No, but I know it in my heart.’

‘I don’t have anything to try for.’

‘Then I was wrong, and you are a coward! Locking yourself away, hiding from the world, lying to everyone, refusing to even believe that things can get better if you let them, if you try, if you trust just one person to have your back! You’re a fucking coward, Riley Harker!’

‘I’m not like you.’

‘You’re just like me, except you get to hide behind your sad story and your shame and the power you wield! We all have horrific shit in our past! We all have scars! But only one of us is trying to die when so many lost would do anything for thirty seconds more of this big fucking mess of a planet! Look at this!’ He slaps his hand on the concrete and grit. ‘Look at that beautiful bitch of a storm. Hear the thunder and taste the rain! Can you feel that bruise? Yeah? There’s a world out there that you and me never got to go be in because of cowardly men who couldn’t let us go! There’s so much craziness and fun and pain and confusion and love! Does it not matter that I love you? ANSWER ME!’

‘It-it matters.’

‘Then you stay with me this time and we fight together!’

‘I’m scared to fight.’

‘I know. I know you are. But I’ll be right beside you.’

‘Kade!’ Lachlan is here.

He’s yelling something, Blaire too.

Kade bends low.

‘You’re my family. You always were. Be the big brother and do the hardest fucking thing in the world… and stay.’