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With a sigh, I made my way inside to the room I used as my studio. The familiar scent of paint and canvas filled the air. I pulled a fresh canvas from the stack.

When this was finished, I would give it to Enzo, and I had a feeling he would love it. Enzo had a strange taste, and if I wasn’t who I was, if he wasn’t who he was, we could have been friends. We could have sat and talked over the crow, the dead stag.

Enzo wasn’t a bad person. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It was his misfortune that he befriended Ryden, and Ryden fell in love with what was supposed to be mine.

I could have forgiven even that. But he made her fall in love with him, and that was a sin too big.

She was the one who killed Ryden by falling for him.

I took Kat. I would take Irene. I would take everyone else.

When it was time, I’d break her… and Yara would hold me as she cried, and we would once again find solace in each other.

I’d love her, and she’d love me back.

It would be perfect.

7

BURIED

YARA

Ryden insisted on driving me to the crime scene. There was no talking him out of it, so I didn’t bother trying. When we pulled up beside the storage unit, I reached for the door handle and turned to him.

“You really didn’t have to come with me, Ryden,” I said. “You should go check on Enzo and Irene. I’m the only one who’s safe. He won’t hurt me.”

Ryden’s hands tightened around the steering wheel, his knuckles turning white.

“I know that.”

“I’ve done this practically all my life. I’m good at this. Enzo and Irene… not so much.”

“I know you don’t need me, but I can’t stop worrying about you. If I’m here, I can at least stop someone else from hurting you.” I saw it in his eyes then—the horror, the pain. “What if something happens? What if you’re not ready when it does?”

I had a feeling what this was about.

Somewhere deep down, he still blamed himself for not protecting his mother from his father.

“You couldn’t have done anything, Ryden. If you were there, your father would have killed you too. He’d have killed you after he…” Ryden sucked in a sharp breath. “I know. You’re scared that I’d die when you’re not there to protect me. Like your mother.”

The look of utter despair…

“I’m terrified. I don’t want to lose you. Losing you would unmake me. I-I love myself when I’m with you, I love you more for that. I finally have things I never thought I deserved, I need. I couldn’t go back.”

“You don’t have to. I chased you all the way here, and I think I want to keep you.”

His smile was a punch to my heart.

I leaned in, pressing a kiss to his chin, his throat.

“I need to go now, and you have to go back. Nikki and Sofia deserve justice. Go back to work, do what comes best to you. Solve their murders and catch the bastard who did it to them.”

“You’re telling me to leave you the fuck alone?”

“I won’t be alone here,” I said. “I’d be surrounded by cops, Ryden. And they all have guns.”