Who the fuck could even look at me after what I’d done?
Flames licked around my non-existent legs.
My legs might not exist, but the pain did.
Pain was my punishment.
It chewed through me until my bones turned to char. Flames snarled over my skin, turning my corpse into dust.
My organs popped and sizzled.
My heart shrivelled up and vanished in an inferno.
And I recalled why I couldn’t trust.
Why I couldn’t get close.
Why I couldn’t be happy.
Because it was all my fucking fault.
I was the product of my end.
I’d chosen my path.
I’d stolen every drop of happiness from others because I would never experience such joy.
Until her.
Until the dream turned nightmare.
Until I purchased a figment of my imagination.
A speck of fucking hope.
That was how I’d come to know Eleanor.
I’d bought her.
I’d requested men to grab her, steal her, and send her to my shores.
What a fucking monster.
I’d torn her from her friends and family.
I’d trapped her and molested her.
I’d stolen her heart and left her for vengeance and now...
Now, I wanted to fucking die.
I intended to keep my promise.
I didn’t deserve to live.
Two brothers who were the epitome of evil would be gone, and the world would be a safer place.
My body seized.
I gasped as the flames crept higher, burning my cock, my stomach, my lungs.
It took everything.
It scorched me, blackened me, destroyed me.
Something sharp struck my face.
A parrot squawk ripped through my ears.
Pika.
Even the parrot that I’d loved for half of my life couldn’t absolve me.
I’d killed on his behalf.
I’d arranged for the deaths of so many men who still used animals as their test subjects.
Blood suddenly poured into my prison.
A tsunami of crimson life force, hissing with hate as it met the flames of my cremation.
It painted my flame-riddled corpse.
It clung to me.
The blood of my past.
The blood of my truth.
It poured down my throat.
It struck a match on my soul.
Fire howled.
Pain exploded.
And I burned out.
My invisible form collapsed into a pile of bone charcoal.
Traffickers.
Purchases.
Girls.
Goddesses.
Teeth.
How fucking wrong I’d been.
How stupid I was to believe I could be redeemed.
This was burnout.
Not mental. Not symbolic.
Real.
Literal and legitimate, it didn’t just wipe out my power or my pain.
It burned me alive.
It sacrificed me.
Removed me.
It chewed through everything I had left, flames and fire, pain and promises.
It burned me until there was nothing left to burn.
Until there was nothing left of
Lust.
Love.
Life.
Me...
Chapter Twenty-Five
HE DIED.
He died while I pounded on his heart and begged into his ears.
He died as his pulse blazed past survivable.
He died as the monitor switched from chaotic chirps into flat line screaming.
And I lost a piece of myself.
He died to hurt me, to spite me.
He died because of me.
And I lost another piece.
He died because he’d come after me.
Because he’d saved me.
Because he’d loved me.
And I lost another piece.
His islands weren’t enough to bring him back.
Pika wasn’t enough.
Skittles wasn’t enough.
I wasn’t enough.
And I lost another piece.
Grief came swift.
Tears brewed heavy.
Terror was absolute.
And I lost another piece.
The flat line screech of his dead heart broke me.
The slack lips and closed eyes broke me.
The loss of such perfect possibilities broke me.
And I lost a final piece.
I spiralled.
I sobbed.
My grief mutated from pathetic to furious.
Vicious violence bled past my tears.
I crawled on top of him and struck his beautiful face.
I struck again.
He left me?
He abandoned me?
Well, he would arrive at his reckoning bearing my sorrow-inflicted scars.
My sobs overflowed.
I lost all my pieces.
And I snapped.
Chapter Twenty-Six
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Chapter Twenty-Seven
DARKNESS HAD FALLEN.
A skip into the future, transforming sunlight to midnight.
I groaned as I tried to sit up. Muscles didn’t obey me. Limbs didn’t bend right, and the world didn’t stay still. Nausea spun me upside down, and I lay sprawled where I’d woken.
Where am I?
I blinked, gritting my teeth against the swirl and sickness of the world.
Sully.
Oh, God.
The memory.
The awful, awful reality.
Dead.
Gone.
He’s dead!
A keening, screaming pressure fissured my chest.
He’s dead.
I lay on my back.
Sobs erupted and wracked my weak frame.
He can’t be dead.
Please.
It can’t end this way!
It can’t.
“Sully! God, please.”
Noises sounded behind me.
Someone came to offer condolences, their presence unwanted and cruel. “Hey. It’s okay, Eleanor. I’m here.” Louise Maldon appeared beside me, ducking to her haunches and taking my frigid hand. “You’re okay.”
I tore my hand from hers, needing to roll over, to curl into a ball so my grief couldn’t dig its blade deeper into my belly.
Sully...
My sobs came faster, harder, crippling me.
She wiped at my tears, unable to stem the gush. “I’m so sorry that I had to do that. Let it pass. The nausea will fade.”
In my suffocating sorrow, I didn’t understand.
All I knew was I couldn’t live in this horror.
Let it be Euphoria.
Let it be a nightmare.
Anything but real.
He’s dead.
No!
I cried harder than I’d ever cried before.
She hugged my head and brushed my tear-wet hair aside. “Listen to me, you’re fine. I had to administer a sedative because you were out of your mind. You were hindering our efforts. We couldn’t have you striking him while we tried to save him.”
Her words did their best to wriggle into my misery. The grief pressed harder, stabbing its blade, cutting up my entrails.
Sully...
Louise stood and grabbed me by the shoulders. Dragging me into a sitting position, I dry retched as nausea pushed acid up my gullet. She moved to the side, pre-empting my attempt at vomiting but continuing to brush aside my hair. “I need you to listen now, okay? He’s alive.”
Liar.
Deceiver.
Trickster!
I swiped at her, mad in my misery. “I watched him die!”
“You did.” She grabbed my chin, fixing my dizzy-drunken eyes on hers. “He flat lined. You lost yourself to grief. I tried to remove you from the room so we could work on him, but you were uncooperative.” Her fingers dug into my cheeks. “I injected you with a sedative for your own sake...and for his.”
I blinked, tears still rivering down my face. “How could you tear me away from him? He died!”
“He died, but he didn’t stay that way.”
I stilled.
Everything stilled.
Sanity did its best to tiptoe through my lost willpower and
