Page 82 of Blood We Steal

He just smirked. Then twisted harder, and I heard the snap and Aaron’s scream.

“Let him go,” Simone said, her teeth gritted as she tried to pull out of my hold.

“Stop it, Simone,” I said.

“Help him, Rubin.” She looked at me, eyes pleading, imploring, begging me for another man.

Aaron moaned. And Damian, who still held his broken arm, twisted harder.

Simone let out a cry that made Aaron’s pain sound like her own, but she swallowed it. I stared at her while she stared at Aaron. She glanced at me again, her eyes screaming, her mouth silent.

This was what I’d wanted all along. Simone had begged before. She’d been afraid. But now she was completely broken.

The truth of it hit me, pieces I’d refused to see coming together to indict me.

Simone had betrayed me for him.

A deep groan of metal twisting, then giving way broke the spell.

Then the lights flickered.

Clicked.

And the room went black.

FORTY

Simone

Ifroze, the darkness settling on me like a weight I couldn’t shoulder.

Could I shoulder anything anymore?

With Rubin, you wouldn’t have to.

That thought had me slumping down to the floor.

I really was a tradhtare. In this moment, after everything Rubin had done, I could admit that I wanted him. That I needed him.

It was pathetic, shameful.

It was true.

Rubin hated me, had sworn to see me dead, and I’d never felt safer with anyone in my entire life.

God…

I just wanted—needed—for this to stop, knew that nothing would be better than lying on that cold filthy concrete floor and not moving an inch, come what may. Even though my skin crawled at the thought of the rats that would scurry over me, that revulsion wasn’t enough to make me want to stay upright.

I heard a foot sliding against the floor to my left. Kane and Veronica running to safety. If I’d had the ability, I would have laughed. Safety had always been a lie, no matter how I might try to convince myself otherwise.

“Miu just like your daughter,” Damian spat. Then I heard what could only be a fist slicing through air. Aaron’s whimper pierced the darkness and my shock and my self-loathing.

No one would save me. But someone had once. In the next breath, I was moving toward the source of that sound, my focus singular in pursuit of it.

I held my hand out in front of me, in darkness so complete that it felt alive. I forced out the sounds of the chaos around me and moved toward that pitiable sound.

I almost screamed when my foot bumped something I realized felt human.