Page 135 of Lured By Shadows

“Ira…” Kiera’s eyes widened at once. “It is okay. You will be fine.”

“No.” The word broke out of me, sharp and shaking.

The professor stopped talking. I barely even noticed it happening until the room went silent and I realized everyone was staring at me.

“I can’t…” My voice cracked, breath hitching hard in my chest. “I won’t let this go.”

My gaze snapped toward the door, and after that everything blurred together. I barely registered grabbing my things and storming out, fury igniting so violently inside me it almost drowned out the heartbreak underneath it.

Fuck him.

If Culver wanted to act like some manipulative fuckboy out there kissing random girls while feeding me promises, then fine. I’d show him exactly what it felt like to lose me. I’d make him hurt the same way he’d just gutted me open.

My fingers shook as I yanked my phone out and typed out a message to Carter.

I want you.

Pick me up tonight.

I hit send before I could think twice.

I didn’t care if I regretted sleeping with Carter again. Anything was better than sitting there drowning in the sick feeling while some man tore me apart from the inside out, especially a man who hadn’t even slept with me yet. Shit, maybe that had been the game all along… dragging me along slowly until I was attached enough for it to really destroy me.

God, I felt so fucking stupid.

Every warning I’d given myself came screaming back now. Don’t fall too hard. Don’t trust him so easily. Don’t let yourself become one of those girls who confuse obsession for love.

And still, I’d done it anyway.

Because Culver had gotten under my skin in a way nobody else ever had.

If I believed in soulmates or whatever all the spiritual girls online talked about, I would’ve thought he was mine.

But no. He was a twin flame.

Toxic. Consuming. Irreplaceable.

And I hated that most of all.

33

By the time I reached home, I was seething, trapped by my own choices. As though I’d painted myself into a tight corner where pretending I didn’t give a damn was the only move left, even as inside I was coming apart at the seams from how much I craved him. Deep down, I knew this mess was my own damn fault.

And yet, even after I’d stormed off and walked myself home while he must still have been in class, I was startled when I wasn’t getting any calls from him. I thought he was keeping all his tabs on me, so it was surprising and a little unnerving. It made sense, though, because I didn’t really matter much to him from the very beginning. I was just a cute toy he could play with for the time being.

So when Carter texted me, smug and assumptive, already acting like it was because of his dick that I was asking for him, my stomach twisted. I shoved my phone aside like it had personally betrayed me. If I was going to do it, then I had to commit. I went straight for my closet, yanking hangers aside, my movements sharp and restless.

I needed the right outfit. Something that hugged my waist, something that cinched and skimmed in all the ways Carter had openly drooled over last time. I was going to make Culver regret what he did to me. Putting me through his little games… well, I could do the same. Unfortunately, I was too quick to put myself through it, knowing Carter was not what I wanted. Not compared to what I felt for Culver.

The doorbell rang while I was still zipping my boots.

I froze, my heart leaping stupidly into my throat, a part of me half hoping, half expecting to open the door and find Culver there instead, wild-eyed, possessive, ready to drag me back inside and tell me I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere without him.

But when I opened the door, it was Carter.

He looked good, objectively. Polished in a frat-boy way, but it landed flat. All I could think about was how forgettable he was, how bland every inch of him felt compared to the velvet threat in Culver’s voice. No matter how smooth Carter tried to be, he’d never touch the ache, the low electric pull that lived in me whenever Culver so much as looked my way.

So I smiled with cold politeness.