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“And what about Cassia?”
“Cassia gave me something that I never got from Seraphina. She gave me peace. She made me see a light in the darkness that is my life, and she made me feel as normal as anyone else.” I locked eyes with Izabel. “She is my light.”
Izabel looked at me for a moment—pain and regret lay in her features.
“You need a whole person, Fredrik,” she said. “I have to believe that one day you’ll find her, a love who is both light and darkness, who understands you and fulfills you the way that Seraphina did, but who can also give you peace.” She interlocked her fingers on the table and leaned forward. “But you can’t do this with her, and you know it. She’s not a whole person. And she’s gone too far—in every way—to ever become one. She could snap and turn at any moment, and you know that, too.”
I looked away. I didn’t want to hear any of this. Because I knew it was true.
“You’ll find her—”
Present day…
Izabel was wrong that day in the coffee shop. She was wrong because I had already found her—the real Seraphina. I’d found her and fell in love with her, and then, like a train on its way toward a sharp corner at eighty miles per hour, I utterly destroyed her. I let Seraphina become infected with the same virus I’d allowed myself to catch: humanity.
I had always struggled with it before I met Seraphina. I needed to bleed, and torture to feel alive and curb other urges I kept hidden deep inside of me—the desire to kill. But when I met Seraphina, she helped me to understand that I could be both human and the monster I was made into at such a young age, but only if I did it the right way. I could have empathy, but I could never let it control me; I could have mercy, but I could never let it become me or change who I was.
I know now who I am, who I’ve always been.
And I will never turn on my darkest half again.
(Welcome back. Welcome home.)
“Willa,” I say, and she shoves the last piece of food into my mouth. After swallowing: “I want to show you my face.”
For the first time since she abducted me, I have the absolute, undivided attention of her monster; her eyes lock on mine, full of wonder and expectation but also full of the mysterious danger again.
And I understand now what makes her so dangerous, that eerie feeling I felt before but just couldn’t quite place.
Willa was raped and abused repeatedly for most of her young life. She hates sex. She hates men. She despises, with every dark ounce of her being, anyone, man or woman, who loves sex, who gives in to it, who partakes, who takes without asking, who is weak to the temptations of lust. It’s why she put my cock into her mouth—she wanted to gauge my reaction. She wanted to see if I’d give in to the desire, if I’d become stupid to the temptation. In short, if I’d given in to her sexually, even in the tiniest fraction, I’d already be dead.
“Let me show you my face,” I tell her.
Willa’s eyes become bigger and sharper, her pupils as black as infinite space; she swallows and begins to breathe with her lips parted; I see the veins in her temples pulsing. She’s become a different person so quickly, so easily, in anticipation of her agenda. She’s no longer the calm, childlike woman but has become the unstable, violent killer. And one wrong move, and she’ll gut me like a pig.
“You vant to show me your face, Freedrik? Are you sure?”
I nod.
“Yes, Willa. Bring me the mirror.”
She takes the mirror beside us and moves it in front of my face.
I peer in at myself, searching my own dark eyes, my own dark soul.
(Hello, my old friend.)
And then, I give her what she wants by telling her exactly what she needs to hear.
“I never want you to touch me again,” I say. “Do you understand? I wanted to cut you from stem to stern when you put me in your mouth, Willa.” I grit my teeth and ball my fists at my sides; tears appear in my eyes and drip sideways down my unshaven face. “You made me feel dirty and ashamed, Willa—you made me hate myself, and I wanted to kill you!” I roar.
Her doe eyes grow so wide, so full of awe and wonder and hope. Her chest rises and falls with heavier, quicker breaths—she blinks; I can’t fucking believe it, but she blinks! Several times at that.
“I don’t care if you keep me down here forever,” I go on, “but don’t ever fucking touch me again because I’ll never forgive you, and I’ll never be yours.”
She moves the mirror closer to my face again, just like before, and like before, I turn away from it, pretending that my reflection disgusts me now and it’s all her fault.
When I clench my eyes, I hear the mirror shatter on the floor. I keep my eyes closed when I feel her undoing my restraints, starting at the feet and working her way to my wrists.
