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April 11 - April 19, 2025
“You are the thing I most look forward to, Rowan.”
“I told you already. Stop hiding. It’s not going to work with me, not anymore. You want this? You want me? Then fucking tell me, Sloane.”
“You,” I say. Every breath shudders through my lungs. “I met you. I didn’t want anyone else. Just you. I only want you.”
I told her I’m no angel. I don’t think she believed me. But she’s about to discover that I’m the devil she never knew she needed.
Sloane’s eyes roam across my body to take me in. And I let her. I fucking welcome it.
“Something caught your eye, pretty girl?” Her throat strains as she swallows. I feel the heat of her gaze as it drags up my body to collide with mine. “Yes. All of you.”
“You’re beautiful, Rowan.” This time, it’s my turn to blush.
“I would kill for you, and I have. I would do it again, every damn day. I’d turn myself inside out for you. I would die for you. I don’t just like you, Sloane, and you fucking know it.”
“I more than like you, Rowan. I think about you all the time. I miss you every day. You appeared one moment and nothing has been the same since. And that scares me. A lot.” Rowan presses a kiss to my shoulder as his thumb glides across my cheek. “I know.”
“I’m scared of you destroying me. Me destroying you.”
It’s hard to imagine how to climb past these obstacles that seem like mountains when you’re standing in their shade. But I’ll never climb if I just keep standing still.
So I keep asking myself the same question: What if I try? I don’t let my mind wander to an answer. Because the real answer is, I don’t know. I’ve never really tried and meant it before, not like this.
Don’t answer the question. Just try. That’s what I think when I look at my reflection in the bathroom mirror.
Rowan slides his hand beneath my pillow and pulls me closer until my head rests on his chest, his heartbeat a comfort in the dark.
“It sounds like he’s going to cut people up for you. That’s so Keanu-mantic.”
And across the full front of the restaurant, stretching over the door and the awning, a massive sign in block letters. BUTCHER & BLACKBIRD.
There’s relief knowing I can love and be loved, after years wondering if I was so broken that there was room only for vengeance and loneliness in my heart. And I think I see the release of that burden reflected in Rowan’s eyes too.
Nobody’s ever looked at me the way she does, with an intoxicating mix of pride and secrets that only we share. The rest of the room disappears as I just soak it in for a moment.
“When I was young, I collected every lucky charm I could find. I carried a rabbit’s foot around everywhere. Don’t ask Fionn where I got it, he’ll never shut up,” I say, and laughter surrounds us again. But Sloane doesn’t laugh, she only flashes a melancholy smile as she stays hooked on the past beneath my words. “I couldn’t understand why those talismans never changed my luck, so I stopped believing. But now I know. I was saving it all up to meet you, Blackbird.”
Winston keeps watch as I do some chores and make lunch and give him a slice of bacon that he hasn’t earned, because he’s kind of a dick.
Lol
I even put on some fake lashes, because fuck it. If I’m going to be a psycho, I’m going to be the hottest damn psycho Logan International Airport has ever seen.
She’s so fucking beautiful. So brave. The gun doesn’t waver in her hand as she keeps it trained on him and walks forward to stop enough to the side that I can see her clearly.
“Pow, pow, pow,” she says in a staccato rhythm. Her grin spreads before she lowers the weapon to her side. “Just kidding.”
rush of blood sprays across Sloane’s face. She doesn’t blink as she lets her gaze travel over every detail of his pain and fury, her smile dark and triumphant as his dimming eyes glare back.
“And I’m still very angry with you.” “I get it, love.” “I want to stab you.” “Yeah, that makes sense. Please not my dick though. Or my balls. Or my pretty face.”
The red spatters and streaks on her face are so achingly beautiful, her tears so fucking agonizing.
The tears in Sloane’s eyes shift and shine as they gather at her lash line. “I am not unlovable.” She jabs her bloody finger in my direction, punctuating every word. “I am very fucking lovable.”
“Come on, Blackbird. Let me up so I can prove to you that I fucking love you to pieces. Maybe I’ll take that first aid kit by the door too if you don’t mind.” Her ferocious glare returns. “Or I’ll just bleed out on the floor, that’s cool … but getting out of the chair would still be aces. Preferably with no stabbing.”
But she’s here, with her ginger scent and black eyeliner smeared in streaks down her skin, her freckles dotted with specks of blood. Creases line her forehead and her furrowed brow as her gaze bounds between mine. She’s never been more beautiful.
“You have never been unlovable. You were just waiting for someone who will love you for who you are, not for who they want you to be. I can do that, if you’ll let me.” I press my lips to hers and taste salt and blood but pull away before the kiss deepens. “I fucking adore you, Sloane Sutherland. I wanted you from that first day at Briscoe’s. I have loved you for years. I’m not stopping. Not ever.”
“You might be psycho,” I say with a grin as her eyes narrow, “but you’re my psycho, and I’m yours. Got it?”
I feel it in every beat that throbs in my raw, bleeding flesh. That the world could turn in every direction and shatter every reality, but there’s no other life than the one we choose to build.
“You did color,” he whispers, but he still doesn’t let go. I smile in Rowan’s arms. “What can I say, Butcher. I guess you brought it out of me.”
And then I just sit back and watch my Blackbird, no longer wielding her art in monochrome, but in vibrant Technicolor.
“Beautiful, Sloane,” I say. “Thanks,” she replies warmly, but she doesn’t turn around, or she would see that I’m not staring at her canvas, but at her.
Sloane’s lips part, her cheeks flushed with rising frustration. Fucking adorable. Flustered Sloane with her feathers ruffled and her talons ready? That’s always my favorite version. And I savor every moment, from her fierce glare to her determined steps as she stomps to the ladder to get a closer look.
“How’s the ice cream looking these days, Butcher? Managed to crack into some cookies and cream yet?” “Ouch, Blackbird,”
“Did you just propose on a napkin with a ring you stuffed in a guy’s eye hole?” I blink. My mouth opens. Nothing comes out for a moment that feels about as long as eternity. “You know, it seemed pretty cute in my head, but in hindsight … maybe it’s too much?” She shakes her head. “Not enough?” She shakes it again, a few tears jostling free of her lashes. “Just right?” “It’s fucking perfect,” she sobs. “Oh, thank Christ.” A long breath whooshes from my lungs as I press my palm to my chest.
“Sloane Sutherland, my beautiful Blackbird. From the first moment I met you, you changed the course of my life. I can’t remember anything being fun or exciting or new without you. I can’t remember feeling anything but numb until you burst into my world in your smelly little cage of orzo pastas,” I say, smiling when her laugh breaks free amid her tears. My grip firms around her trembling hand. “I can’t envision the future without you in it. And I don’t want to, not ever. So marry me, Sloane, and we’ll go on crazy adventures forever, and fuck shit up, and be best friends and do karate in the
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“I love you, Butcher,” Sloane whispers when she pulls away to look into my face. Then she slants her mouth to mine.
Maybe I was right. We’re not normal people. We are monsters. But if we’re monsters, we’ll thrive in the dark. Together.
“I love you so fucking much that it physically hurts me,”
