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I should pay for my sin. I should suffer. I should die at his hands. It was his right. After all, I killed his heart.
“I will break you, Julianna Romano.” You can’t break what’s already broken.
“I vow to spend the rest of my life making you regret what you did to Gracelynn.” “… To love her, to honor her, to comfort her, to cherish her…” “To hurt you, to break you… and to hate you for the rest of our days. I will never be your
protector, never your defender; I vow to be the villain in your story.” “… And to keep her in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?” “In health and in sickness, through sorrow and pain, for all the days in my life, I will be your worst nightmare.”
That wasn’t a wedding. It had been a one-way ticket to eternal damnation.
My body had long grown accustomed to pain. I had lived with it long enough that it was now familiar; we were best friends, after all.
Atone for your sins. I reminded myself. Beg for absolution.
Killian and I had come to an unspoken understanding. Civil and in love. Until the end of our contract.
“Do you trust me, Princess?” I nodded, voicelessly.
His dark eyes flared. “May I have this dance, Princess?”
“Patience is a virtue, but mine has been stretched thin. I throb for you, Princess.”
“If I slide my hand under your dress right now, will I find you wet, Miss Romano?” Sweet hell.
You’re mine, Grace. Mine to cherish. And mine to protect.”
It hurt, confessing that truth out loud. To tell Killian that I wanted him to move on with another woman… For my love was a catastrophe. It didn’t matter that it killed me,
Atonement was only an illusion that I was desperate to believe in.
“I plummeted into chaos because your love was everything beautiful and pure, but my love was everything deceitful and destructive. So, I didn’t just fall in love with you, Killian. I crawled, on my knees, bleeding for you. So, it was real. Every moment, every smile, every kiss… it was real and it hurt.”
“There’s a fine line between love and hate. And I just realized that I love you as much as I fucking hate you, Julianna.”
“You were the thorn, Julianna. You always were,” Killian said, his voice deceptively soft.
I watched him walk away. Thud. The numbness spread through my body. Thud…Thud…. The room swayed.
My stomach dropped when I saw Julianna’s body on the floor, seizing. The rage immediately dissipated, like ice water had been dumped over my head, and I jerked into motion without really thinking. My heart thudded in my chest as I rushed to her side, kneeling by her convulsing body.
“You’re safe,” I muttered. “You’re okay. I have you.”
Numbness was better than feeling too much.
He took me away, from my sins and the pretty illusion that was my salvation.
That was until now, on the back of Cerberus as he ran free and wild… I finally tasted freedom. And it was pure ecstasy.
That would have been a good sign, if she wasn’t burning with a fever.
Trust. That was exactly what we lacked in our marriage. So I gave him the fragile piece of my heart. I trusted him, yet again.
When I flinched again, Killian’s chest rumbled with a threatening growl. “Watch your tone when you speak to my wife.”
“Hate is too simple a word to describe what we have, what I feel for you. It’s not hatred, Princess. It’s so much more. It’s chaos,”
“You’ve dug yourself under my skin, into my bones. You fucking stabbed me in the chest, I’m bleeding for you, Princess. You kill me and I still fucking need you like I need my next breath.
Please be okay, Princess. I’m coming for you.
He wrapped the towel around me before his arms curled around my hips. “You’re not fragile, but you’re my wife – the woman I love and I almost lost you a month ago. Please, humor me. Let me do this,” he rasped.
