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“We need to have a talk, Adeline. I’ve let you process for over four hours now. I need you to talk to me.”
“You’re drowning, Addie. Just let me help you.”
“You’re not fine. And you know what? Neither am I. I’m not fucking fine at all.”
"Do you think needing me somehow makes you weak?" "Doesn't it?"
"No, baby, it makes you strong.”
"I may own every breath in your body, but make no mistake, Adeline, you own mine, too. I am yours to command. To bend and break. To mold and manipulate. Do you think that makes me weak? Or do you think I'm strong enough to admit that even though my body can physically live on without you, I would never get my fucking soul back?” His hand slides into my hair and fists the strands tightly. "Without you, I will shatter. But with you, I am indestructible."
How can he feel like home, feel so safe, yet make me feel like I’m being buried alive?
“That’s like asking me to cut out my own fucking heart.” “If I can live without one, so can you,”
“Do you think of them when I touch you?” he asks, his voice turning hard.
“Little mouse,” he whispers.
“You’ve forced yourself on me before, remember? Taken from me—stolen from me. What makes you so different, huh?”
“What you’ve forgotten is that the heart beating inside your chest isn’t fucking yours,” he snarls. “It’s mine. And if my heart has stopped working, then pull that trigger, little mouse. Kill the rest of me. I’m nothing if I’m not the reason you breathe.”
“Let me—fuck Addie, just let me fucking hold you,” he bites, his voice breaking.
He stuffs his face in my neck and he just… listens.
Listens to his heart breaking inside my chest.
“Sometimes, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to fully tolerate your touch,”
“Are you okay with that?” he counters. “Is that how you want to live your life? Fearing the touch of a man—of me.”
“You’ll always be safe with me, little mouse. Always.”
Until I glance down at his chest, seeing something I hadn’t noticed before.
“What is that?” I ask, my voice strangled with shock.
“A reminder,” he answers simply.
A fucking rose. He carved a symbol of his love for me into his chest. “Why?”
“I don’t care if I need to set this world on fire until there’s no one left but you and me. The world will burn around us, and I’ll gladly live in chaos with you as long as the only person that is a danger to you is me.”
“You rescued me, and I will never forget that. And the only way I can repay you is by saving myself.
“Every time I look at them, I think of him,” she continues in a hushed tone. “I
don’t want to look at my body and see anyone else but me and you.”
“Sometimes,”
“I wonder how you could still possibly want me.”
“I’ve followed you through lifetimes, Adeline. My soul needs you so badly that I’ve become a shadow, destined to hunt you for eternity.”
“You and I will never end, little mouse. Even when we’re six feet under, and our bones are dust, I will haunt your soul until it aches to be free of me. And then, I will hold you tighter.”
I rinse the soap out, her tears following the suds down the drain while she mourns, her head bowed with grief. Then, I carry her out of the tub and set her on the counter, holding her mouth open as I brush her teeth. I kiss away every tear and remind her that she will always carry Phoebe with her, and those flames are now hers, too.
“Greetings, fellow Americans,”
Xavier Delano is not missing. He’s dead.”
I am Z, and I am watching.
all I could think about was how much I love him.
I guess in the end, he was my safe place. He did hurt me, Zade, but he protected me, too.”
I don’t care if I live or die—as long as it’s all for you.” “Don’t say that,” I whisper.
I'll never understand how humans fear death when time is far scarier. It ultimately leads us to death because it’s the only thing that truly makes us mortal. We’re locked in the illusion with no way out.
“Do you want to see how easily I can break you?” I murmur coyly.
“I love you, Zade. Sometimes I can’t fucking stand it,” I say, my voice raspy and uneven. “But it was the only thing that kept me alive. You saved me. Even when we were apart, you saved me. And I hope to God you never stop hunting me.”
“What, baby? I can’t what? Make you love me? Care about me? Or is it that I make you feel all those things when you don’t want to?”
“Your heart, your soul, and your very breath. Run, little mouse. This time, no one will be chasing you.”
“Addie, you fucking idiot,” I growl to myself.
“Oh, you asshole.” You deserved that. “Shut up,” I
“I’m too addicted to you to ever let you go,”
“Would this being swollen with my child make you stay?”
“Claire Williams is not the first to contribute to the sickness that infects our world, nor is she the last. One by one, I will disinfect the pests from society, and only then will we find peace. I am Z, and I am watching.”
“Speaking of surprises.”
“It was in the mail. But I think I still need convincing, if you ask me,”
It’s a white gold band shaped in a vine with tiny white jewels encrusted into it.
