Page 86 of Wrath

I offered her a watery smile. “We’re happy here, right?”

She gaped at me. Out of everything she expected me to say, it apparently wasn’t that. “Of course!”

I cupped her face and rubbed my thumb back and forth over her cheekbone. She cuddled against my palm like a cat, and my heart swelled…before instantly meeting resistance with the barbed wire surrounding it.

“This is all I ever wanted for us.” Another tear joined the first. “I love you so much.”

“I don’t understand.” A frown curled her lips, and the furrow between her brows deepened.

“But how can I put my happiness above my brothers’? Above the rest of the world? They need you, Z.” I spread an arm out to encompass not only the bedroom, but the house as a whole. Idyllic. Comfortable. Safe. “I can’t allow greed to blind me to the rest of the world. I want nothing more than to keep you hidden away, but that’s not right.” I pulled her lips to mine in the most tender, softest kiss imaginable. Every butterfly in my stomach rioted when we parted. “I’m sorry.”

I couldn’t stare at her a second longer. If I did, I might change my mind and be selfish. Keep her for myself.

“Lin? Lin!” Z called to my retreating back as I pushed past her and hurried down the stairs.

Tears blurred my vision, and my heart thumped erratically in my chest, cracking and breaking and shattering and?—

“Daddy?” The quiet voice sounded from directly behind me.

A sob built in my chest.

Could I really do this? Could I really kill my own daughter?

She’s not real,I mentally scolded myself, feeling the last remnants of my heart crumble into thousands of intricate pieces.

“Daddy, where are you going?”

I froze, one hand on the doorknob, indecision warring within me. My muscles locked together. Panic gripped me in a chokehold.

Then, without a word, I threw open the farmhouse door…

And immediately exited into a bustling forest.

A few humans gave me confused looks. Bash, who had been walking by, also paused to stare at me, his mouth molded in a frown. He still wore the same clothes he had on when I disappeared. It must be the same day. Hell, for all I knew, no time had passed.

But it didn’t feel that way to me.

“Dev? Are you okay?” He reached for me, but I stepped away, belatedly aware that tears still streamed down my face.

“The genies will join now,” I whispered hoarsely.

His brows lifted in surprise, but before he could press for an explanation, I hurried away.

I needed to be alone.

I needed to forget everything I had just given up—and the future I now knew I could never have.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Z

“Atta’s really okay?” Mali’s voice sounded small, rife with pain.

“She is,” I assured her, wondering if I should reach across the table and grab her hands in mine. Comfort her.

I would’ve done that only a year ago, but…a lot had changed since then. Mali had betrayed me, and that betrayal had cost our other friend, Diego, his life. But she had proven herself time and time again, even allowing herself to be tortured by Aaliyah to fix things between us. I forgave her.

But she had yet to forgive herself.

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