Page 178 of BounBound By Scars

No one moved.

No one could.

Kabir.

My lungs locked. Vision tunneled.

No thoughts came—just static. Just white noise and a cold, creeping fog filling the space where I used to be.

He’s dead?

Kabir is dead.

Kabir is dead.

Zarek stood up suddenly, knocking into the lounge table.

“Hey, hey—” Logan reached for him, steadying him by the shoulders but he shook him off violently.

His eyes were hollow. Frantic. His breath coming faster now.

Not a full breakdown. Zarek didn’t do that. But he was still… not okay.

Leora went to him. Gently took his hand. He didn’t shake her off.

He just kept muttering. “N-Not again. L-Logan…”

My hands were cold.

Everything in me was folding inward.

Shutting down.

The room was blurring at the edges, like a dream trying to wake me up.

Kabir is dead.

The sentence repeated, dull and deafening.

Kaylan moved in front of me—shifting my chair, her hands on my cheeks. “Amelia. Amelia, look at me—”

But her voice was muffled. Underwater. Distant.

I couldn’t hear her over the screaming in my chest.

Zane was pacing, fists clenching in his hair.

Sebastian was still standing, open-mouthed, frozen in disbelief.

Delara turned wordlessly and left the lounge, the door clicking softly behind her.

None of us stopped her.

Because there was nothing left to say.

Kabir was gone.

I stood up so abruptly, Kaylan’s hand slipped off me.