Page 172 of Buried in Blood
And then—
Clap.
The sound cuts through the air like a gunshot.
Clap.
Clap.
Slow. Mocking. Intentional.
Our heads whip around.
Astra tenses beside me. Lucien’s hand slides toward his waistband. Dante steps in front of Evelyn. I don’t breathe.
A figure steps out from behind the mausoleum, boots crunching the gravel like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
Damien.
His black coat flaps open in the wind, shirt wrinkled, hair slicked back like a man showing up to his own execution. He has a bloodied bandage on his side. His hands aren’t raised, but they aren’t holding a weapon either.
Justclapping.
Slow.
Measured.
Dead-eyed.
“Well,” he drawls, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “Don’t let me interrupt your little memorial.”
I step out to the side to try to separate myself from my friends. I would be devastated if one of them paid the price for my sins.
The birds go silent.
The wind dies.
And everything holy about this place turns to rot.
49
Damien
She looks weaker than I remember her. She was wielding a gun not too long ago—now she stands there like a fucking coward.
Hair tangled. Shoulders hunched. Eyes wide and searching like she still thinks she can run.
Pathetic.
I raise the gun and savor the sound of her gasp—sharp and hollow, like a bird’s wings snapping mid-flight.
My little traitor. Standing beneath the dead sky with the same face I branded into memory and the same weakness trembling in her fingers. Her friends freeze around her, but I don’t see them. I don’t care. Not right now.
Right now, it’s just her.
And me.
“Did you really think you were special?” I sneer, stepping closer. “That you were different from the others? That the way I touched you, hurt you, protected you—it meant something?”
