Page 60 of Destruction of Two
Only when Saint slips out do I fall against Syko’s chest and dissolve into sobs all over again. I cling to him, afraid that this is also an illusion despite telling myself that him and Saint are both real.
Syko’s fingers push into the roots of my hair, and I feel enveloped by warmth at all sides.
“This is real.” Syko’s rumbling voice echoes in my ears. Have I said that out loud? “Izara… what’s wrong?”
From across the fire, Malek is sitting up. He nudges Phoenix, and the demon blinks away his sleep the moment he sees me trembling with tears in my eyes. Their bodies are strung tight with quiet rage.
I don’t want to tell them. I’m too ashamed. But the words come tumbling out of my lips anyway. “The sixth circle,” I explain between sobbing gasps. “Osmodeus was the ruler. He gave me visions. He…” I choke, not sure I can get past the emotions to say the words. But I do. “He made me kill you. All of you. In different ways, no matter how many times I tried to stop it, my Prod,I,ripped all of you apart.”
I can feel the four of them share a glance, though I don’t see it. I don’t even know if I want to.
“It was an illusion, baby.” Phoenix’s strides toward me and his hands slide down my spine. Saint watches us in silence and there's guilt in his features like we shouldn’t have done what the three of us just did.
Not now.
Even if it was a moment of blissful distraction.
I wrench away from Syko. “You don’t understand,” I rasp, shame heating my cheeks. “My Prodenjoyedthe kill. She relished in it. Even when I tried to stop her, I couldn’t, and I was forced to watch you die.” My voice breaks on that last word, and Phoenix makes a growling sound and pulls me off of Syko and into his arms.
Malek gets up, coming closer to us, his hand pushing firmly in my hair and both Phoenix and the wolf hold me gently. “That wasn’t you. It wasn’t real. You would never do that.”
A choked laugh escapes me. “Wouldn’t I, though? I killed Adam for grabbing my arm. For grabbing myfucking arm.What does that make me?” My nails curl into Phoenix’s chest but he doesn’t flinch at all. He merely pulls me closer.
“I’ll go into hell,” Phoenix threatens, his voice dark with the promise of vengeance and death. “I’ll find Osmodeus and I’ll fucking kill him.”
Red emerging from depthless pits flash in my memories. “Too late,” I whisper against his skin. “I killed him first.” The silence that follows prompts me to add, “My powers are different in hell. They’re… stronger…”
Tell them,my mind screams.Tell them all of it. Everything. Right now.
But I can’t. I won’t.
I don’t.
Because I’m still a coward. And because I don’t know if they’ll understand why, despite the trauma, I have this burning need inside me to go back to my place of torment.
They won’t get it.
Only Professor Shade will.
He might be the only one to understand this new broken soul I carry within myself. Power… I know it’s not everything, but it had certainly been seductive enough for me to want another taste, another glimpse of what I was, of what I can become. For a girl who’s had nothing her entire life, the prospect of it nearly blinds me with obsession.
While I was there, I wanted nothing more than my men. Now, I want to feel that control again. The power. Because if I can’t have it, I’m afraid my Prod will come out to kill.
And I won’t be able to control her at all.
Twenty-Two
Izara
Early that morning, before the sun even kisses the skies, I sneak away from camp before anyone wakes to find Professor Shade deep in the woods of the Academy. He leans against the rough bark of a dead, black tree, arms crossed against his chest and one ankle thrown over the other. His graying, inky hair is slicked back and he has an air about him that screams businessman.
Even while he’s wearing a sweatpants outfit in a very unoriginal gym teacher type of way. He should look corny, but he only looks handsome and a bit dangerous.
He appears perfectly put together while my thighs and body ache from everything I did last night with my men. Not to mention how puffy and swollen my eyes still feel from the endless tears.
When I approach, twigs snapping beneath my tennis shoes, he pushes himself off the tree and meets me halfway in confident strides.
The smile he gives me is a slow curl of his lips. It’s a powerful promise that pulses between us. Between the spaces of our bodies, he holds out one hand, palm facing up. “Ready?” he asks.
