Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 54899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Her cheeks pale. “You killed someone when you were young?” she guesses. “Is that why you ended up in foster care?”
“No,” I confess. “My parents died. I never lied to you about that.”
“Then why do you think you’re a monster?” Her jaw firms. “What did they do to you to make you think that?”
She’s righteously angry. On my behalf.
I cling to it like a lifeline, and my hands tighten around hers. She doesn’t recoil.
The truth spills out of me. “My father was a murderer. A serial killer.”
The last of the color drains from her face.
“That same tainted blood runs in my veins. My mom…”
“What happened to her?” Karolina prompts when my throat closes.
I have to continue. I can’t seem to stop now. I can’t deny her anything, not even this. Not even if it makes her walk away from me.
Because deep down, I know I deserve to lose her.
“She found out what my father was. About the women he killed. We were under police protection for a year, and every time she looked at me, she saw my dad. She saw him in me, and she hated me for it. She was afraid of me.”
Karolina’s eyes shine, and she caresses my cheek. “You were a child.”
I turn my face into her palm, breathing her in like I need her more than oxygen.
“How did she die?”
Nausea curls in my stomach. The blood. The wicked gleam of the blade. The methodical way he made her scream…
“He found us,” I say, and it’s as though someone else is speaking. I’m lost in the dark memory, no longer present with her.
“Look at me, Brandon.”
My name. My name in her sweet voice.
I focus on her: the center of my world.
“You’re safe,” she promises. “The past can’t hurt you anymore.”
“I couldn’t stop him. I didn’t.”
Tears glimmer on her cheeks, but her voice is steady. “You were just a little boy. How could you possibly have stopped him?
My cheeks flush with shameful heat. “Maybe part of me wanted her to die. Then she could never look at me with disgust ever again.”
Karolina’s hands gently bracket my face, thumbs brushing my cheekbones. They glisten with my own traitorous tears.
I clutch at her waist, holding her close.
“What happened to your father?” she prompts softly.
The gunshot. Gore splattering on the wall. The gaping hole in the back of my dad’s head.
You’re my legacy, Brandon. Don’t let me down. His final words ring in my ears.
“He killed himself before the cops could arrest him.”
Karolina’s throat works, as though she’s swallowing down her own surge of nausea. “You said he killed your mom. Did he hurt you, too?”
“He never laid a hand on me,” I say bitterly. “He didn’t want to risk his rotten legacy.”
“Don’t say that about yourself. You did nothing wrong.”
Ice crystalizes in my veins. “Then explain to me why I was able to kill for money. Why was I capable of murdering again and again, and I felt nothing. I hunted those men down, and I ended them without a second thought.”
She considers me for a long moment. “Did you like it?”
“What does that matter?” I challenge. “I’m evil, Karolina. It’s in my soul. I was born to do this.”
“Did you like it?” she repeats, refusing to allow me to evade her question.
“I don’t feel remorse.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I’ve never thought about it before.
“I did what was necessary,” I finally say.
Her fingers trail through my hair, and I shiver at a rush of foolish hope.
“You didn’t take pleasure in it,” she surmises.
I hear the ring of truth in her words, even if they don’t quite resonate in my soul.
“You can’t excuse what I did.”
No matter how desperately I want her to.
“You can’t tell me what to do.” She’s gentle in her defiance. “You survived, Brandon. That’s all that matters to me. I thought you were dead.”
“You have to hate me for it.” The deep-seated belief has been with me too long to let it go so easily.
I never wanted to tell her any of this. She’s too sweet and pure to accept what I am at my core.
“I don’t have to do anything,” she refutes. “I accept you, Brandon. For all that you are. After all that you’ve done. I’m not capable of hating you.”
My fingers flex into her waist, clinging to her with the bloodstained hands that will never be clean.
I can’t let her go.
By some miracle, I haven’t lost her. She hasn’t turned from me in disgust.
She grasps my shoulders, directing me to my feet. My forehead rests on hers. We exchange ragged breaths. I can’t get close enough.
“We’re alike. We’re meant to be together,” she murmurs. “We have each other. That’s all that matters.”
I shake my head, even as I yearn for it to be true.
“What you did to Carter doesn’t compare to my sins. You protected yourself.”