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Shivering.
“You’re going to work hard, Gemma Ashford. I expect you to pull your weight. To obey me, learn from me, and do what I ask. The moment we go outside together, we aren’t strangers; we’re partners. Do you hear me?” He put pressure on my hand, puncturing the old wound over his heart and drawing a droplet of crimson. “If you think there’s any chance in hell that you can kill me to get free, I suggest you do it now. I’ve lined up the knife. You only have to push. Do it now because I refuse to work my ass off for the next few months only for you to end it. My head hurts. I feel sick all the damn time. All I want to do is rest. And if that’s eternal rest thanks to you putting me out of my misery, then so be it.” His eyes blazed, brown and black, autumn and coal. “Choose.”
Familiar animosity and coldness marked his face, and his hand trembled around mine. His closeness made it hard to breathe while his violent honesty ripped out the final shred of my shattered soul.
For a long moment, we stood in those demented flames. We burned together. We stared and searched and cursed the chain binding us.
Not the one around my ankle and his belly. Not the one made of metal.
A different kind of chain.
One that could never be broken, no matter if I went home or stayed, no matter if he lived or died. A chain made up of two hearts that had no business joining. A link that doomed us forever.
I started to cry.
Silent, slow tears.
He sucked in a breath as my fingers tightened around the knife.
My life flashed before my eyes.
The reunion with my brother. The coffee with my mother. The hugs from my friends. The fan mail from my YouTube followers.
All of it.
There, ready for me to take.
All I had to do was push.
A savage push into a broken man’s heart, and I could be free of all of this.
More tears fell as I looked at the knife. My shoulder tightened, and my stomach coiled for power.
And suddenly...I was done.
All my anger.
My rage.
My fury.
It all just...vanished.
Tiredness swamped me; unhappiness churned my heart.
I cried harder, quiet and wretched.
He was right.
I didn’t have the strength. I had no more energy to hate. After a week of going over every swear word and threat I could imagine, I was too exhausted to even try.
My fingers opened beneath his.
He let me go.
The blade fell to the marble, bouncing high before clattering to a stop by our feet.
For an agonizing heartbeat, I cowered beneath my failures, my weaknesses, and the fact that I’d once again given up my freedom. And then, my tears were wiped away by rough thumbs, my cheeks cupped with shaking palms.
“Thank you,” he whispered.
I didn’t reply.
I let my tears fall because they were symbols of my past. This was a funeral, and my freedom was firmly locked in a coffin I would never open. I would mourn it. He would let me mourn it because once upon a time, he’d had his freedom stolen too.
He didn’t rush me. He didn’t touch me other than to wipe away my tears. And only once they dried up did he shift away and clear his throat. His eyes burned with ownership but also understanding. He was my master now, yet he knew what it was like to be me. To have all control stripped away and be at his mercy in all things.
I didn’t think he’d abuse that power.
Not now.
Not after this.
“I’ll look after you as long as you look after me,” he murmured. It could’ve been romantically sweet, yet it sounded like a death sentence.
We stood in that truce, knowing this was the moment everything changed. I didn’t know what that change would bring, but we were no longer separate. Our survival hinged on each other—the most intimate of all relationships.
Sniffing back my final sadness, I looked up and caught his stare.
I wasn’t angry. I wasn’t afraid. I was just me. A girl who’d achieved the impossible and become financially free thanks to scaling problems people deemed unachievable.
This was just another problem. A challenge to be conquered.
I can do this.
“Tell me,” I said, calm and collected, standing as regally as I could muster. “Tell me what we need to do.”
We.
That one tiny word.
It hovered between us on a parachute, dancing on the fire between us.
He noticed.
He snatched it from the sky and hugged it close.
The faintest glow of relief filled his eyes as he nodded. The animosity between us was still there but muted beneath a common goal. “We work side by side to survive.”