Page 163 of Chasing Ruin
We’d suspected that Hellfire would’ve planned to attack us while most of us were gone on the hunt.
Thankfully, nothing happened. With Mihai’s men on our side, Hellfire and Ioana were stretched way too thin.
With everything almost over, I’m not sure how to go back tobefore. There’s this constant rage living inside of my chest whenever I don’t see Wolf where he’s supposed to be.
And there it is again—the hollow space beside me.
“Son.”
“Don’t,” I blurt out numbly. “We’ve… we’ve looked, Dad. Just don’t.”
He lowers his gaze, his jaw clenched. “Maybe he escaped.”
I stand up jerkily, leveling my gaze on him. “Or maybe he’s one of those burnt bodies we couldn’t identify.”
I don’t wait for his response and start limping toward the door. My feet carry me outside but my mind remains in that room.
Goddammit!I’ve never left this room without his voice echoing off these walls. And this is the third time in the last week I’ve done it. Feeling hollowed out after.
It isn’t until I’m standing right outside Charlotte’s door that I realize I’ve somehow led myself to her.
Subconsciously pulled to the one person I can’t seem to meet the eyes of.
We haven’t talked much since we came back.
Healer told me how she’d stayed by my bedside in the infirmary. At least until I woke up hours later.
Now, I’m here. Hand raised to knock. It’s so fucking natural to simplybeby her side. Especially since I wasn’t around her just to protect her these past weeks.
There’s a numbing silence after I knock. Followed by a soft “come in.”
I’m not sure what I expected to see when I opened the door, but the sight still leaves me completely, paralyzingly empty.
She’s sitting on the carpet, a box in front of her.
I know that box. It contains two years’ worth of words from her brother.
There’s a cut—Wolf’s cut—draped over her lap.
I quietly make my way to her, ignoring the sharp sting in my leg. The bullet Scar’s men gave me had only grazed the flesh of my calf. But it still fucking hurts to put my weight on it.
She doesn’t look at me. Not even when I awkwardly settle down across from her.
The silence between us isn’t terrifying this time. Not like the cell, but it’s still heavy. Suffocating in a different way. Thick with words that don’t matter anymore. Words that won’t fix our reality.
After a while, she looks up. But her gaze doesn’t reach my face.
My breath catches when I realize what she’s looking at.
“Will you get a new one?” she asks, her voice dull as she stares at my cut. “Or just remove the word ‘Vice’?”
She traces the raised stitching on the cut in her lap, her thumb brushing over Wolf’s name.
Within a blink, I’m beside her, my back settling against the couch. I pull her toward me, guiding her legs into my lap. She comes easily like her body knows where to go even if her mind doesn’t.
Her face tucks into the crook of my neck instinctively.
Wolf’s cut lies between us.
