Page 74 of Iced Up Love: Part Two
Property of Jackson.
The skin around them isn’t.
The cuts run across it at angles that don’t match anything deliberate, not a clean removal but something done in anger, the blade dragged through the same place more than once, the edges torn where it caught, where it didn’t slide cleanly.
Blood sits along the lines, fresh enough that it hasn’t darkened.
The camera lingers.
It takes its time.
It moves across her like it has nothing pressing it to hurry, pausing where the damage is worst, where her body doesn’t respond, where her head turns just enough to show she’s there without being able to do anything about it.
Behind me, Zach swears, the sound catching on the way out.
Lucian doesn’t speak.
Christian doesn’t either.
I watch the whole thing.
I take in every second of it.
The way she tries to form words that don’t come out right.
The way her body doesn’t follow through when she tries to move.
The way he stays just out of frame, present without being seen.
The video ends.
The message appears beneath it.
Say goodbye. She is no longer yours. Now she is completely mine.
I look at the words long enough for them to settle into place.
Then I hand the phone back to Jackson.
Carefully.
“We take the dealer,” I say.
The words come out level.
They don’t match what’s sitting underneath my skin.
“I’ll pull them apart,” I add, and this time I don’t look at anyone when I say it. “One by one, if that’s what it takes.”
There’s no argument. No attempt to redirect it.
Because at this point, it isn’t a threat.
I’m not interested in stopping.
seventeen
Zach
