Page 85 of King of Ashes
VIAN
Not even a full day without her, and I am pacing my living room, a restless wild animal in a cage. Trapped by the unforgiving past, shackles locked around my ankles and thumping against the floor with each step, I’m reminded that I am moving in place.
This wasn’t fucking supposed to happen. I stayed away for four years to let her mind rest, shoving everything into her subconscious so nothing could escape, but now she gets more flashbacks, reliving things even if she can’t name them.
It’s only a matter of time, and I am running out of seconds faster than expected. Time slips through my fingers like grains of sand in an hourglass, and I can’t hold on to it, can’t stop the wreckage from unfolding again.
I slam a fist into the window, but it doesn’t crack while everything in me shatters.
Palming the glass, I stare out. Clouds gather in the sky, carrying a storm with the potential to rain hail on my head.
I hear the ping of the elevator, and when I look over my shoulder, my uncle steps inside.
I haven’t answered his calls. After I drove Zara to the airport, kissing her as if it were the last time, I came home and locked myself in to spar with my demons.
He observes me, a cautious expression etched in his eyes. “You should tell her.”
I shove my hands into my pockets so I don’t lash out. “You should tell your daughter first. Neither of us stands on moral ground here.”
He lets out a dejected sigh and goes to the bar, pouring himself a glass of whiskey.
“Should you even drink that?” I jerk my chin toward the glass, annoyance thick in my voice.
“You should worry about your life. Mine is ending, and I accepted that.”
I’ve always had difficulty accepting things I can’t change. Accepting that we’re nothing more than puppets on someone else’s strings. We falsely believe we’re in control, yet we’re not. Life and death are interconnected. We’re just here for the journey. Pathetic.
He takes a seat in the armchair, sipping from his glass. “What are you going to do?”
Turning around, I lean back against the cold surface. I’ve asked myself this question since she reentered my life, but the answer still escapes me. I don’t know the right move, considering the fatal consequences—to my heart, which won’t survive losing her again, and to my will to continue living without her.
A part of me wants to confess. The other to keep the past buried.
Her memories have a pattern, revealing tidbits of our shared past without disclosing that he is, in fact, me.
Maybe she is ready to accept my side of the story. That I didn’t do the unthinkable—killing her beloved father—without a valid reason.
It’s this city and my love that coax the memories out. How long until that one event blasts through? How long until she unravels the coincidences as facts? That the unidentified man hasn’t switched to my face for no reason.
I should have opened the damn gates and shown her inside, but pictures of us decorate the walls; we picked every little detail with care. It was supposed to be our home. We spent just one weekend there before it all went to shit.
He casts an intent stare my way. “You have a responsibility.”
“Don’t fucking tell me something Father ingrained in me since birth,” I snap, on the verge of a mental breakdown.
“You love her too much, son.”
Is there any other way to love a woman? I love her with every sinful fiber of my body and every sullied beat of my heart—with everything in me. Completely. Endlessly. I wear her from the inside out. She’s tattooed on my skin and stitched into my fabric.
I glare at him, and he lifts his palms in a nonthreatening gesture. “I saw you then, thinking I had lost you, too. This time, I won’t be here to guide you.”
I curl and uncurl my hands in my pockets, needing to expel this pent-up energy, though I can’t promise him not to worry. My uncle is the only person with whom I don’t have to play a role or pretend.
I am the worst actor with the people I love. It’s a wonder she hasn’t connected the dots with how often I slip, but she senses there’s more. She simply prefers to ignore it so she can love me with no shame, no guilt. That would disappear if the truth were revealed.
I lost her the first time. It’s my story versus his. I am up against a man she worships, a father who could do no wrong inher eyes. Yet he was a coward, letting his ego win and causing carnage.
My uncle grunts, pain marring his face, which turns ashen. “Everything hurts, son. I’m ready.”
