𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐍 | 𝟏𝟖+

22 | Revelation

"She's dead."

Dead. Evelyn Leveque. The woman who breathed light into my world when all New Aberdeen gave me was a pillar of darkness. She became a second heartbeat, a second life when I found myself giving up.

Dead.

"That's not possible," because it's not. "She was here yesterday. I talked to her... she was going to the board meeting at the new research centre. You saw her—"

"I saw her die," Cato interjects. "That's what happened at the board meeting."

Through my blurred tear-rimmed vision, I meet the fractured grassy forests that belong to Cato's irises. He tries to hold back, but he too disintegrates inside. The shards of his heart shatter like glass, and with every passing minute I feel the sharp edges cut against my own.

Dead.

All those times Evelyn snuck me into her office to confide in me about her rocky relationship with Audwin, about how she fears he'll send her away from the estate, about Cato, about her duties, about everything—gone. The protection she gave me, her watchful eyes a shield around my being—gone.

As a child, she was the one who would tuck me in and sing me lullabies, before she would go and tuck in Cato. She was the one who gave me honesty about the world, and about how my mother's reputation could never impact who I was.

I owe my life to her.

A sob breaks from my lungs. I'm exposed to him, my emotions splayed across Evelyn's old office, as my world collapses. I try to hold on, to grip whatever light Evelyn left behind, but instead, her son stands in her place.

Cato's mood shifts, his expression becoming uneasy. "Maureen," his voice mumbles, low and calculated. "She died this morning at the hospital, and I remembered that you work there. My mother told me, so I went to find you." Those green eyes flash. "You weren't there. I was told you quit months ago."

I feel the world closing its walls on me, and where's my escape? Cato? Thomas? Evelyn?

"You know, I've done my research, and I know where you ran off to," Cato's jaw ticks. "Who you ran with."

I swallow.

"Thomas Smyth," Cato drags on, his voice deep and edging on a predatory growl. "From what I've learned, he's not favoured well with law enforcement, but never a target. He owns more than what he lets on—a whole fucking street near the centre of the city. Nothing high class, though. Nothing like what you're used too." He looks up at me, his gaze curious. "So why him?"

"You have to understand that it's better this way," I whisper. "I was nothing at the hospital, like I was just another bloody corpse that they had to discard."

"You have no idea what Thomas does, do you?"

"And you do?"

Cato runs a hand through his chestnut hair as the question spears me against the door. How does Cato know? But the question is only short-lived as feelings of a bitter heat swell in the pit of my stomach. There's no trust between Cato and I, nothing like what we had as children. In fact, there's so little of it that he had to pry into Thomas' background.

I straighten my back. "I know what Thomas does, and I know what I'm getting myself into. Not even you can convince me otherwise."

This breaks him, and I find myself pinned against the closed door with his chest against mine. His rampant heartbeat thumps in his chest like a scarred rabbit. His green eyes burn brighter than the sun, blazing, heat scorching and gaze ravenous.