LOGINJaxx's Point Of ViewI stood up from the plush leather couch as slowly as my ribs would allow, keeping my arms locked securely around her. My side gave a sharp, familiar jab of pain, but I barely registered it. The only thing that mattered was the woman cradled against my chest, her head resting heavy right over my pounding heart, her breath coming out in long, soft, exhausted hitches. She had earned this stillness, this rest, after everything the day had thrown at her. God knew she'd fought harder today than most men I'd put in the ground ever had. Most of those men had begged, had broken, had folded the second things turned ugly. Elena hadn't folded once.I looked down at her face in the warm, dim light of the holding room. Her eyelashes were still clumped together from tears, her lower lip slightly swollen where I had bit it earlier, and her skin looked paler than usual against my dark shirt. A strange, heavy ache twisted right in the center of my chest....not from the bullet wou
Elena's Point Of View"Elena... you don't have to pretend," Jaxx murmured softly into my hair, his large hand gently cradling the back of my head, drawing me even tighter against his broad chest. "Let it all out. Let it out on me, princess. Please."Those words tore through the final wall I had so desperately tried to hold up, a wall I had spent all day reinforcing brick by brick, pretending I was fine, pretending none of it had touched me. I had told myself the same lie a hundred times since morning.'I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine,' until the words had lost all meaning, until they had become nothing more than a hollow chant I repeated to keep myself upright.My whole body shuddered violently, and I broke right there in his arms. The tears came spilling over my lashes in hot, uncontrollable rivers, soaking straight into the shoulder of his black shirt. A loud, terrible sob racked my chest, cutting off my breath until I was practically gasping for air against his neck. I felt something
Elena's Point Of View"You heard me, Cynthia," I said, my voice cutting through the thick, stifling air of the basement like a freshly sharpened blade. "Or do you need me to write it out in clear, simple letters so your liquor-soaked brain can actually digest it?" Cynthia's jaw worked silently for a moment before her pale, sunken face twisted into a grotesque, hysterical sneer. She shook her head violently, straining against the tactical ropes until the wood of the chair groaned beneath her. Something feral flickered behind her bloodshot eyes, the look of a cornered animal that had never once considered surrender. I almost didn't recognize her anymore, this shrunken, venomous creature wearing my mother's face. "He has brainwashed you!" she shrieked, her voice rising to a sharp, grating pitch that echoed off the cold concrete walls. "Look at you! Standing there defending a mobster, speaking to your own mother like I'm dirt under your shoe! He's turned you completely against your own
Elena's Point Of View"You heard me, Cynthia," I said, my voice cutting through the thick, stifling air of the basement like a freshly sharpened blade. "Or do you need me to write it out in clear, simple letters so your liquor-soaked brain can actually digest it?" Cynthia's jaw worked silently for a moment before her pale, sunken face twisted into a grotesque, hysterical sneer. She shook her head violently, straining against the tactical ropes until the wood of the chair groaned beneath her. For a fleeting instant, I saw something flicker behind her eyes… was it shame, or merely the calculation of a cornered animal searching for a way out? I couldn't tell anymore. I wasn't sure I ever really could. Once, long ago, I had believed I could read every shift in her expression, every subtle tell that meant she was about to soften. That version of her felt like a stranger to me now, a ghost buried beneath layers of bitterness and drink. "He has brainwashed you!" she shrieked, her voice r
Elena's Point Of View"How dare you say that to me?!" Cynthia shrieked, her voice cracking into a raw, nails-on-a-chalkboard rasp that bounced off the cold concrete walls of the warehouse. She thrashed against the heavy tactical ropes binding her wrists, her greasy, tangled hair flying into her face, strands sticking to the sweat on her forehead. The ropes bit deeper into her skin with every violent jerk, leaving angry red welts, but she seemed not to notice or care, as if decades of denial had numbed her to pain long before tonight."I am your mother, Elena! I carried you for nine agonizing months! I went through blood and sweat to bring you into this world! I made you! I gave birth to you! I gave you life, and you dare stand there with that arrogant, ungrateful look on your face and treat me like trash?!" She spat onto the dusty floor near my sneakers, her face twisting into an ugly, venomous mask, years of resentment carved into every line of it. The fluorescent light above flicke
Jaxx's Point Of ViewI woke long before the morning sun managed to fully cut through the heavy black-out curtains of my bedroom. I looked down at my chest, where Elena lay completely sprawled out, her face buried into my ribs and one of her bare legs thrown over my thighs. Her breathing was slow and even, a small miracle after everything she'd carried the day before. I studied the faint shadows still lingering beneath her eyes, evidence of a grief that sleep alone couldn't erase, and felt a familiar tightness settle in my throat. Watching her like this, unguarded and still, I found myself cataloging every small detail of her face, as if committing them to memory might somehow protect her from whatever came next. We had stayed up ridiculously late the night before. Even after the heavy tearful breakdown and the late-night soup, she had stubbornly refused to close her eyes, insisting that we play an old multiplayer mobile racing game together on our phones, as though pretending the w
Jaxx’s Point Of View “Oh… I came to check if you’re still breathing, Matilda.” Her lips parted, her breath hitched, shock painted her expression. She hadn’t expected that. She stiffened in her seat, as though the words themselves burned her skin. And that’s when the old man snapped. “Watch y
Elena’s Point Of View“Tell him you’re done with his bullshit. To hell with him. And come to me. Do that…” his smirk was pure challenge now, “and I’ll give it to you.”For a moment, the world stopped. My ears roared, a violent rushing sound, as though blood itself rebelled against what I’d just hea
Elena's Point Of ViewThe collision left my body trembling, the impact reverberating through every inch of me. My breath came in shallow gasps, heart hammering like a wild drumbeat in my chest. The silence afterward was suffocating, pierced only by the relentless patter of rain against the twisted
Lilian's Point Of ViewI could barely hold in the scream clawing its way up my throat.The hallway was dim, the shadows from the chandelier slicing across the marble tiles like jagged blades. Graham’s arm wrapped around my waist as we ascended the stairs, his grip possessive, almost as if trying to







