Semua Bab HE BROKE ME; THEN HE OWNED ME: Bab 151 - Bab 160

~ElenaKatherine’s mouth was quivering, not quite a smile. She let the silence sit for a second, like a challenge, then reached into the clutch at her side and produced a thin envelope. The move was small, practiced, one of those gestures that means you’ve rehearsed surrender and leverage a dozen different ways.“You want something worth my life?” she said, folding her fingers around the paper as if it were delicate glass. “Fine. I’ll give you three things, Elena. Three reasons to keep me breathing.” She slid the envelope across the table. The paper made a small, clean sound against the wood.I didn’t reach for it. I watched her instead, watching the way her hands kept steady. People get nervous when their value is in a little packet. They either crumble, or they become lethal. Katherine was the latter.“First,” she said, “I know every route, every safe house, every smuggler and broker that keeps the border towns fed and armed. I can strangle or feed. I can make your enemies starve

Her fingers were trembling where they clung to my shoulder, but it wasn’t fear, it was hunger. I kissed down her chest, then back up to her throat, tasting her pulse as it pounded against my lips.“Thorne…” she whispered again, breathless, but still she didn’t stop me.That was all the permission I needed. My hand slid down over the flat of her stomach, undoing the button of her jeans with a roughness I couldn’t contain. She gasped as I tugged them down her hips, dragging her underwear with them until she was bare beneath me.The sight of her stole the air from my lungs. Beautiful. I crushed my mouth to hers again, devouring her moan as my fingers slipped between her legs. She was already wet, the feel of her nearly undid me. I teased her, stroking slowly, deliberately, until her hips bucked against my hand.She broke the kiss, head falling back into the pillow, lips parted in a cry.“Don’t stop,” she begged.And I didn’t. I slid two fingers inside her, curling them until her walls

~IslaI knelt down in front of the altar, the cold marble biting into my knees, but I didn’t shift. My hands were still wet from the water, my hair dripping down the back of my neck, but I didn’t care.I stayed there, bowed, because I had nowhere else to go.The priest was behind me, sitting in a wooden chair as though he had carried the weight of souls for a hundred years. His voice was steady, not soft, not cruel, simply firm, as though the words were carved into him long ago.“You’ve been saved, young woman. Go and live a holy life, kill no more,” he said, like it was an order, not a suggestion.I lifted my head slowly, wiping my eyes with the heel of my palm, though it did nothing. The tears kept coming anyway. My voice cracked when I asked, “Have I really been saved?” My throat burned, my face soaked with grief I couldn’t wash away.“Don’t doubt the power of the Most High,” he answered, his tone unshaken, like he had said these words a thousand times before. “I assure you that th

~KatherineThe door loomed behind her, and for a moment, I thought she’d refuse. I thought Luna would dare defy me again, just as she had when she stole Raven’s breath from his lungs. But then she stood, brushing her hands down her gown like some saint reborn, and walked forward.I tightened my grip on the knife, feeling the slick bite of the handle against my palm. My gun never wavered.Every step she took, I saw Raven. His smile, his voice, the way he’d lie awake whispering plans for us in the dark. And then, the way he looked at me in those last days, hollowed, poisoned, destroyed by her.“You should’ve died long ago,” I whispered, though my voice trembled with more pain than hate. “Raven would still be here if not for you.”The priest’s words echoed faintly at my back, warnings, scripture, things I once would’ve clung to. Not anymore. Not with blood burning in my veins, louder than God Himself.As she brushed past the altar, I felt a flash of anger so bright I almost lunged at h

~ThorneLiam sat cross legged on the rug, his small shoulders straight and his palms pressed together on his knees like a student in an ancient court. His hair was a wild brown halo I hadn’t bothered to tame this morning, and every now and then he looked up at me to check whether I was still watching. He always did that, made sure I was there before he dared to stumble through another line.“Say it again,” I told him, folding my arms and leaning against the doorframe.He looked down at the paper, lips moving, whispering the words before trusting his own voice.“The woods are lovely, dark and deep,” he began, halting only once to glance up.I nodded encouragement.“But I have promises to keep,” he went on, a little louder now.“And miles to go before I sleep,And miles to go before I sleep.”When he finished, he bit his lower lip the way he always did when he was proud but didn’t want me to see it.I ruffled his hair, and he laughed, that small, careless sound that always managed to