guilt immediately—I’m a bad fucking person, because in that moment, all I wanted was her lips. I didn’t give a shit about anything else.
I leaned against the cold glass, pulling up my phone.
Every night, I’d replay the last minutes before Snitch left over and over again on a loop, reading all of Story’s letters until I felt I’d memorized every secret path in her soul. At first, the sheets smelled like her, like warmth, like marshmallows. But trying to hold on to her scent was like trying to hold on to a memory.
It slipped through my fingers like fog.
You are Grayson Crowne, after all. You have tens of thousands of people sliding into your DMs. Why would you notice me?
How naive is she? It’s as adorable as it is maddening because it gets her into so much trouble. I would notice Snitch if she were one flickering star among the billion brighter. I could pick out her scent if she were one flower in a wildflower patch. I’d know her voice if she were a wisp in a windstorm.
I couldn’t not notice her. My only regret was I didn’t see the letters sooner. Almost two weeks had passed before I saw Dear Atlas in my inbox. By then, she’d stopped sending me letters.
I did write her back.
Secretly.
Because I was watched now. My Instagram. My everything. She was the only thing that got me through these two weeks locked in this fucking house, playing the perfect prince. She hadn’t read my letters yet. Maybe for the same reason I hadn’t read hers at first. It was hidden away from an account I didn’t know.
I should have told her tonight.
Even this small secret weighed.
I typed another letter to her.
Dear little wife, every secret I keep from you builds a new thorn around my heart—
“Merry almost Christmas.”
I stopped short at West’s voice, slowly turning around. Blood roared in my ears and my muscles stiffened as the world around me vanished into a pinprick.
I never thought about killing anyone. That line was so far away I couldn’t even see it, let alone cross it. Then Story kissed me, she slid into my sheets and into my veins. I would do anything for her, anything to protect her, and that line became visible on the horizon.
When she got pregnant, suddenly that line wasn’t close—I was about to fucking trip over it.
I don’t like him beneath the sheets.
He’s hurting her.
The only thing stopping me from crossing that line was Story. She saw a future for us, one that wasn’t bloody or pointless.
West’s lips were moving, and I focused past the roaring in my ears.
“…You’re gonna realize you need me, Crowne.”
I dragged my hand across my jaw. “Right. Like I need a fucking STD.”
The muscles beneath my ear were in pain from grinding my teeth and I was on the verge of tackling West to the ground.
So I turned, for the future Story saw.
West yelled to my back. “I’m the only one trying to keep our girl alive!”
Sixteen
GRAY
OUR GIRL.
Our girl?
I think I short-circuited. I spun and slammed West into the wall before my next breath. “Our girl? There is no our girl.”
The hallway was empty, only our rippled reflections cast in the glass window.
Every day I remember how he felt inside me.
I pressed my forearm into his neck until the veins popped.
And now I can’t differentiate them inside my head.
Deeper—his Adam’s apple digging into my skin.
A deep, gnawing cavern of self-loathing.
He was hurting her. I could see crossing the line, ending it here.
He coughed, sputtering, “You fucking need me.”
A wave of black washed over my eyes; I could barely see West past the throbbing in my skull.
He was hurting her.
West gripped my forearm, pulling it off enough to cough out the words: “All this reuniting the family shit is bullshit. My father burned down du Lac Manor just to force your hand so we could stay here. He burned down a house with centuries of history. A house he got a boner just talking about. Just for the chance at a coin. ”
There it was again, that knot in my gut.
Fear.
Everyone knew more than us.
But I schooled my features, I lied.
“I don’t see what the fuck this fairy tale has to do with me or Story.”
He laughed. “You’re just as shit at lying as she is. I already know you’re looking for it, Gray. You sent her a lot of texts.”
I slammed my knee into his gut and West doubled over. I knew she didn’t get my