Chapter 134
Kara
The world tilted as Asher carried me through the party house, my head lolling against his chest. Everything smelled wrong—stale beer, cheap perfume, and the acrid stench of my own vomit clinging to the hem of my dress. My stomach heaved again, but there was nothing left to bring up.
Pathetic. You're so fucking pathetic.
"Here." Blake's voice cut through the fog. I felt myself being lowered onto something soft—a leather couch in what looked like a guest bedroom. The walls swam in my vision.
"She's burning up." Asher's hand pressed against my forehead, cool and steady. Through the mate bond, I felt his iron control fracturing. All my fault. Should have stopped this earlier. Should have—
Stop. Blake's mental voice cracked like a whip. Blaming yourself helps no one.
Someone draped a jacket over my shoulders—Blake's, carrying that explosive fire-and-leather scent that made my wolf whimper with confused need. My traitorous, stupid wolf who couldn't remember that these same hands had shoved me into snowdrifts and locked me outside to freeze.
He crouched beside the couch, using a cocktail napkin to wipe the corners of my mouth with surprisingly gentle touches.
Don't. Don't be gentle now. I can't handle gentle when you used to be so goddamn cruel.
"Cole," Asher said quietly. "Ice. Water. Now."
Footsteps retreated. I tried to focus on Asher's face, but two of him kept blurring together. The room spun like I was trapped on a carousel from hell.
"Fat pig," I heard myself mumble. The words tasted like battery acid on my tongue. "Debt slave. Tumor."
That's what they said. That's what YOU said. All of you.
Asher's jaw turned to granite. Through the bond, his fury detonated like a grenade—not at me, but at himself. We did this. We created every scar she carries.
Damn right you did, asshole.
A cold compress materialized on my forehead. I flinched at the shock of it, my whole body jerking like I'd been electrocuted. But Asher's other hand caught the back of my neck, holding me steady as he gently patted my burning cheeks.
"Little Luna," he murmured, his black-ebony-and-tobacco scent rolling over me in thick, deliberate waves. "I need you to focus on my voice. Just my voice."
But I couldn't. The room kept tilting, and tears were sliding down my face without permission. I hadn't even realized I was crying.
Stop crying. You swore you'd never cry in front of them again. You SWORE.
But the alcohol had stripped away every defense. Ten years of holding it together, and now I was falling apart on a stranger's couch while my childhood tormentors played nurse.
Fuck. Fuck fuck FUCK.
Cole reappeared with a bucket of ice and three bottles of water. Blake snatched one, cracked it open, and pressed it to my lips. "Small sips, Princess. Come on."
Princess. He calls me Princess now like he didn't spend years making sure I knew I was trash.
The water was cold. Clean. It washed away the bile taste, but not the shame burning in my chest like molten lead.
You're safe, all three of them pushed through the bond simultaneously. Safe. Ours. Protected.
Liars. You're all goddamn liars.
Their pheromone thickened in the air—black ebony, fire-and-leather, mint-and-ozone braiding together into something that should have been overwhelming but instead felt like armor wrapping around my shattered defenses.
I managed to swallow two mouthfuls before pushing the bottle away. My eyes focused on the ceiling—white plaster, a boring light fixture, so much safer than looking at their faces and seeing the pity I didn't fucking deserve.
"You really said those things," I whispered to the uncaring ceiling. "About me. You really... really meant them."
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Say something. Deny it. Tell me those bitches were lying.
But they didn't. Because they couldn't.
Because it was all true.
---
A soft knock interrupted the terrible quiet. I didn't have the energy to turn my head, but I felt Blake tense like a coiled spring ready to strike.
The door cracked open. A woman stepped inside—tall, willowy, with long chestnut hair and the kind of effortless beauty that came from good genes and expensive skincare. Her scent hit me a second later: jasmine and... cedar? No, that was someone else's scent mixed with hers.
Great. Another ex-girlfriend here to gloat.
Vivian, Blake's thought came sharp with surprise. What the hell is she—
"I know I'm probably the last person you want to see right now," Vivian said, raising both hands in a gesture of peace. Her voice was steady, mature. Nothing like the shrieking harpies who'd cornered me upstairs. "But I need to talk to her. To Kara."
Blake rose to his feet, positioning himself between us. "This isn't the time."
Damn straight it's not the time. The time was ten years ago when you could've—
"I think it is." Vivian's gaze slid past him to me. Something flickered in her expression—not pity, but recognition. Like she was looking in a mirror that showed the past. "I know what it feels like to be the girl everyone hates just for existing near them."
I let out a bitter laugh that sounded more like a sob. "You had friends. You were popular. You had money, you were gorgeous—"
"None of that mattered." She moved closer, perching on the arm of the couch. Her jasmine scent wasn't cloying like the others'—it was soft, almost apologetic. "In Silver Frost, every girl wants to be Luna. And when they can't have it? They destroy whoever can."
She glanced at Blake, and something passed between them—a shared history I'd never be part of. My stomach twisted with a jealousy so sharp it cut.
She got his normal years. His almost-human years. I got the monster.
"They shredded the paintings I was preparing for my art show," Vivian continued, her voice matter-of-fact. "Put a dead rat in my locker. Locked me in the girls' locker room without my clothes during a fire drill." She paused. "Want to know why Blake and I broke up?"
My heart stuttered. Through the bond, I felt Blake's discomfort spike like a fever.
Oh god. Oh shit. I don't want to know. I don't—
"He called me the wrong name," Vivian said. "Twice. In bed." Her smile was sad and knowing. "He called me Kara."
The world stopped.