Chapter 191

Draven's pov

I finally arrived at where she was.

Not just physically,but emotionally. Mentally. Spiritually, if that counts for someone like me.

She didn’t hide.

No shadows. No veil. No mask.

She let me see her. The real her.

I don’t know if that made it better or worse.

She stood there,still as death,like she’d been expecting me. Maybe she had. Maybe she knew I’d come crawling the second she called. The second I saw that text light up on my screen.

End me.

Two words. That’s all it took to split my soul in half.

I hadn’t felt fear like that since Hazel died. The kind of fear that’s louder than any gunshot and colder than blood on your hands.

She didn’t scream. Didn’t cry. Didn’t even look angry. Just… hollow. Like a cathedral long abandoned by its God.

“I brought something,” I said, dropping to my knees like a man at confession.

Her eyes barely flicked downward as I reached into my coat and pulled out Hazel’s dagger. Polished bone handle. A name carved into the hilt,mine, beside hers.

I set it on the ground between us.

“Hazel’s favorite,” I said quietly. “It’s safer with you now.”

“You think that makes us even?” she asked, voice flat, bitter.

“No,” I answered. “I know it doesn’t.”

The silence between us swelled, thick as smoke.

She stepped forward, boots crunching over gravel. No hesitation. No mercy. She crouched and picked up the dagger, then stared at it like it was a memory she couldn’t trust.

“You’ve been watching me,” she said.

I didn’t answer.

“How else would you have found me so fast?”

Still, I didn’t answer. Because what was I supposed to say?

Yes, I installed a tracker on your burner. Yes, I’ve had eyes on you since the night you disappeared. Yes, I’ve been monitoring every whisper your name touches.

Because I’m a bastard.

And because I couldn’t lose you too.

She looked at me again,hard.

“You were supposed to let me go.”

“I know.”

“You were supposed to stay out of it.”

“I tried.”

“Not hard enough.”

She dropped the dagger in my lap like it burned her.

Then she handed me something else.

A list.

Names.

Dozens of them. Typed. Annotated. Marked.

Victims. Girls. Boys. The broken. The trafficked. The ones no one would ever come looking for.

“Save them,” she whispered, “or there’s no redemption for either of us.”

I stared at the list. Some names I recognized. Others were new. Each one a grave waiting to be dug.

“This is suicide,” I muttered, eyes scanning. “You want me to go after all these people? At once?”

“You're the mob lord, aren’t you?” she said. “Or is that title only good for fear and not justice?”

I exhaled through my nose, tension coiling in my spine.

“I’m not built for justice,” I admitted. “I’m good at destruction. At endings.”

“Then end them,” she said. “All of them.”

My hands trembled as I folded the list.

She turned away, like she was already dismissing me.

I reached for her hand.

She didn’t pull back. Didn’t flinch.

So I brought it to my lips and kissed her palm. Not for love. Not because I believed I still had the right to. But for regret. For every time I chose war over her. For every bloodied road that led us here.

“I never deserved you,” I murmured.

“I’m not yours to deserve,” she replied.

And that cut deeper than the dagger ever could.

I stood.

“I’ll go.”

“Don’t come back unless they’re free,” she said. “All of them.”

I looked at her one last time. And for a moment,I almost begged. For forgiveness. For a second chance. For something that resembled mercy.

But she was beyond mercy.

So I flew out the next hour.

Not as a mob lord.

But as her soldier.

Her executioner.

Her redemption.

Later that night…

As the jet took off, I stared out the window at the city lights shrinking beneath me.

She didn’t cry.

She didn’t scream.

She didn’t say goodbye.

I don’t know which broke me more.

Hazel would’ve said I’m a fool,bringing the dead girl’s blade to the woman I failed to save. But maybe that's what I am. A fool chasing ghosts.

“You’re quiet,” said my pilot through the headset.

“I’m thinking,” I said.

“About the targets?”

“No,” I muttered. “About the consequences.”

Because this wasn’t business. This wasn’t a hit list from a rival family or a back-alley vendetta. This was a war,against names that had never been spoken aloud. Men with governments in their pockets. Women who smiled on stages and auctioned children behind the scenes.

There would be no survivors. No second chances. Not for them. Not for me.

I opened the folded list again.

She’d written something in her handwriting at the bottom.

“Blood can’t cleanse blood, Draven. But maybe it can feed the fire.”

I stared at those words like they were a verdict.

And maybe they were.

Because tonight?

I wasn’t going to be the man she once loved.

I was going to be the monster they feared.

And when I came back...

If I came back....

I’d bring them their freedom, or I’d die trying.

Because she gave me one last command.

And I don’t break her commands.

Not anymore.

I stared at the list again, the ink blurring slightly from the pressure of my grip. I wasn’t just doing this for them...I was doing it for her. For the version of Eira I broke. For the pieces of her I shattered with silence, with power, with cowardice disguised as control. I’d hunted monsters my whole life. Now I was going to burn the ones I let live. Maybe I couldn’t fix what I ruined. Maybe I couldn’t be forgiven. But I could fight. For her. For every girl on that list.

And maybe, just maybe, earn the right to look her in the eye again.