“Don’t worry,” Weston breathed from behind me, his face close to mine. “He won’t hurt you. And if he starts anything with any of us, we can take it.”
In what world did it seem like this would be a good idea?
They were fucking insane.
I gritted my teeth and prepared for the worst.
TWENTY-ONE
The boys melted into the shadows, and it was just us.
Tension grew thick in the air as Caiden stared at me. His hood was partially obscuring his face, but his bandana was pulled down, and I could see the tight set of his mouth as he prowled towards me. I took a step back, then another, suddenly afraid. My back hit the cold stone wall, and suddenly there was nowhere else to go.
His hands hit the wall either side of me, and he leaned his body into mine.
“What the fuck, Winter?” His whole body was vibrating with anger.
I swallowed hard, trying to stop my voice from shaking. “Do you have any right to be angry?” I whispered.
“Yes, I fucking do,” he snarled.
“Why?”
“Because you’re not theirs.”
Fury replaced my fear at his harshly spoken words. “You sound like a broken record, Caiden. I told you that I couldn’t deal with this anymore. Leave me alone, please.”
I pushed against his chest and ducked under his arm, running blindly, needing to get away from him. I tripped over a loose cobblestone, and I was falling, the ground slamming up to meet me.
Arms caught me, and he spun me around, pulling me to his chest. “Stop fucking running from me. You didn’t let me finish,” he gritted out through clenched teeth.
Manoeuvring my arms from his grip, I reached up a shaking hand and pushed his hood back, needing to see his face. In the dim moonlight, his eyes were hard, angry, black and fathomless like the ocean below us. “Finish, then.”
“You’re not theirs,” he repeated, glaring at me.
“Yeah, I heard you the first time. Do you have anything else to add?”
He stared silently at me for a long time.
He let go of me.
He let me walk away.
Tears filled my eyes as I reached the castle wall once again, and I slumped against the stone, defeated, hidden by the shadows. He was never going to change. He was too fucking stubborn.
I sniffed, wiping a tear away, furious at myself for crying over him.
“Snowflake.” I nearly jumped out of my skin at his voice, right behind me. I let him turn me around to face him, and our eyes met, his face blurry through my tears.
He let out a pained groan and grasped my face in his large hands.
The sob ripped from my throat.
“I’m not my mother. I wish you would see me when you look at my face. Not her. Me.”
“Winter.” He kissed away a tear trailing down my cheek and wiped the tracks with the pads of his thumbs. “I know I’m fucked up.”
“I can’t do this with you anymore. It hurts too much,” I whispered brokenly, shaking my head, attempting to move away from him.