The Siders Box Set by Leah Clifford

Author:Leah Clifford [Clifford, Leah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781912382613
Publisher: Inked Entertainment
Published: 2020-04-03T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

Kristen closed an eye and dusted from lashes to brow bone with a deep maroon shadow. It didn’t do much to slow her hammering heart. Luke’s show at Aerie would be over by now. She recited half a dozen poems from memory, the cadence of the words soothing her.

After a second layer of mascara, she studied herself in the mirror.

The image was striking. She’d grown used to her thrown together look, the lack of makeup. Of effort. The fact that she was making the effort for Luke didn’t raise any feelings of guilt. This was about false promises of things he couldn’t have. Simply playing a game. And if brushing her hair and wearing a tight top gave her an advantage, Kristen would work the angle. Luke didn’t have many weaknesses to prey upon.

Already her mind had started to crumble again. She hadn’t let Luke in enough to gift herself more than a day or two of sanity. There were no other options without Gabriel.

And she and Luke both knew it.

“If Gabriel would answer his damnable phone,” Kristen mumbled to her reflection, one finger stretching her eyelid, applying liner with a heavy hand. It’s been three weeks. He knows you’re struggling. He must. He doesn’t care. She ignored the voice. “When he finds out how bad he let things get, he’ll never leave again.” She knew she sounded like a petulant child, didn’t care.

Luke however, had answered her earlier phone call on the first ring.

She stared at herself for another long second.

“Keep yourself together,” she whispered to the girl in the mirror. The lips moved along with hers, but Kristen wasn’t sure if the girl in the reflection was acquiescing or mocking.

She lifted her phone from the vanity with a shaking hand and texted Sebastian: ‘Not to be bothered tonight’.

She stabbed Gabriel’s name on her recent calls list in one last Hail Mary chance.

“Please,” she whispered. It rang twice and went to voicemail.

“You’re angry,” she pleaded into the phone after the beep. “Want me punished? I promise, I’m punished. I’m sorrier than you could ever dream.” Her stomach felt too hollow, empty. She softened her tone. “Gabriel. Where are you?”

She hung up, tossed the phone aside. Eden would have gone after Az anyway that morning. So Kristen had given her every bit of Touch she’d had. And not only for Eden. Because Kristen’s first thought had been Gabriel. How much it would hurt him to lose Az to the Fallen. For a bitter moment she wondered what he’d do if he lost her to the Fallen.

Kristen pulled her knees up, hugging them to her chest. Deep inside her, things were breaking. He is losing me to the Fallen, she realized.

The floorboards creaked softly outside her door.

She slipped off the bed and crossed the room. At least Luke had done her the favor of using the back entrance. She lifted her hand, pressed it against the wood without opening it. From the other side there was only silence.

She turned the knob.

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