Page 74 of Venom and Bind

One month later

I walked slowly down the cemetery path, my boots crunching in the snow as I passed row after row of stone markers. The sun dipped below the horizon, and I tugged my hat down, covering my ears as the wind picked up. I didn’t look up as I walked; I already knew where I was going.

The granite headstone, simply engraved with the name “Blackwood,” was at the end of the row, the dirt gravesite standing out like a sore thumb among the much older ones with overgrown grass. I stood silently for a moment, gripping the bouquet of black roses.

The lump in my throat grew, and this time I didn’t stop the tears from falling. I cried selfishly for myself because of everything I had been through the last year, but most of all, I cried for Cian. I missed him so fucking much, it hurt to breathe. I kneeled down, placing the roses at the base of the stone.

“I hate this,” I whispered as I traced the letters on the headstone. Chills ran up my spine, anger still raging through my body after all these weeks. Had it already been a month since I had last laid eyes on his face? Since I had held his limp hand in the hospital room as Thora had sobbed behind me?

I pressed my lips to his name one last time, letting the sobs rack my body. “I’m going to make this right.”

The alarm on my cell phone dinged, and I pressed the off button and headed back to my car. The drive to Cian’s parents’ house—well, technically my house since it was in my name now—was long and gave me too much time to think. I pulled up the gravel path half an hour later, staring at the house that had been my home for the last few weeks. It just wasn’t the same without him here. It never would be.

Just like clockwork, all the lights in the house turned on like they had done every night at six p.m., illuminating the entire house and the lake. Coffee. That was what I needed. I drummed my fingers on the countertop as the coffee machine worked its magic. The mug burned my hands, but I didn’t care. It was like my entire body was in a constant state of numbness. I sat down on the couch, pulling the pillow in my lap, and setting my coffee on the side table.

Looking at Cian’s family photo albums always soothed me. I traced the outline of his face in a photo from when he had graduated college. God, he looked so happy, so accomplished. The beeper in my pocket chimed three times, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up.

Almost time.

The liquid burned down my throat as I threw the coffee back, flipping the pages until I got to the end. I sank down deeper into the couch, my head resting on the pillow with my arm underneath it as I closed my eyes. The beeper went off again. Two rings this time, and I let out a shuddering breath, still keeping my eyes closed.

I didn’t know how long it was, but when my beeper chimed one time, I held completely still, counting to one hundred in my head. My ears prickled at the sound of a floorboard creaking in the kitchen, and I held my breath, listening for the noise again.

There it was. Another creak.

My entire body was on edge, screaming at me to get up and run. But I lay perfectly still and evened out my breathing, keeping my eyes closed.

I could sense him as he came closer and stood at the end of the couch near my feet. His breath was erratic, as if he was ecstatic that he had caught me off guard.

My eyes flew open as Ryzen stood not more than six feet away, his lips twisted in an evil grin.

“Hello, Nova. Happy to see…” His eyes widened, and his body convulsed as I pulled the stun gun out of the pillow and zapped ten million volts of electricity in his face.

He fell to the floor with a thud, hitting his head on the side table on the way down. I reached for my handgun in the waist of my jeans and cocked it, holding it steady on him. Orin raced through the front door, gun raised.

“Tie him up.” My hand didn’t waver as I pointed the gun at Ryzen’s head. I hadn’t expected him to hit his head on the way down; that part was just a cosmic bonus from the universe. Orin grabbed the chair from the dining room table and hoisted Ryzen up, tying him expertly to the chair. There was no fucking way he was getting loose. Not now.

His head hung low, blood dripping from the gash in his head. Suddenly his head whipped up and he gasped, his good eye wide as his gaze traveled from Orin leaning against the doorframe to me sitting in a chair across from him. He jerked in his restraints, grunting as he thrashed around.

“You’re not getting loose, Ryzen.” I crossed my leg over the other.

“You bitch, you think you’re fucking smart!” His voice was laced with panic, and satisfaction coursed through my veins.

Good, I hope he felt terrified and helpless. Exactly as he had made me feel so many times. But not anymore, and definitely not right now. No, I was as cool as a cucumber and going to enjoy every damn second of this.

“I gotta tell you, Ryzen, you look like shit.” I snickered and scrunched up my nose. His eye patch hung halfway off his head; the other half of his face was marked with discolored burn marks and scars going up his ear to the top of his head where patches of hair were missing. I noticed a bloody bandage wrapped around his right hand when Orin tied him up, the skin that peeked out looking rough and uneven. Such a stark contrast to when I had first met him—that moody billionaire with the cute dimples in the elevator now looking like a crisped-up maniac.

“I’m going to fucking kill you. Peel the skin off your—”

I rolled my eyes and twirled my finger in the air. “Yeah, yeah. You’re going to kill me. I’m going to pay. Blah, blah, blah. Play a different tune, would you?”

He huffed, his nostrils flaring. “Too bad Cian’s not here to see this play out. Oh, but he wouldn’t be. Because I killed him. And you know what?” He leaned his head forward, baring his teeth. “I fucking loved it.”

“But did you though?” I uncrossed my legs and leaned closer, letting my gun hang between my legs. “Did you really kill him?”

His brow furrowed, his eyes moving back and forth as if thinking. “You’re trying to trick me, bitch. I fucking killed him. I saw him buried. I saw you crying your pathetic heart out every single day at that graveside.”

“You saw what I wanted you to see.” I smirked and tilted my head to the side. “Maybe I’m not as stupid as you thought after all.”