Page 172 of Wallflower

“I killed them.”

“Them? Who? When?” Her silence is unsettling, a cold seeping into my bones. “Flower…did you kill Shantel?”

Slowly, she nods, a deep rooted tension dissipating at the confession.

“Why? Were you jealous? She meant less than nothing to me.”

“You think I’d commit murder over something as trivial as jealousy?”

“Then, why? Why would you hurt Bucky like that? His parents?”

“I don’t care, Rip. I know I should, but I just don’t. Not when it comes to you.”

“Baby…” I’m fucking torn, so unfathomably fucking angry at her for this, for hurting my best friend in a way I can’t fix, can’t reveal.

“Ripley, I’d conjure her from the dead if I could, just so you could watch her demise this time. I’d skin her alive if I thought it would bring you peace, healing.”

How can I be so enraged when she’s saying all the right things? My heart thawing and melting with every word that tumbles from her soft, lethal lips.

“He doesn’t deserve this,” I rasp, thinking of the pain in Bucky’s eyes, the way Kyle had to hold him back from diving off the cliff’s ridge to get to his sister’s contorted corpse.

“Maybe not, but you didn’t deserve what happened to you either.”

“You shouldn’t have done this.”

“Gaze upon my field of fucks and see that it is barren.”

“Rose…”

“No. Don’t do that. She hurt you, and not only was it eating you, it was taking bites from me too. You couldn’t see what I did. The way it affected you when you thought no one was watching. You tense at her voice, her laugh. Flinch when she gets too close. Fuck, your dick went soft inside me.”

“So you kill her?”

“Yes,” she growls, hooded eyes looking up at me. “Whip me, beat me, do whatever if it makes you feel better, or brings some retribution in your eyes for the pain I’ve caused, but I won’t say I regret it.”

“Why?”

“Why?” The word is a forced laugh. “What a stupid fucking question. You knowwhy.”

"Why me?”

“What? Why you?Why do I love you? Are you fucking serious?”My unfocused eyes snap back, zipping to her angelic fucking face. “Because you’re fucking you. And it's somehow everything I ever wanted.”

Despite her putting me in an impossible position, the rage I desperately tried to cling to this entire time evaporates to nothing. I’ll carry this secret to my grave for her. Crawl across smouldering embers to prove my devotion to her. Because shedid this for me. Despite everything that she went through, what I plotted to fucking do to her, she chose to protect me, to end my fucking torment, no matter the cost.

“You love me?”

“Of course I fucking love you.”

"You’re not just saying that?” Fuck I sound like an insecure, love-struck fool.

“No,” she smiles softly, a blush warming her cheeks, “you’re it for me.”

“Really?”

“Yes."

She’s perfect. She’s fucked up. And she’s mine. Wholly. Completely. Irrevocably.