I don't know at what point my body stopped feeling like my own.
Maybe it was when I saw the corpse.
Maybe it was when I started cutting.
Maybe it was when the fire rose from my mouth and swallowed his face whole, and neither Malakai nor Raphael could do anything but stare.
Or maybe it was now — sitting in the back seat of Raphael's car, with a dead man in the trunk and my pulse beating too calmly for a girl who should have been losing her mind.
I looked out the window and kept my hands folded tightly in my lap.
The roads grew emptier the farther we drove.
Buildings thinned out. The streetlights got fewer. Trees began replacing people, shadows swallowing the roadside until it felt like we were driving into a place the world had forgotten. Up front, Raphael was quieter than usual, which honestly said everything. Malakai sat beside him in silence, one arm resting near the window, his posture composed in that unnatural way he always carried himself — like no matter what had just happened, he could force his body into stillness and make the world believe it had no effect on him.
I didn't know how he did that.
Or maybe I did.
Maybe people like him learned that stillness the same way I learned silence — because life gave them no choice.
When we finally turned into the narrow road leading toward the place Raphael had mentioned, I understood immediately why he had chosen it.
Madison Street was hardly even a street anymore out here.
The road was cracked and half-eaten by weeds, branches hanging low overhead like claws trying to close in on the car. The woods swallowed everything around us. Trees, thorny brush, tall grass. Everything looked overgrown, untamed, and eerily untouched. Like no one with sense had willingly come here in years.
Then I saw the building.
It stood back from the road, half-hidden behind wild growth and neglect. Long, low, and crumbling at the edges, with windows so dirty they reflected almost nothing. Parts of the walls were stained with age and weather. One side of the roof sagged slightly, and vines had crawled up the concrete like nature had decided the place no longer belonged to men.
It looked abandoned.
Truly abandoned.
Not the kind of abandoned you saw in cities, where everyone still knew the history of the place. This looked like it had been left behind so thoroughly that even memory had stopped visiting.
Raphael killed the engine.
For a second, none of us moved.
Then I said, "This works."
Raphael looked at me in the mirror, and there was still that thing in his eyes — not exactly fear, but something close enough that it brushed against it. Like he still didn't fully know what to do with me after what had happened in the office.
Malakai got out first.
Raphael followed him.
By the time I stepped out of the car, they were already at the trunk.
When the lid lifted, the metallic smell hit again.
I looked at Lorenzo's body only briefly this time. That was enough.
The woods were too quiet. No birds. No traffic. Just the rustle of leaves somewhere high above us and the creak of old branches shifting in the wind. The air felt damp and stale, carrying the smell of wet earth and rot.
Malakai and Raphael each took one side of the body and began carrying it toward the building.
I followed them inside.
The interior was worse than the outside in the way abandoned places always are. Dust blanketed almost every surface. The air was old and heavy, and every step stirred up the stale smell of concrete, mildew, and neglect. Parts of the floor had cracked. A few rusted metal shelves leaned in the corners. One wall was blackened as if something had burned there years ago and no one had cared enough to clean it.
Then we found it.
A deep, built-in basin near the back room. Too large to be a normal tub, too worn to be called a jacuzzi anymore, but deep enough. Solid. Drained. Forgotten.
Perfect.
"Fill it," I said.
Neither of them argued.
Raphael turned the old tap system after checking that water still ran, and after a few ugly coughs from the pipes, it did. Slow at first, then steady. Malakai uncapped the remaining bleach and sodium hydroxide supplies and waited for my instruction.
"Add them."
The chemicals hit the water one after the other, the smell changing instantly — harsher, sharper, almost biting.
The whole room started to stink of bleach and something more dangerous under it.
"Now put him in."
They lifted Lorenzo again and lowered him into the basin.
The body sank awkwardly, half-submerged at first before settling deeper into the chemical-filled water. His suit darkened as it soaked. The burned parts of his face looked worse now. More unnatural. More final.
I stared at the basin for a moment, making sure everything was right.
Then I stepped back.
"Within three days to a week," I said quietly, "he'll be properly dissolved. There won't be much left to trace."
Raphael looked from me to the basin and back again.
He gave a low whistle that didn't sound impressed so much as deeply unsettled.
Malakai said nothing.
I could feel his eyes on me though.
That heavy, dark stare that always made me feel like he was trying to peel back layers and understand something I hadn't meant to show.
I looked away first.
"Let's go."
The ride back felt different.
Not lighter.
Just quieter in a way that made every word matter more.
For the first few minutes, no one said anything. The tires rolled over the broken road and then back onto proper pavement, the car humming through the fading evening like the world outside had no idea what sat in the silence between us.
Then Malakai spoke.
"Where did you learn all that?"
I looked up from my hands.
He wasn't turned fully toward me, but I knew the question was for me.
I shrugged lightly. "Places."
That clearly wasn't enough for either of them.
Raphael glanced at me in the rearview mirror. "No, no, no. Absolutely not. That answer is criminal." He pointed vaguely behind him with one hand before putting it back on the wheel. "The important question is not where. The important question is how the hell you stayed cool through all of that."
I said nothing.
He kept going, because of course he did.
"You were cutting off fingers like you were plucking corn off a cob." He shuddered dramatically. "Teeth. Fingers. Chemistry. Fire." He gave a horrified laugh. "What the hell, Kiera?"
That finally made me smile a little.
"I've always been intrigued by things like that," I admitted. "Bodies. Biology. Crime documentaries. Surgeries. All those things. Told you before."
Raphael made a face. "That is not a normal sentence."
"It is to me."
He groaned. "That was your first time actually doing something like this?"
I nodded once. "Yes."
Raphael nearly swerved. "Jesus Christ."
I laughed softly at that, and the sound seemed to make him tense and relax at the same time.
"If this is your first time," he muttered, "I genuinely don't know what you'll grow into."
I leaned back against the seat. "Hopefully something legal."
"That seems unlikely now."
That made me smile again.
Then, quietly, Malakai asked, "What do you want to study in college?"
I hadn't expected that.
For one second, I just looked at the back of his head.
" No need.. I'm bot even sure I would go to college."
Then I said honestly. Then he turned and looked at me expecting an answer.
"Forensic pathology," I said.
Raphael made a sound that was half disbelief and half surrender. "Of course."
Something about that almost made me laugh again.
But before I could say anything else, my mind snagged again on what had just happened — the blood, the dead eyes, the smell of burning skin, the awful stillness of the office before we moved.
I went quiet after that.
And maybe they both sensed it, because neither of them pushed further.
When we got back to the house, everything felt too normal.
That was the strangest part.
The gate still opened. The fountain still ran. The lights still glowed warm against the front of the mansion like nothing ugly had happened that day. Like there hadn't been a corpse in the trunk less than an hour earlier.
Raphael stretched the moment he stepped out of the car. "I need a shower, a prayer, and possibly therapy."
"You need silence," Malakai muttered.
"I also need that," Raphael agreed.
He disappeared toward one of the guest rooms without another word.
I went upstairs to my room.
Malakai went the other way — probably to get ready for the meeting he still had somehow not canceled.
I shut my bedroom door behind me and leaned against it for a second.
Then I went into the bathroom.
The second I turned on the shower and stepped under the water, the strength I had been holding upright all day started to crack.
Only a little.
But enough.
I braced one hand against the tiled wall and let the hot water run over me, over my shoulders, down my back, over hands that had touched too much and a mind that had seen too much.
I had stayed strong in front of them.
I had.
Because someone had to.
Because panic would have wasted time and there had been no time to waste.
But now, alone in the steam and the sound of water, I could finally admit it:
It had terrified the hell out of me.
Not enough to make me freeze.
Not enough to stop me.
But enough that now, with no dead body in front of me and no blood to clean and no two dangerous men silently watching what I would do next, my knees felt weak.
I shut my eyes.
Breathed.
Forced it down.
Because what else was I supposed to do? Fall apart now? Cry over something that couldn't be undone?
No.
I washed my hands again. Then again. Even after the blood was long gone.
And when I stepped out of the shower, I had put myself back together enough to function.
Enough.
I had barely finished dressing when my door burst open.
Bridget.
"Girl," she announced dramatically, already halfway into the room, "I have so much to tell you. School was chaos today."
I turned too quickly, my heart kicking once against my ribs before I forced myself to relax.
She noticed nothing.
Of course she didn't. Bridget entered rooms like a storm — loud enough that quieter disasters often went unnoticed.
I managed a smile. "Hi."
She flopped onto my bed immediately, shoes kicked off without care, hair falling around her shoulders as she launched into her story. Something about school drama. Some girl crying in the bathroom. Somebody cheating on somebody else. A teacher losing patience over an assignment no one had done.
I listened.
Or tried to.
But the truth was, my mind kept slipping.
Back to the office.
Back to the body.
Back to the flame.
Back to Malakai's expression when I told him to go clean himself up while I handled the rest.
Every time Bridget laughed or said something especially ridiculous, I had to drag myself back into the room.
"You're not listening," she accused eventually.
"I am."
"You're thinking."
I smiled weakly. "That too."
She narrowed her eyes like she was about to interrogate me properly.
Then the door opened again.
Malakai walked in.
He had changed.
Fresh black clothes. Clean. Sharp. Tailored in that unfair way everything seemed to fit him. His hair was still slightly damp from the shower, darker at the ends, and the sight of him looking so composed after what had happened earlier felt almost surreal.
Bridget didn't even look surprised.
Instead, she threw her hands up. "Have you ever heard of knocking, you asshole?"
Malakai gave her a flat look. "It's my house. I can do whatever the fuck I want."
Bridget rolled her eyes. "Of course you can."
"And don't talk to me with that tone."
She waved him off. "Whatever."
His gaze shifted briefly over her. "You're back from school."
Bridget deadpanned, "No, actually. I just came back from a tennis lesson."
I nearly laughed.
Malakai looked unimpressed. "You're insufferable."
"And yet deeply loved."
His eyes moved past her.
To me.
And just like that, the room changed again.
Not obviously.
But I felt it.
The earlier things came rushing back all at once — the blood, the body, his silence in the car, the way he had looked at me when I told him what to do, like he was seeing something he hadn't expected and wasn't sure what to make of it.
He held my gaze for one second longer than necessary.
Then he said, "After the meeting, we need to talk."
My stomach dropped.
I nodded. "Okay."
And then he left.
Just like that.
Bridget slowly turned to look at me, her eyes already sparkling with the kind of chaos only she could summon at will.
"Ooh," she said. "Girl's in trouble."
I forced a small laugh. "I'm fine."
"Sure you are."
"No, really. I'm okay."
She watched me for another second, but thankfully didn't press. Instead, she got off the bed and stretched.
"I'm actually exhausted," she said. "If I stay awake much longer, the stress in my shoulders is going to start charging me rent."
That made me smile more genuinely.
She came over, hugged me tightly, and pressed a quick kiss to my cheek.
"Bye, baby. See you later."
I hugged her back. "Okay. Bye, Bri."
Then she was gone too.
And I was alone.
Again.
The silence in the room felt bigger after she left.
I sat down slowly on the edge of my bed and looked at the door.
After the meeting, we need to talk.
My mind immediately did what minds like mine had been trained to do — jump to the worst possible conclusion and start building a full emotional graveyard around it.
What was he going to say?
Would he be angry now that the adrenaline had worn off?
Would he regret letting me get involved?
Would he decide I had seen too much?
Would he send me away?
To the dungeon?
The thought made my stomach twist.
I hated that the possibility still lived inside me — that no matter how much had changed in this house, some part of me still believed one wrong step could send me back into the dark parts of his world where warmth didn't exist.
I looked down at my hands.
They were steady now.
But I remembered how they had felt around the glass of orange juice when I first opened that office door.
I remembered how cold the room had gone when he looked up and saw me.
I remembered the dead man's eyes.
Then, against my will, I remembered something else.
Malakai sitting in the car, silent, thinking.
Malakai asking what I wanted to study.
Malakai looking at me with something unreadable but no longer entirely cold.
And somehow that made the waiting worse.
Because anger I understood.
Punishment I understood.
But this thing growing between us — this strange, dangerous, unspoken shift — I didn't understand that at all.
I lay back slowly on the bed and stared at the ceiling.
Outside my room, the house moved on.
Somewhere downstairs, a meeting was probably already beginning.
And somewhere in that same house, Malakai Blackwood was planning a conversation that could change everything.
I closed my eyes. Played with the bullet on the bracelet. Trying to stay calm.
And for the first time that entire day, I let myself feel afraid.