AVERY
"I still don't… trust you. But..." I trailed off, my voice breaking on the words I didn’t want to say aloud. My pride tangled with my fear, a familiar, bitter knot in my throat. The nightmare still clung to me like smoke, like blood.
I didn’t want to ask.
Didn’t want to need.
But I did.
Because in the dream, Kylen had come for me. Not the charming, polished mask he wore for the world. No, this was the real one. The monster who smiled as he slit my skin open and watched me bleed. I begged, screamed, tried to shift—but my wolf was gone, poisoned and writhing inside me. I could still feel the silver searing through my veins, his voice a low hiss in my ear. Jessa and Lyra was there as well and...
"You're nothing without me. Just a broken little girl in a cage."
He whispered it, ov
