Ss finishes his tale, eyes gleaming with a challenge as he looks at Harlow. His throat works, and his fingers curl slightly and uncurl, as if he’s checking the impulse to ball his hands into fists.


    “Who… who was it?” Harlow asks, her face pale, eyes dry.


    “Some guy,” Ss says with a jerk of his shoulder, like he wants to shrug with indifference, but is too wired to pull it off. “dimir’s goon. Don’t know his name and it wasn’t on the news. When they came for us, they took the body away and bleached the floor before the police arrived. dimir wanted the crime scene clean of his evidence, and that guy’s body was like a neon sign pointing at him.”


    Harlow turns to me, hugging herself, shivers going down her arms and sides.


    “But he’s dead,” she says, her quiet voice ringing with satisfaction. “You killed him.”


    I nod, and she throws herself at me, cool arms wrapping around my neck. Suddenly, I have an armful of naked Harlow pressing to my body, and despite the solemn mood and grim memories floating in the air, my dick twitches in my pants.


    Without conscious thought, my hand travels down her spine to settle right over her ass, and I start nning how to drag her away for a bit, when Ss’s cold voice cuts through my growing lust<span id="page_146">.


    “Don’t you want to know what your brother’sst words were?” he asks, taunting.


    “Fucking stop already,” Jack says, and I’m torn.N?vel(D)rama.Org''s content.


    On the one hand, I always wanted her to know. I wanted the knowledge of everything that led to us bing ghosts to destroy her as we took our revenge from her body. But Harlow’s grown on me. She’s be… precious, in a way. She’s suffered enough, and she’s still grieving, I can tell.


    I don’t want to add to her suffering. But of course, it’s toote.


    She turns to Ss, walking out of my embrace, her body vibrating with tension.


    “Tell me.”


    Ss watches her for a while, and I think there’s hesitation in his face. I sigh with relief, thinking that maybe there is enough good left in him to take pity on my cold, trembling little bird.


    And then he speaks, shattering my hope.


    “With his dying breath, Noah said these words: please, take care of Harlow. Promise me.”


    She freezes, her mouth falling open as tears gather in her eyes. I pray for Ss to end it there, because that’s enough opening old wounds for us all, but his face sharpens, eyes zing with a new resolve, and he adds, “And we promised. Because if your dying friend lies on the floor in a pool of his blood, you fucking promise. You tell him whatever he wants to hear.”


    He breathes hard, chest heaving, and his eyes grow hard like ss. Harlow presses her hands to her chest, and I put my arm around her, but she’s tense and rigid, unable to fold into my embrace. I look at Ss, and he throws me a mocking re.


    It’s a challenge, but I won’t stop him. I promised I’d let him do this. And I’m a man of my word.


    When I say nothing, simply stroking down Harlow’s skin and prosthetic as gently as if she truly was a wounded bird, Ss’s face turns uglier<span id="page_147">.


    He pants with the rage he pent up for two years. If he could breathe fire, he would. I know that curse we woke up with after we died burns him inside like a hot iron. I know, because I feel it, too. The trap we’re in is a suffocating, endless torture. Instead of soaring free, like dead souls are supposed to, we are branded and tied.


    To her.


    But unlike Ss, I can’t hate her. I’m no longer on board with what he wants to do. I just want her to be safe and sound. A little bird, taken care of and cozy in her nest, watched over by three vengeful ghosts.


    She is my something missing, finally found. I’ve always been a protector, and Ss is hard and self-sufficient. Wounded so much, he can’t give over control. But she…


    I sigh, shaking my head, the hot pain in my chest rising with every breath. No time for dreaming. We have hours left, and then…


    Ss’s sharp voice cuts through my thoughts. “We promised. Each of us said it out loud to ease our dying friend’sst moments. And then, just like that, he was dead. But we weren’t. Not yet.”


    Jack pants with fury on the other side of Harlow, staring at Ss but unable to stop him. It’s like he wants him to finish. He wants to hear the cursed ending of the tale, even though we know exactly how it ends. We lived through it. We can never forget it.


    “And then, the dead guy’s friends came,” Ss speaks, voice quiet, but so perfectly clear. Harlow’s breathing is shallow, barely audible. I don’t breathe at all. “Three of them. Caden shot one in the leg, and then got a bullet in the skull. Jack got three before he copsed. And I was shot in the stomach, and when Iy on the floor, waiting to die…”


    He takes a shuddering breath, rage giving way to pain, and I let go of my little bird, leaving her in Jack’s care, and go over to my hurting lover. Gently, as if reaching to touch a wild animal, Iy my hand on his shoulder de. Ss flinches but doesn’t throw me off<span id="page_148">.


    “They told me everything,” he says, voice dropping to a hoarse whisper. “While I writhed there in agony, they told me who ratted us out. They gloated while Iy there, my guts ripped open, the life bleeding out of me. And when they were done, they kicked me. So many times.”


    Harlow sobs once, her face splotchy and streaked with tears, and Ss looks up with a ghastly smile.


    “Right before I lost consciousness, I was d, angel,” he says, suddenly so calm, it’s eerie. “I was d because it was over. I knew I was dying, and I weed death with open arms. Like a beautiful angel bringing me rest.”


    We’re quiet, only Harlow’s choking sobs breaking the silence. She tries to swallow them, but they explode out of her, muffled sounds of suffering andpassion. She can’t tear her red-rimmed eyes away from Ss, both her hands, white and ck, shaking on her naked chest.


    “And then I woke up,” Ss says hoarsely, his calm features crumpling. “I was dead, and yet I wasn’t. Bodiless yet in pain, free to roam yet not to escape. I woke up in this house with clear awareness of why I was held back. Why the angel didn’t want me.”


    He looks up, hard, unforgiving eyes drilling into Harlow.


    “I made a promise, and it binds me even in death. Because I promised to protect you. I am now here, going mad from being unable to die. From being trapped in this horrible prison.”


    Harlow’s silent, frozen to the spot, and Ss grins, his handsome face twisting in an evil smile.


    “You’re my unfinished business, angel.”