Haunting-Adeline

I had forgo en what it felt like to truly be scolded like a child. My mother
does it o en, but considering that’s all she’s ever done, it felt less like being
scolded and more just like a normal conversa on with her.
But now? I feel nothing but small and bent out of shape, like a piece of
paper wadded up in Zade’s fist. Pride bucks against that feeling, and I want
nothing more than to snap something clever back and hold on to my
dignity.
I’d only be proving him right, though. He’d look at me with superiority,
and I’d only shrink further beneath him.
“Okay,” I relent. “Fine. I’ll just be mad at you for being a creep then.” I
pause, ha ng the words but knowing they need to be said. “I’m sorry for
misplacing blame, but I’m not sorry for the ass bea ng you’re about to
get.”
He suppresses a smile, but he can’t contain the emo on in his yin-yang
eyes. Pride. Amusement. Something deeper and far scarier than Zade’s
hand wrapping around my throat.
I don’t give myself me to panic, nor do I hand myself over to the heat
he invokes, I just let my body take over. I jerk to the le , bringing my elbow
down on his outstretched arm before he can blink.
His grip loosens. And I seize the moment, pouring all my frustra on into
my limbs. I may not be able to hate him for Max’s misplaced blame for
Arch’s death or Mark’s wandering eyes, but I can use that against him in a
different way. In a way that ma ers.
I curl my fist and swing it back into his face and then crush my elbow
directly into his nose.
His head jerks back just in me, my elbow striking true but hardly
enough to be gi ed with a bloody nose.
He lets go and it feels like I can finally breathe. Not because he was
squeezing hard enough to genuinely choke me, but because I finally
succeeded.
He chuckles, deep and low, as he steps away from me. The bastard
doesn’t look the least bit ruffled, but I choose not to dwell on that. If I
focus on everything I didn’t do, then I’ll only be stripping myself of power.
“There you go. That was really good, baby.”
“Don’t call me that,” I mu er, but really, I feel a nge of pride swelling
deep in my chest cavity.