Chapter 59 · The Spouse Who Survives

"Kane, drop the blade!"

He didn't.

The knife hovered over the black stone at the center of the breach, shaking in his blood-slick hand. Red light crawled through the cracks under his boots. Every pulse made the chamber buck.

The contract lay open between us, its pages pinned down by iron nails. The final line was blank.

Kane stood over it like he planned to fill that line with his own death.

"You heard me." I stepped closer. "Put it down."

His eyes lifted to mine. One was still gray. The other burned with the breach's red glow.

"Get out, Evelyn."

"That's your plan? Order me around until the city eats you?"

"It's not eating me. I'm giving it what it needs."

"Your body? Your name? Your stupid heroic little soul?"

His jaw locked.

There it was. The answer he wouldn't say.

I lunged.

Kane caught me before my fingers reached the knife. His hand clamped around my wrist, hot and hard, and dragged me against his chest. His coat scraped my cheek. Blood soaked through the fabric beneath it.

"Don't touch the contract," he said.

"Then stop trying to sign your death warrant.