The knife slides between my ribs like butter, cold and intimate.
Emily's face hovers above mine, beautiful and terrible, her silver hair falling around us like a curtain. Blood bubbles up in my throat as she twists the blade, and she's crying, screaming words I can feel more than hear.
"I love you, I love you, I love you."
Each declaration punctuated by another thrust of steel through flesh. My hands clutch at her arms, trying to push her away, trying to pull her closer. I can't tell which. The pain is everything and nothing, spreading through my chest like fire and ice simultaneously.
"I love you so much, Danny."
The knife finds my heart.
I jolt awake with a gasp that sounds more like a choke.
My arms are wrapped around Emily so tightly I can feel her ribs compress under the pressure. She's pressed against my chest like I'm trying to absorb her into my body, my fingers digging into her back hard enough to bruise. My heart hammers against my sternum, the phantom pain of the blade still echoing through my chest.
Emily's blue eyes are already open, watching me in the dim morning light filtering through the curtains. There's no fear in her expression despite my death grip. Just a soft smile that makes something in my chest loosen and tighten simultaneously.
"Bad dream?" she murmurs, her voice rough with sleep.
I nod, not trusting my voice yet. My fingers slowly relax their grip on her back, though I can't quite bring myself to let go completely. The nightmare clings to me like cobwebs, sticky and suffocating.
Emily shifts slightly in my arms, bringing one hand up to stroke my hair. The gesture is soothing, maternal, and I feel myself melting into it despite the adrenaline still coursing through my veins.
"Want to talk about it?" she asks, her thumb tracing gentle circles against my scalp.
"No." The word comes out flat, automatic. I loosen my grip on her slightly, feeling the sweat cooling on my skin. My heart's still racing, but something about saying it out loud makes the nightmare start to fade at the edges.
Except it doesn't, not really. Because even now, even awake and rational, I'm clinging to Emily like she's the only solid thing in the universe. In my dream she killed me. Stabbed me over and over while crying about love. And the second I woke up, my first instinct was to hold her. To seek safety in the arms of the woman who'd just murdered me in my subconscious.
What does that say about me?
Emily must sense something in my body language because she shifts closer, wrapping her arms around me more firmly. Her warmth seeps into my chest, chasing away the phantom cold of the dream blade.
"Is there anything you want to ask about?" she asks softly. "From last night?"
Last night. The question she asked while riding me. The promise I made without thinking. The tears and desperation in her eyes when she swore she didn't kill Franklin.
"Yeah, actually." I pull back just enough to see her face properly. The morning light catches in her silver hair, making it glow like captured moonlight. "Were you happy with Franklin?"
Emily's expression shifts, something complicated flickering across her features. Surprise, maybe. Or pain. Her thumb stops its soothing circles against my scalp, her hand going still.
"No," she says after a long moment. The word comes out heavy, weighted with years of something that looks like regret. "He sold me a lie."
I stay quiet, giving her space to continue. My arms stay wrapped around her, but looser now. Less desperate.
"I thought I loved him," Emily continues, her voice dropping to something barely above a whisper. "I really did. I was young and stupid and I believed everything he said." Her jaw tightens, and I see her eyes go distant, like she's looking at something far away. "But he never loved me back. Not really. It was all fake to him."
The bitterness in her tone cuts through the morning quiet like a knife. I stroke her back gently, feeling the tension coiled in her muscles.
"What do you mean, fake?" I ask.
Emily's eyes refocus on me, and there's something raw in them now. Exposed. "Franklin was good at performing," she says, and the word drips with venom. "Good at saying the right things, making the right gestures. He knew how to make me feel special, wanted. But it was just..." She gestures vaguely with one hand. "It was just a show. Something he did to keep me around."
The bitterness in her voice makes my chest ache. I watch emotions flicker across her face like storm clouds, each one darker than the last.
"Honestly?" Emily's expression hardens, her blue eyes turning cold in a way that makes my breath catch. "I hate him. I'm so fucking happy he went missing."
The words land heavy between us, brutal in their honesty. Her hand moves to my chest, fingers spreading across my sternum where the dream knife had pierced. She rubs slow circles against my skin, the touch grounding me even as her admission echoes in my head.
"But I haven't thought about him at all since I met you, not since yesterday," she continues, her voice softening as her eyes refocus on me. "You're all I think about, Danny. All I want."
Something in my chest tightens and releases all at once. I cover her hand with mine, pressing it harder against my heartbeat.
"My love for you isn't fake," I say, the words coming out fierce and certain. "I'm not performing. What we have, what I feel, it's real."
Emily's expression transforms. A smile spreads across her face that's equal parts wicked and adoring, her eyes lighting up with something that should probably scare me but doesn't. It's the kind of smile that promises both salvation and damnation, and I want to drown in it.
"I know, Danny," she purrs, her fingers flexing against my chest. "You're so good at loving me. So perfect at it."
Her hand slides up to cup my face, her thumb tracing my bottom lip with reverent precision. The intensity in her gaze makes me feel pinned, examined, worshipped.
"That's why you're mine," she whispers, leaning in until our foreheads touch. "That's why you'll always be mine. Forever"
I should probably be disturbed by the possessiveness in her voice, by the way she said she's happy Franklin disappeared, by the dream that still clings to the edges of my consciousness. But all I feel is relief. Relief that she chose me. Relief that whatever happened with Franklin, she's here now, in my arms, looking at me like I'm something precious and vital.
"Forever," I agree, and I mean it with every fiber of my being.