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I shifted back on the narrowher roo, stretching up in height, the way everyone seeuous line into being a teenager An almost-adult

But the way she cried, the way she wrapped her arainst my neck--that was a kid That was a kid who’d already lived a hard life and was being asked to take on more

"I know," I said quietly "I know"

The darkness rose and fell overthe simple fact that hts But hours later, no matter how still I forced s--the feeling that they were still running

11

I WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING looking for a fight Muscles ached that I didn’t know I had, and my feet screamed bloody murder when I slid my tennis shoes back on All the sleep had done was process y to burn I opened the door and shut it behind me as quietly as I could, so as not to wake up Zu

The manual clock in the hallway said 4:45 AM It would be another hour before anyone else was up and ready for the day Plenty of tih ht in the gym was already on, and my whole body tensed in anticipation when I saas running on the tread quick, confident strides Cole must have seenand didn’t acknowledge ht next to thebelt

"Not in the

"Too bad," I said, walking over to retrieve two pairs of gloves "I a to warood five runt and hit the STOP button on the loves from the floor, his face flushed froht I had half a second to drop back into a fighting stance before his knee rose up toward ht by yet another obvious swing heout of s It was a distraction--he had le heartbeat

I twisted out fro to use the oing to happen The best I got was a stoh, not the way he normally would have I felt the temperature in the roo ust No The word shot through my loves The sparring may have started as a way to release so me alive from the inside out, but my head had hooked into the rush of it in a way I hadn’t expected I needed hts of Cate and Jude and aiting for us at the end of all of this out ofit out

I lowered ed toward him I saw his expression darken in the mirror in front of him just before he slam us both sprawling back onto the edge of the ed me by my neck further onto the mat, and then he showedto roll or kick hi He had ht settled on my chest One hand pinned mine overjust the right aen supply down to nothing

He eased up on my windpipe, but not byup to try to hit his lower back His skin seeainst his skull, his face set with fury

I choked in a shallow breath, but he didn’t pull back-- into that sa in my eyes

"Cole--" I choked out "Stop--"

He didn’t hearto be able to touch him And I knew that the only way out of this was in

I drove into hisa punch I should have landed the hit and bounced back out, let it register like an electrical shock to his syste it back down, drowning ht swirled aroundinto shadows that became a sht coh the curtains that --food The trail of gray floating aroundfrom the closed oven door Pots and pans popped up on the stove, appearing one at a ti sound came from the brown sauce that had boiled over the lip of thea sie point fro blond hair and the hands that kept pushing er floodedto reach for so the wo familiar about it, the shape of the nose, the set of the jaw--I knew this face, I’d seen two younger versions of it He had gone a shade past red and was screa the rooaze shifted down, taking in his dark, wrinkled polo shirt, the squir pink in the face as he cried, trying to wriggle free, reaching forat the ends The first sound that broke through thewail of terror as the ht it up near his face, as if he was going to press its tip against the baby’s cheek