"I'm sorry." I whispered.
His eyes—those impossible blue eyes—widened. He had already taken off his glasses when he entered the mall hall, and now… he froze.
Something about the way he looked at me, something raw, something that reached me like electricity, made my legs move before I could even think.
I bolted. Fast.
"Wait!" His voice called after me, urgent, deep, but I didn't stop. Something about him… I didn't understand it, didn't want to. I just needed to get away.
My heart hammered as I weaved between racks and displays, weaving through people, turning corners.
Then I heard footsteps behind me. Goosebumps pricked my neck. Please, not Dante's guard.
Then I heard it.
"Aurielle."
My body froze. That voice. The way he said my name—like he knew me, like he had always known me. I turned slowly.
He stepped closer.
He didn't need to see my face to know it was me. He knew by the way I carried myself, the way I moved, the rhythm of my panic. But most of all… the green of my eyes. That impossible green, impossible to mistake. My signature. His woman. Alive. Standing in front of him.
"It's really you… You're alive." His voice broke.
He reached out and took off my veil. Then he cupped my cheek.
I yanked his hand away instantly.
"Who… who are you? Don't touch me."
His eyes shattered.
I swear I could see his heart breaking right there. The way his lips trembled, the slight catch in his throat… he looked like I had just punched him straight through the chest.
"Aurielle… it's me. Kieran."
The name Kieran vibrated in the air between us, heavy and thick, but it hit me like a language I had never learned.
"I don't know who you are," I whispered, my voice trembling. I backed away, my heels clicking against the polished mall floor.
"You're mistaken. I'm... I'm not who you think I am."
"Don't do that," he breathed, taking a frantic step forward. "Don't look at me like I'm a stranger. Aurielle, I watched you die. How d...id you survive?"
He reached out again, his fingers hovering inches from the sleeve of my durga, afraid to touch me, afraid I'd vanish into smoke.
"Our son," he choked out, his eyes drowning in unshed tears. " Adrien asks for you everyday. I didn't know what to tell him...."
The mention of the name Adrien sent a sharp, stabbing pain through my skull. My vision blurred. A flash of a small, laughing face—blue eyes, a crooked bowtie—flickered in my mind and then vanished.
"I... I have to go," I gasped, clutching my head.
"Go? You aren't going anywhere," Kieran's voice shifted. The heartbreak was still there, but the D'Angelo iron was returning.
"I've lost you once. The world would have to burn before I let you walk away again."
"No!" I panicked, looking toward the mall exit.
In the distance, I saw him.
Dante's guard.
He was scanning the crowd. Then he saw me, he began coming closer.
"Please," I begged Kieran, my eyes wide with terror. "If you really know me, if you ever cared about me... let me go. Right now. You're putting me in danger."
Kieran's gaze narrowed, "Who has you, Aurielle?" his voice dropped to a lethal, quiet growl. "Who am I going to have to kill to bring you home?"
Before I could answer, the air itself seemed to shatter.
BANG.
The sound was deafening, a sharp crack that echoed off the high glass ceilings of the mall.
For a heartbeat, the world went silent. Then, the screaming began.
Chaos erupted like a flood.
People dove for cover, shoving past us, turning the orderly mall into a stampede of terror.
Kieran didn't hesitate. His hand clamped around my arm, pulling me behind the solid weight of his body.
"Get down!"
"Get away from me!" I gasped when he reached into his suit, his hands steady as he drew a sleek, black firearm.
"You have a gun? Who are you?"
"I'm the man who is going to keep you alive!" Kieran roared over the noise.
Another shot rang out, closer this time. I saw a spark hit a metal pillar inches from my head.
"Aurielle, look at me!" Kieran's voice broke for a split second, a flash of the man who had been mourning me. "I will never hurt you. I swear on our son's life. But you have to trust me!"
In the distance, I saw him—Dante's guard again, he was the one firing.
He didn't care about the civilians. He didn't care about the law. He only cared about Dante's orders: Do not let her leave the car. He fired again.
Kieran shoved me toward a clothing rack and returned fire. The sound was rhythmic, professional. One, two, three shots.
I watched in horror as Dante's guard took a hit to the shoulder, his body jerking back, blood blooming like a dark rose against his suit.
But he didn't fall. He snarled, lunging forward through the racks of clothes, knocking over displays of glass and metal to get to me.
"Let go!" I screamed as the guard's hand finally found my durga, yanking me backward with enough force to snap my neck.
Kieran dove across the floor, his fingers brushing the hem of my garment, but the guard was a beast. He kicked a heavy shelf over, sending hundreds of boxes crashing down between them.
Kieran stumbled.
He moved with a slight hitch, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He had been a shell of a man since my "death," and the shock of seeing me was draining his strength.
"Kieran!" I screamed his name—a name I didn't remember but my soul recognized.
"I will get you back!" he shouted, his jaw tight with agony as he scrambled over the debris. He reached for his fallen gun, but the guard was already dragging me toward the service exit, shoving more displays into Kieran's path.
Every clattering object, every fallen rack, was a wall Kieran couldn't bridge. He looked at me—one last, desperate look—and I saw the ghost of the man he used to be. The man I had once maybe loved?
I wanted to run to him. I wanted to fight the guard. But as the heavy steel door of the exit loomed closer, I realized the terrifying truth.
Dante's hell was waiting for me. And Kieran's heart was breaking all over again.