Ariel takes a step. Stumbles. Catches herself on a pew gnawed to splinters by termites and time. The movement parts her dress’s torn slit—I glimpse the bandages Zoya applied hours ago, already blooming fresh crimson.
“You,” she rasps at me, voice raw from screams, “don’t get to die today. Not when you have children to live for.”
Thunder cracks. The church groans. Behind me, Feliks drags Jasmine toward the blown-out wall.
But all I smell is peaches.
Ariel limps closer. Rain pools in the part in her hair. She stops a breath away. Her palm finds my chest—over the wound Kosti’s betrayal left.
“Look at me,” she demands.
Her thumb brushes my jaw. “You don’t get to quit,” she whispers. “Not on them. Not on me.”
It’s not forgiveness—that will take time. It’s not absolution—that will take pe
