The police tried to calm him, but he shoved them aside, his grief morphing into wild obsession. “Put him in jail! Let him rot! He killed her—he killed my Seraphina—” His voice cracked again, collapsing into sobs.
He dropped to his knees once more, clutching his chest, his breath coming in broken gasps. His body convulsed with the pain in his heart, sharp and unbearable. It felt like the very organ inside him was tearing apart.
And maybe it was.
Adrian’s heart. The one that beat inside him now. The one that had always belonged to Seraphina first. Maybe this was why it hurt so much. Maybe this was why every cry he let out was heavier, sharper, filled with more anguish than he could understand.
Or maybe it wasn’t Adrian at all.
Maybe it was him.
For years he told himself Seraphina was nothing but convenience. That she was pity. That she was never love. Yet here he was, on his knees in the middle of the street, sobbing her name, begging the universe to give her back.
Because somewhere in the years, without admitting it, without realizing it—he had loved her. Truly, deeply, helplessly.
And now, she was gone.