𝐑𝐀𝐘𝐍𝐄 𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐑 is your average do-good lawyer on the rise to fame as a representative of young victims. Except her motivations aren't all that innocent. Rayne's only goal is to run from her past, to leave confrontation for the courtroom, no...
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WITH HIS VISION ANGLED DOWNWARD, Rueben viewed the worn rubber of his high-top Converse and wondered when his life started its tumulus roll downhill. He rested his forehead on the table, shielding his expression and heart from those who he knew were watching him fall apart like he was a circus display.
He wanted to perform for them—like some rat begging for peanuts.
There was a very strong, very vicarial urge to bash his head against the metal—enough times that blood coated the floor he sat above—enough that his face was gory and unrecognizable. But he couldn't. Whether it was because he didn't have the balls, or some reasonable part of him was shouting that hurting himself wasn't going to change anything, he didn't know.
Rueben's ears quirked at the sound of the door opening and shutting. He quickly raised a hand to his cheeks, collecting his overflowing emotions before Jonah could use them against him. It was one thing to have forged evidence stacked in his name, but it was another to transform his grief into something horrifying.
If that happened, he'd actually deserve to go to jail.
—because nothing would stop him from bashing Jonah's head into the concrete.
He let his fantasy crumble to the floor like tarnished paper as he sat up, removing one mask for the other—plastering on, I'm a man, like his father and everyone else expected of him.
What Rueben didn't expect, however, was Rayne.
He blinked, and forced his eyes to focus on her fragile body—her short legs and long torso—and he drew his head back in confusion. It had been well over four hours at this point. If they were letting her back here, what did that mean for him?—what did it mean for her?
"Hi," she whispered.
The sound of her voice curdled like spoiled milk in his abdomen.
The last thing he wanted was her here.
Still, he played the part as well as anyone in his situation could. Rueben gave her a slight hand-wave, incapable of having a voice after spending the last thirty minutes crying it raw. Rayne moved closer to him, crossing the square room until she found a place beside him.
He closed his eyes, head still tilted upward at her, and breathed in her scent, her new familiarity, her humanity, and he wondered how she could stomach being near him. He had killed well over a hundred people in his lifetime, but he still mourned like the next mother-fucker.
How could she stand him?
"Stupid question, but how're you doing?"
"Guess," he barely shoved out.
She didn't respond, which begged the opening of his eyes.
Rueben sighed and took her in. Devoured the sight of her heart-shaped cheeks, and the smooth sharpness of her jaw from the seating he was in. With her still standing, he saw every underside and crevice she had to offer, and suddenly, he didn't feel so weak having her around.
