All Chapters of The Darkest Devotion: Chapter 21 - Chapter 28

28 Chapters

Chapter Twenty-One

GABRIELLANice.I turn the word over in my head the entire ride home, sitting in the back seat with my arms crossed and my jaw tight.‘I was nice enough to, but don’t expect it all the time.’I scoff internally. If this is him being nice, then I genuinely don't want to know what the alternative looks like. My mind drifts, unhelpfully, to the other night. To his voice dropping an octave, to the warm press of his hand against my throat. Be very careful about the things you say to me. You wouldn't want to see me truly angry.If that wasn't anger, then what was his anger truly like?What is he actually capable of when he stops holding back?And why does my curiosity about him grow by the second?I shift in my seat and look out the window, watching the city blur past. My neck still feels warm. It's been days. Days since he touched me, days since I stood there like an idiot with nothing to say, and my skin still remembers it like a fresh burn. I reach up and press two fingers to the side o

Chapter Twenty-Two

GABRIELLAThe music cuts out for the fourth time in twenty minutes."Again," Instructor Reyes says from the center of the studio, and no one in the room breathes.We reset our positions. I roll my shoulders, trying to shake out the tension that has been building since the second run-through. The overhead lights in the department dance studio are unforgiving at this hour, and the mirrors lining the far wall give us nowhere to hide. Every mistake in one’s movement or position is right there to be seen by everyone, including yourself.The music starts again.We get through the first sequence cleanly, then the second. When we reach the lift combination in the third movement, the one that has been destroying us all week, we all hesitate before moving forward.My partner's hands find my waist, and I go up, but when I come down, my movement is slightly off-axis, and the whole formation on my side lands in the same graceless manner.Instructor Reyes raises a hand. The music stops and heavy si

Chapter Twenty-Three

GABRIELLAThe pills are in my apron pocket, and every time I move, I feel that small weight against my hip. It’s not physically heavy, but the potency of what I’m about to do makes it so. Nicole folded them into a tissue and pressed it into my palm outside the studio after class today, calm as anything, like she was handing me a stick of gum. ‘Put it in his drink, not his food,’ she’d warned.I nodded and shoved it in my jacket pocket and didn't look at it again until tonight when I slipped it into my apron pocket.I turn back to the cutting board. The recipe on my phone says "finely diced," and what I've produced after ten minutes looks more like a battleground. My eyes are watering, and I tell myself it's only because of the onion, even though I know my hands are shaking for another reason entirely.In two hours I'm going to do something I can't take back, something that could possibly go wrong.When Nicole handed me the pills, I wanted to back down. I wanted to tell her I was not

Chapter Twenty-Four

GABRIELLAThe bass hits me before anything else does. The music is thumping and the disco is dizzying. Lisa's hand tightens around mine as she pulls me into the crowd.I've been to parties before, if you count Papa’s exquisite dinners where I had to watch from my bedroom window.This is vastly different from those formal events. There are bodies everywhere. Some are dancing, some are doing…other things in the dim corners of the floor, pressed up against walls and each other in corners where the lights are low enough, and none of them seems to care who's watching. Smoke hangs in the air, sweet and heavy, and I have to fight the urge to cough or press my hand to my nose. I don't want to look like what I am.A girl who's never been to a real party in her life.Lisa weaves through the crowd like she's done this a hundred times, and maybe she has, and I follow with my fingers locked around hers, my heart thumping in rhythm with the music.We reach a table near the back where the lighting

Chapter Twenty-Five

LEONThe moment I jerk awake, I know something is wrong.First, my head is pounding. The terrible ache makes it almost impossible to open my eyes, but I do, equally forcing myself to stand from the sofa.The second thing I notice is that my legs take a second longer than they should to cooperate. I brace myself against the armrest and wait for the room to stop spinning. The apartment is dark except for the city light coming in through the curtains.Thirdly, the house is quiet. It always is, considering there are just two of us living here, but something about this particular silence makes my back stiffen.My hand goes to my waistband out of habit, my fingers closing around the gun I always keep there, and I step forward and try to remember how I ended up asleep on the sofa. My neck aches from the angle my head had fallen asleep in, and my body feels unnaturally heavy.I look at my watch. It’s a few minutes past midnight.Without thinking, I move to Gabriella's side of the apartment.I

Chapter Twenty-Six

GABRIELLAThe first thing that hits me is the lights.It comes through my curtains in harsh stripes, directly on my face. It drags me out of my sleep. My eyes open slowly, and then I wince and cover my face again, blinking to adjust to the brightness of the room. My head aches as I glance around me. The ceiling above me is familiar. I’m in my room. My bed. I can’t remember getting in here. I look down at the stuffed rabbit tucked under my arm, which I don't remember reaching for.I lie there for a moment, waiting for my brain to catch up.Then I turn, and I see him.Leon is sitting on the small sofa in the corner of my room, his elbows resting on his knees and his head bent forward into his hands. He hasn't noticed I'm awake. He's just sitting there, still as everything else in the room, and the sight of him is so wrong that for a long moment I just stare and try to figure out if I'm still dreaming.He's never been in my room before. He’s never even been on my side of the penthouse a

Chapter Twenty-Seven

GABRIELLABy Monday morning, the apartment walls feel like they are closing in on me.The feeling has been building since Saturday morning. The unease and silence from Leon, Nicole and Jack.The tension between Leon and I has taken on a physical quality. It feels like a third presence moving through the rooms with us. He hasn’t stopped cooking for me, and that presence sits at the table between our plates, filling the hallway when we pass each other without speaking, and occupies the space between us as we remain at opposite ends of the apartment, avoiding each other. So this morning, I get dressed faster than I ever have and head to the parking lot before he can enter the kitchen to make breakfast. When he sees me leaving, he follows silently behind me.The car drive is more torturous than any other drive I’ve ever been on. I practically jump out of the car as we arrive at the school parking lot and rush to my first class of the day.Nicole is already at our usual spot when I get to

Chapter Twenty-Eight

GABRIELLAI make it three steps outside her office before the tears come.I hold them as long as I can, blinking hard against the burn behind my eyes, and by the time I round the corner into the main hallway, I've lost most of the battle. Nicole and Lisa are waiting by the lockers, and the second they see my face, whatever they were talking about stops."What happened?" Lisa asks, already reaching for me."I was stupid." “Gabby…” Lisa wraps an arm around me. “What went on in there?”My voice comes out wobbly. "I explained my situation to her and asked if she could take me as a private student,” I sniff. Saying it out loud makes me sound even stupider. “But she said I'm not someone she can work with right now. Or maybe ever."Lisa's face falls into something sympathetic, but before she can say anything, Nicole laughs.It's not a kind laugh. It's short and sharp."You thought she'd take you?" She asks like the whole idea is genuinely funny to her. "Gabriella, she trains the best dancer

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