Crowed (Team Zero #2) by Rina Kent

And yet, I’m not scared. If anything, I’m curious. Intrigued. Amazed.

I want to know everything about him, but I also feel the need to push him away. All at once. He’s dangerous to the fortress I’ve been building since Maman’s death, but he’s also an excitement I’m yearning to experience. Even if for only a short while.

“You don’t want to die,” Crow says in a low tone. “You think you do, but all you want is to stop the emotions from bubbling to the surface. Sooner or later, those bottled up feelings have to be released or they will suffocate you from the inside. It’s better to attack them before they attack you.”

Anger hits me like a train crash. I try to wiggle free, but his fingers dig into my skin, bruising, steel-like. That doesn’t stop me from shouting. “Keep the psychoanalysing to yourself! What the hell do you know about me to judge me?”

He pushes me. I stumble and my back hits the wall with a thud. “Been there. Done that. Bought the fucking T-shirt, Nurse Betty. If you think that numbing your emotions will keep you safe, then fucking think again. You’re only fooling yourself, and deep down, you know it.”

“Let me go.” I claw at his forearm. I need to find refuge away from him and whatever the hell he’s saying. I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to be trapped in that endless grief.

All I have to do is run to my room, lock the door, hide under the covers, and wallow in my numbness.

Crow’s not having it. He keeps me firmly caged between his chest and the wall. His fingers continue to hold my face hostage. “Not until you admit it.”

“Fine. You’re right. Just let me go,” I say everything he wants to hear so he’ll leave me alone. I can feel that surge of emotions rushing, shooting and climbing to the surface. I need to be alone and stay the hell away from this man.

“Say it.”

“Say what?”

“That you’re not fine like you pretend to be.”

I swallow the chaos running rampant in my chest. “I’m fine.”

His grip on my chin tightens as he shakes his head. “Try again, Nurse Betty.”

“Let me go!” I scream again, wiggling against him and hitting his chest. Anything so he’ll just release me. I’m trapped, lost, and confused.

I’m not supposed to have any of these emotions. I’m supposed to feel numb.

Numbness is safe.

Crow grabs both my wrists in his free hand and yanks them above my head against the wall. He leans close, his breaths fanning my face. “We can stand here all fucking day if you like.”

“Please...” I resort to pleading. The unwelcome sensation is nearing the surface. I can’t let all that chaos out.

“Please what?”

“Please stop provoking me.” I meet his eyes, trying to find a shard of mercy in him. “Leave me in peace.”

He glares, the blue of his gaze freezing. “Admit. It.”

“I’m not fine,” I whisper just so he’ll give up already. Instead of the indifference I was used to, something cracks inside me. The sound is so crashing, I close my eyes at the intensity of it.

“Louder,” he orders.

“I’m not fine.”

“Louder!”

“I’m not fine!” A sob tears from my throat. “I’m not fine. I’m not.”

Images of Maman before her death fill my vision. She was a shell, but I’d rather have that shell than be alone. Dad disappeared when I was a kid. Papa died, and all I had was Maman. She was the anchor of my existence. When she left, the loneliness almost tore me apart.

I spent weeks roaming the house like a ghost, being swallowed in the laughs we had together. Every day, I hoped all this was a dream and I’d wake up to find her and Papa and everything that made me happy.

There’s no sense of life after her. Only deep loneliness. I can’t figure out how to live without her and Papa. I can’t figure out why I’m still existing after their deaths.

But I deluded myself into thinking I was fine, so none of those feelings would return. Numbness was a lot better than grief.

And now, because of this man, I can’t even lie to myself anymore.

I stare into the turquoise blue eyes that are breaking me and putting me back together again. Crow’s expression softens as he releases my chin and wrists.

“What do you want, Eloise?” He runs a finger down my cheek, wiping a tear, and waking every dead patch of skin in his wake. “What do you really want?”

This man. This stranger. This killer. He’s both excitement and danger. Adrenaline and confusion. He’s everything I shouldn’t want, but at the same time, he’s all I crave. All that breathes life into me.

For once, just for a short while, I don’t want to feel numb or dead.

I clutch his arm, using the deep blue of his eyes as an anchor. “I want to feel alive.”





Crow


I want to feel alive.

Just hearing those words coming out of her mouth makes blood pump in my veins.

Eloise is staring at me with those huge eyes, bright green and filled with confusion and a tinge of fear. Her lips quiver and a tremor passes through her tiny hand that’s clutching my arm.

It’s like she really doesn’t know how to do this. How to be alive.