23. Chapter 23

Chapter 23

Xavier

M y eyes kept flicking back to Axel and Kade in the room behind us. Seth and I sat out on the porch, but I could feel Kade's gaze on me. I didn't know if it was a warning, or if he was simply making sure that nothing happened to the smaller man while he stood beside me.

"You know, I don't remember him being quite so… protective of anything. Then again, my memories are all fucked up, so maybe he changed toward the end of his life."

Seth's eyes followed mine, and the soft smile that spread across his face was all sweetness, all warmth and love. He shook his head. "No, I'm pretty sure that's a new development. He still doesn't know what to do with it sometimes."

I'd never heard anyone talk about a psychopath with so much fondness in their voice. Even Axel didn't sound quite so love-struck when he spoke about me, and I wasn't anywhere near the same level as Kade.

"Did something happen when they brought him back?"

Seth paused, and his lower lip caught between his teeth in a nervous gesture; I could almost feel Kade tensing inside.

"Not exactly. I think…" He hesitated, looking me up and down. "I mean, do you feel any different?"

"No, I—"

"No, not physically. I mean do you feel things differently? Are you feeling… more than you did before?" He paused again. "More emotions."

He seemed flustered, a tinge of pink to his cheeks like he was embarrassed that he'd asked, or worried he'd asked too much.

I decided to put him out of his misery before Kade came out here and threw me over the porch railing.

"I… It's a bit different, yeah. I mean…" I pointedly didn't look at Axel when I spoke, dropping my gaze to my hands instead. "I know how much I cared about him before, but it feels… intense now." I wasn't sure how to explain it, or how much I wanted to explain to a complete stranger. But honestly, who else would understand this more than someone who'd gone through it?

"And you can't remember anything about the man you were before?" That slightly pained expression was back, but this time he was smart enough to turn so Kade couldn't study his face.

It didn't stop the man from staring harder until Axel said something, and he reluctantly pulled his attention away.

"No, not really. I have… It's almost like muscle memory. When I woke up, I knew how to use my phone to figure out where Axel was, but I didn't remember Marshall using it."

Seth frowned, biting his lower lip again. "They were talking about figuring out a way to make sure that past memories didn't exist anymore. It makes sense that they'd make sure you still knew how to navigate the world around you without remembering who your body belonged to before."

"You sound like you know a lot about it." I really was in the right place if I wanted answers, even if I wasn't sure how much I wanted to know.

"It's kind of hard not to when a company decides to completely upend your life and change everything." He'd started picking at the frayed strings of his hoodie again.

If I'd been someone else, maybe someone with a little more tact, I might have left him alone. It was obvious that the topic distressed him, at least on some level… but I wasn't sure when I'd ever have this opportunity again, and I wasn't going to waste it.

"So… you and Kade were both given the same drug as me? Or some variant of it, right?"

He forced his eyes from his fingers and looked at me. For just a second, they were still wide and just a little glassy looking, but they slowly narrowed the longer he stared.

Maybe I'd misjudged him—maybe there was more to Seth than doe-eyed innocence.

Or maybe that was the lingering effects of whoever Clay had been.

"Why are you so curious, Xavier? Stop dancing around it and just ask me what you really want to know."

Well, shit. I hadn't expected some pint-sized puppy to see right through me.

"I need to make sure that there's no chance they can bring whoever Marshall was back." I wasn't sure why I gave him the honesty he was seeking, but I didn't seem to have it in me to lie.

Not when he was glaring at me with hazel eyes that seemed to demand the truth.

And not when I could see a world of pain and anger, surrounded by edges that were still so soft, in that stare.

"I already told you—"

"I know what you told me, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to believe it until you tell me again," I snapped. I was tired of playing nice, tired of constantly worrying that the life I'd been given was going to be ripped away from me.

I was tired of worrying about—

"You know, Marshall wasn't such a bad guy. If there was a way they could let you both—"

"No." I cut him off, and I was shocked by the vehemence in my tone. If he wanted to know whether I felt more or not, all he needed to do was listen to me now. This wasn't me.

I didn't care this much.

I didn't feel this much.

And I'd certainly never experienced terror gripping so violently in my chest that it felt like it was trying to claw out my lungs. I could feel it, though, like a living breathing thing that wanted to tear me apart from the inside out.

It had nothing to do with my fear of facing death again, because I didn't remember facing it the first time. No, this fear had to do with life , the life that I'd taken. The life that should have still been standing here.

And how that life might have fit with Axel more than I ever could have.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean no . If there's any chance that Marshall still exists somewhere, I don't want to know. If there's any way they could bring him back so he could have his happily ever after, I'm sorry, but it's not happening." Seth's eyes widened, and I shrugged one shoulder. "Look, if everything you've been telling me is true, and Axel and I are soulmates—if every variation of us forever are meant to be together—I refuse to let him meet Marshall. I refuse to even give him a chance to realize that he might have fit better with him than he does with me." That trembling terror from before flickered from ice to flame, trying to burn me up from the inside out. "I'm all he needs ."

Seth stared at me, and when the corner of his mouth lifted into the slightest smile, I frowned.

"What?"

"Are you listening to yourself? I have a feeling that even if he'd met Marshall first , you'd still be the one he was supposed to be with. Sometimes…" His smile turned a bit sad. "Sometimes you don't exactly fit. Your edges are too smooth and you feel good together, but it's not perfect. But you'd just cut both of you down until it was a match, wouldn't you?"

I didn't have to hesitate. "Yes."

He laughed. "Yeah, it seems that way. Don't worry about Marshall. I met him… he was… kind. And probably entirely too good for whatever life all of us are leading now. I think he wanted to save me when I was there before."

"He did." My voice went a little soft. Maybe I could trust the man in front of me. He had a different motive than I did, but it didn't mean that we didn't want the same things.

At the end of the day, I had to take the allies I could get.

I wasn't going to admit to myself that it might have had something to do with the way Seth seemed so sure I was the person who Axel belonged with. That was a little too sentimental for someone who'd been declared one of the best assassins back when I was alive.

"Can I ask you something?" I needed to change the subject before I did something stupid, like invite him to be my friend .

"Sure?"

"How was it, remembering how the person in your head died?" That was another thing I wasn't looking forward to. I'd probably recover the memories eventually—I'd never considered how death felt . I'd never concerned myself with it because I was so sure it wasn't going to come for me any time soon.

"Oh. It was…" Seth trailed off again, and his fingers lifted and brushed against his chin. It took me a second to realize he wasn't giving me some overly dramatic gesture of contemplation; he was stroking the birthmark that stood out like a strawberry starburst on his skin.

It looked just like mine.

"It took me a while to figure it out, and I'm still not sure why he kept it from me for so long… unless he was afraid to show me how much he cared. But… it was a lot. I remembered it all, and then I realized I'd been looking at the cause my entire life."

His fingers paused on his chin. It made sense… he wouldn't have known what the birthmark was—most people wouldn't think about what their birthmarks really were.

"The cause?"

I already knew though—a starburst like a gunshot under his chin? It was pretty obvious.

"Oh," Seth tilted his head slightly so I had a full view of the mark. "After he finished his mission with Kade, he felt… He wasn't happy. Clay… uh…"

He didn't have to explain.

He didn't have to say it.

Clay had taken himself out after he'd taken Kade out. A faint part of my mind wondered if I'd do the same thing if I had to kill Axel, but I barely had time to contemplate it. My hands were moving of their own volition, pulling my shirt up and exposing my chest and stomach to Seth. I didn't know why him sharing his mark with me made me feel compelled to do the same, but I couldn't stop myself. It wasn't exactly asking him to be my friend, but I still could have slapped myself at the gesture.

His eyes widened.

"Guess we match, huh?"

"You match Kade more than me, honestly." Seth stretched his finger out and ran it along the line on my side. Not the bullet wounds, but the long drag that had to have come from a blade.

My chest twinged—a warning, maybe. I was playing with something I didn't really want, teasing at pain that I could potentially keep locked away forever. I'd been so intent on avoiding it, ready to never remember it. Instead, I shrugged.

"I'm guessing someone got a little stab happy." I wanted to rip the wound open now, while it wasn't just Axel here to deal with it. Maybe I wanted to spare him the pain of watching me remember. I didn't want him to be alone if I fell apart.

Fuck, I really loved him.

Like he was in my head, Seth's words echoed my thoughts. "Better a stranger than the person you love, right?" The frown crossing his pretty lips faded as my vision blurred.

I'd thought I might remember it in little bits, not like this. Not like this. Memory tore to the surface so violently it punched the air from my lungs.

The person you love.

A knife wound .

I—

Gunshots and a knife… and desperation clawing through my chest to go back, because I'd lost it…

I'd lost…

Images started to play in front of my eyes like a movie I wasn't sure I was ready to watch. It didn't matter, though. I'd avoided it for as long as I could, apparently. And this was the only thing left.

The only thing to remember.

The one thing I suddenly realized I wanted to forget.

Fuck you. Fuck, you don't think about anything but yourself, do you?

Axel had sounded so angry. We'd been fighting because he was afraid that I was going to get hurt, and I'd been so furious that he didn't think I was untouchable.

We'd been fighting because he wanted to settle down. Because he'd asked me…

He'd asked…

My hand flew to my chest, up to my throat. There'd been a chain there. A chain like the one Axel always wore.

It's different now.

It's not.

He'd looked so hurt.

"Xavier?" I was being too obvious. I stood with my shirt still held up with one hand, and the other on my throat. Seth was looking at me with wide, concerned eyes. But it was Axel's touch on my bare skin that made me jerk violently.

"Then just get the fuck out, Xavier." I parroted the words that were playing in my mind, and he froze. If I'd needed proof that he'd said them, it was written across his face in ribbons of guilt that left him pale, that tried to strangle him.

"Xavier, I—"

"We fought, because we always fought. And when I pulled a knife, you tried to take it… and I…" He jerked his hand from my side like my skin was on fire, but we were both looking at the same place.

The same slash on my skin.

The knife wound that he'd left behind.

I'd looked at the damn birthmark a dozen times over and hadn't remembered until just now .

Fuck. I hadn't wanted to remember. I still didn't want to remember.

The person you love . And fuck, it had been love that killed me, hadn't it?

"Xavier, please?" I wasn't even sure what he was asking, or why he was asking it. It didn't matter, because I was still remembering.

I remembered storming out and going to the building, meeting Kade there.

Going in.

I remembered finishing the job and the desperation I felt when I realized I'd lost it . Running back inside.

And I remembered the man that Axel's father had sent to kill me.

I'd managed to kill him, but not before he'd done what he was sent to do.

And I—

Fuck.

Fuck .

"Xavier, baby?" He sounded so concerned, so terrified. My eyes trailed along his body and landed on the chain he had around his neck.

The chain I'd never seen him take off. My hand came out in a darting movement, and I tore it from his throat, my brows furrowing together as I stared at the pendant. It was heavy in my hand—it had been heavy in my hand that night, too.

And…

"I remember exactly what happened now, Axel." Even as I said the words, the sharp sting of a knife, the even deeper pain of bullets tore through my mind. I could remember how wet my breath had felt, how my lungs filled with blood.

How it was so slow, and I was afraid .

"Xavier…"

"I know why I died."

And it was too much. It was all too much, and all at once. My fingers squeezed around the metal I held so hard I could feel it slicing into my palm, then I was moving. I pushed past Axel before he had a chance to stop me, past Kade who was watching the entire scene unfold with careful, curious eyes… Then I grabbed the keys from the table and ran out the front door.