When There Is Nothing Left But Love

She was obsessed with Buddhism. The moment she was saved, she erected a Buddha statue in her room and started worshipping it. Tessa sat cross legged before the statue and put her hands together as she muttered the mantras under her breath.

“What do you want to talk about?” she said.

I looked at her and answered, “Do you really believe he’ll bless you?”

She looked at me from the corner of her eye and replied sternly, “I wouldn’t be talking to you now if he doesn’t.”

Well, that was one woman far gone in religion. I paused for a moment. “They said you live in A City. Laurel’s going to open up a shop there once we get back. Want to join us?”

“No,” she refused firmly.

I nodded. “I didn’t mean it, you know. I didn’t want to hurt you guys. I really didn’t. I never expected Dante to hurt you like that. I—”

“Enough!” she interrupted me and threw me a dirty look. “Do you really think you’re that noble, Stovall? You keep looking down at us from a pedestal. Has anyone ever told you you’re one heck of a hypocrite?”

at her,

yourself, but you’re a cold, selfish woman. And yet you keep trying to make yourself out to be some saint. You come from a privileged background, men fawn over you,

gaped at her, having

was spurred on by my silence. “You’re just pretending to be a good guy, but you hate me more than they do, don’t you? That’s why you kept quiet when Dante chose me. Because you’d feel

had a point. Humans would tend to be sentimental, and even though I knew some part of her answer was fueled by her own rage, I couldn’t help but feel that I had the

with the flow and didn’t do everything I could. even though I knew Ashton might

Got nothing to say to that?” She sneered with

anything. Not many people could face their own darkness head on. Me

…

through the glass and covered the bed with golden dust. It was already

from Venria without any passport or ID since the security was lax thanks to Armond, but it wouldn’t be so easy the other way around. Fortunately, Nora and the girls called their families and asked them to send the necessary

I memorized was Ashton’s. That proved to be a headache for Armond, and he had to talk to a lot of people

flight tickets. At the

held my hands. “You can’t imagine