CLAIRE

Yet this was the same man I’d chosen.

A man I had lost almost everything trying to cling to.

Before we were exposed at the banquet, I’d felt smugly satisfied at having snatched him from Lilith, at proving he was mine.

But after everything that’s happened, it’s as if a thin veil has finally been torn from my eyes, and I can now see him for what he truly is.

Greedily ambitious—yet grossly incompetent.

All at once, I felt ridiculous. Absurd, even.

Before I could sink deeper into my self-effacing thoughts, a ringtone cut across the room.

I looked up to see Brandon pulling his phone from his coat’s...