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It made me feel even more worthless.

I was a low-life opportunistic thief that stole from assholes. I treated everyone around me like they were out to get me, and I had zero control over my wild emotions.

I was a catastrophe of a human being, and despite that glaringly obvious fact, Court had decided to bring me on this job. The money would see me through the next five years if I was careful.

And what happened after that? I kept bouncing around from place to place, burning bridges and taking what didn’t belong to me? What happened when I got older? I had no plan for my life. I’d only ever looked a few feet ahead of me, a few days at a time, like there was a perpetual fog blurring my vision and preventing me from seeing too far ahead. I didn’t want to see too far ahead.

I didn’t want to focus on my life. I hadn’t before, and I didn’t want to start now. But things were unraveling too fast for me to control. Every new bit of information I learned, every time Court looked at me like I had value, it all made me want to destroy everything around me.

He was still hiding things. I could feel it. More than that, I could see it in his eyes. An ugly, haunting truth lived beneath his placid exterior. His need for control made more sense. But his fixation on me? I still hadn’t found a single reason for it.

And no matter what I did to put him off—whether on purpose or not—it wasn’t waning. I’d thought that after I’d stormed out of the house because I felt I’d been led on, he would realize how unstable and juvenile I could be. That the more he uncovered, the less he’d want to be near me. He’d finally see there was nothing of value.

Except not a single thing had changed.

That feeling of being a petulant child had only grown since the incident, and I had never been more self-conscious of how terrible I was since meeting Court.

An itch had started in the back of my skull; a gnawing, persistent irritation that was slowly spreading through my entire body. A buzzing hive of agitated energy that made me want to claw my skin off.

For days—weeks?—I’d been haunting this house like a ghost while Court and Cade went off to who-the-fuck-knew where every day. I didn’t want to keep feeling like this, but I didn’t know how to make it stop.

Right now, as I stared out the window in the kitchen at the trees and grass and endless hills that seemed to go on forever, I had the strong urge to run into all that wilderness and disappear.

I drew the sleeve of my shirt down my arm, just enough to expose the first row of scars. An acute wave of compulsion crashed through me, and I dragged the nail of my thumb over the first scar, pressing down as hard as I could. The pain was muted, barely there, not nearly satisfying enough.

I dug in harder, wishing I had longer, sharper nails. Going over the same spot two more times, then three, and the pain was starting to pick up, starting to feel good⁠—

“What are you doing?”

I shoved my arms behind my back, whipping around to find Court standing in the doorway. “Nothing,” I said quickly.

His eyes, which had been searching my face, shot down to my arms. There was a sharpness in his gaze, a piercing shrewdness that made me feel exposed.

“Whitney.” He took a step toward me, and I took a step back.

He knew. I could see it in his eyes.

And I wasn’t getting out of this.

How could someone I barely knew make me feel so much shame? How could I let him make me feel it? I was losing control of myself. Losing control of everything I’d spent a lifetime cultivating.

“Court,” I said, trying to infuse a warning of my own into his name, except I just sounded shaky and unsure.

Because I was.

He took another step toward me, and my back hit the window behind me.

“I asked you what you were doing.” His voice was lethally soft.

I tried searching for the anger that had always been present, needing a sword, a shield, some armor, but all I could find was a soul-splitting mortification that I’d been caught. By him. That he’d found me at a moment where I’d let the darkest parts of myself loose, those shadows that would consume me if I gave them the chance.

I wanted to let them devour me right now, because the way Court was looking at me—like he was pissed off and disappointed and concerned all at once—was making my stomach roil with self-loathing.

“And I told you nothing,” I said. I ripped my eyes from his before I gave in and admitted just how broken and worthless I was. Stepping around the table, very aware that I’d have to go past Court to leave the kitchen, I avoided his gaze and tried to be as nonchalant as possible.

He snagged my arm as I tried to move past him, his grip unforgiving. “I’ll give you one last chance to tell me what you were doing.” Those penetrating eyes searched mine, imploring me to talk to him.

I scoffed and glared up at him.