These Violent Delights

“It would hurt you more than death, but at least you would be alive.”

“How are you this bad?” Juliette asked in disbelief. “I thought you were Russian.”

“I am Russian, not an alcoholic,” Roma muttered.

Benedikt walked to Marshall. Appearing utterly, utterly devoid of anything, anything—he put his hand to Marshall’s throat and kept it there, waiting.
A terrible noise tore forward from his cousin. Roma would hear that sound in his head forever.

Roma shook his head. He said gently, like a caress, “It was a Scarlet hit, dorogaya.”

Shanghai knows. It has always known.
This whole damn place is about to fall apart.

“Forgive me,” he breathed when they broke apart. “Forgive me, Juliette.”

“Do you not listen to me when I speak?” he answered shakily, his lip quirking up. “I love you. I have always loved you.”

“Don’t you dare,” Roma said. “Don’t you dare fall apart now, dorogaya.”

“Astra inclinant,” he would whisper into the wind, so heartachingly sincere even when quoting in Latin, “sed non obligant.”
The stars incline us, they do not bind us.

“Because this—” Roma closed his eyes. Tears. Tears were falling down his face. “This is why my betrayal was so terrible. Because you believed me incapable of hurting you, and yet I did.”