Alina Phillips POV
The dead dog lay between us like a sacrifice.
But I didn't give a damn about the dog.
My eyes were locked on the medal.
My father had earned that Silver Star bleeding out in a gutter to save Jaxon's own father.
It was the only thing I had left of him.
"That's mine," I said. My voice was quiet, trembling with a rage I hadn't known I possessed.
Krystal glanced down at the collar.
"What?" she sniffed, feigning ignorance.
"The medal," I demanded. "Give it to me."
Krystal laughed. It was a wet, cruel sound.
"This old thing?" she said, fingering the collar. "It was just a trinket Jaxon gave me for the dog. He said it was lying around in the safe."
Lying around.
To him, my father's legacy was clutter.
"Jaxon," I said, turning my gaze to him. "Tell her."
Jaxon looked at the medal.
He looked uncomfortable, shifting his weight.
"Alina, not now," he sighed. "Can't you see Krystal is upset?"
"She put my father's medal on a dog," I said, my voice rising. "A dog she trained to attack me."
"It's a piece of tin!" Krystal snapped. "My dog is dead because of you!"
"I didn't kill your dog," I replied coldly. "But I wish I had."
Krystal gasped.
With a shriek of fury, she ripped the collar off the dead animal.
She strode to the edge of the terrace.
Below us, the Hudson River churned-black, freezing, and unforgiving.
"You want it?" she taunted, dangling the collar over the railing. "Go get it."
"Krystal, don't," Jaxon warned, but he didn't move. He didn't take a single step forward.
She let go.
The silver flashed in the light of the meteors overhead before disappearing into the abyss.
I didn't think.
I didn't spare Jaxon a glance.
I scrambled over the railing.
"Alina!" Jaxon shouted, his voice distant.
I jumped.
The fall was short, but the water hit me like concrete.
The cold was instantaneous. It paralyzed my lungs like a thousand needles.
I struggled downward, dragging the dead weight of my broken leg and ignoring the screaming pain.
I groped blindly in the silt and mud.
My fingers brushed against something cold and hard.
I snatched it up.
I kicked for the surface, my lungs burning for air.
I broke the water, gasping, the icy air stinging my throat.
I looked up at the terrace.
I saw them.
Jaxon was holding Krystal close.
He wasn't looking at the water.
He was pointing at the sky.
"Look, tesoro," I heard his voice carry over the wind. "The meteors. I arranged them for you. For our anniversary."
He hadn't remembered my birthday.
But he had arranged the lights for her.
I treaded water in the freezing river, clutching my father's medal against my chest.
The current pulled at me, eager to drag me under.
I let it take me for a moment.
I watched the man I loved comfort the woman who had tried to throw my life away.
He didn't search the black water for me.
He assumed I would swim.
Or maybe he simply didn't care if I drowned.
I realized then that the old Alina Francis died in that river.
And whatever crawled out onto the bank wouldn't be his canary anymore.
It would be his reckoning.
