Brandon glared at the television as if sheer hatred might burn holes through the screen.
Lyse sat beside Levi Van Doren, her posture relaxed, her expression open in a way Brandon hadn't seen in a long time. She laughed at something Levi said, head tilting slightly, fingers brushing his arm with an intimacy that felt deliberate even if it wasn't. Levi leaned closer, protective without being possessive, his presence solid and infuriatingly calm.
At a fucking burial!
They looked like they belonged together.
The image made Brandon's jaw tighten until it ached.
"They must be fucking," he muttered.
The words came out rough, ugly, but once spoken they lodged themselves in his mind like barbed wire. He replayed the scene obsessively, imagining Lyse beneath Levi, imagining the way she might sound, the way her eyes might look when she forgot herself. The thought clawed at him, relentless, corrosive.
