Before Gloria could press the blade any harder,

Brent lunged forward and closed his bare hand around the blade.

Blood streamed down his wrist like a creek.

Three years ago, the day I'd gone alone into a den of armed men to rescue him, he'd thrown his forearm into the path of a machete for me.

He'd told me he would only ever bleed for me, for the rest of his life.

Funny how that promise only had three years in it.

"Brent, I don't want to put you in a hard spot…"

"You're not!"

Brent turned and walked straight toward me.

"Gloria wants this dress? I'll strip it off her myself!"

The words were barely out of his mouth

before he reached down and ripped away the jacket he'd just draped over me.

Then he grabbed the collar of the gown and tore downward.

"Brent!"

I summoned every ounce of strength I had left and locked both hands around his wrist.

My eyes were bloodshot, fixed on his face, my voice raw and shaking.

"You can't do this! My mother sewed this stitch by stitch—you know what it means to me…"

Something flickered in his eyes.

But right then, Gloria's teary, petulant whine rose again behind him.

"Brent, I really don't see the point of being alive anymore. My mom and dad are gone, and anyone can just bully me whenever they want…"

The hesitation in his hands vanished. His grip tightened.

The look he gave me went cold.

"Maya, you brought this on yourself! You're your mother's daughter—what, you think Gloria wasn't just as precious to hers?"

"She sprayed me with a water gun first!"

"That was a *blessing!*"

"Maya, from the second Gloria came back you've fought her on everything. And you *still* don't see what you did wrong! I spoiled you—that's what this is. Today I'm going to fix that!"

The moment the words left his mouth, his hands wrenched apart.

*RIIIP!!*

This time the gown split clean in two.

Brent glanced around at the crowd.

He saw the hunger in their eyes. He saw it clearly.

And he shoved me away anyway, tearing my body free from the two ruined halves of fabric.

Gasps cut through the air around me.

I felt every greedy stare on my skin, swallowed down the nausea flooding my throat, and scrambled to the side to snatch up the shredded remains of the gown and press them against myself, covering what I could.

But the second I managed it, Brent was already striding toward me again.

He grabbed the other edge of the torn fabric.

"Brent!"

I stared him down, my voice a blade.