I could almost see the thoughts playing out behind his eyes while he took in everything I’d said. They tracked slowly from now to before… back to the first moment he’d seen me.
To what I was doing that night.
“So youdidkill my brother.” The fury was back, and he closed the distance between us with his intentions clear on his face. “You took him while I wasn’t there.”
“I—” I caught his hand when he swung at me this time. His eyes widened in shock as I used my grip to shift him a little closer to me, to pin his arm between us so I could finally speak the confession I’d wanted to give all along. “I tried to keep him alive. Iwantedto keep him alive. But I couldn’t.”
All that anger he’d felt earlier seemed to blossom and burst across his features.
“You keptmealive. Why couldn’t you save him instead?”
Instead.
Not save him too.
Instead.
If I closed my eyes and tried to imagine a world without Cole in it, it made the new sensation of warmth in my chest twinge and try to turn inward, to spear the heart I was pretty sure only existed while his was beating.
“It was his time… I can’t…”
“I’m pretty sure it was my time in the river. I know it was my time when that thing stabbed me in the chest. So you need to explain it to me.” His eyes blazed, though the heat was chased with soft liquid pooling against his lids, threatening to spill over and break apart the fury he’d gathered around him like a shield. “Why couldn’t you save him like you saved me?”
The answer was right there on the tip of my tongue. Honesty I wanted to give him… a truth I wasn’t sure he was ready to hear. But now that I could say it, what was I supposed to do? Keep it from him?
I felt like I couldn’t lie to him now, even if I wanted to.
“I was drawn to your brother when I first came to collect his soul—something about him made me need to reach out, to see his mind. Caiden was sitting in a field of red flowers.” Cole’s eyes widened. “And he seemed like he was waiting for someone to join him.”
At those words, the tears fell, and his hand in mine went completely limp as they streaked down his cheeks.
“It was me, wasn’t it? I tried to get there, but…”
“No, I think he was waiting for me.” When the anger tried to claw its way back, I raised one hand and carefully wiped the wetness on his cheek away with my thumb. “He was waiting because he knew it before I did, before I understood. He was waiting because he wanted to make sure when he was gone that you wouldn’t be alone.”
It had taken me so much time to realize it… the red field of flowers, the feeling of guilt and relief that I couldn’t decipher. The way I’d been so drawn to Caiden that I wanted to stay with him. He was a part of Cole. They’d shared a soul once upon a time, before their bodies had split apart.
I’d always been destined to care about his brother, towantto save him… but Cole was the only one I’d ever been capable of loving.
“Iamalone. I’ve been alone since the day you took him from me.” His voice broke again at the end of the accusation, and I couldn’t seem to stop myself.
“You aren’t. Wren and Theo weren’t just there to fight the Enmity… Wren was there the night your brother died?—”
“I didn’t see him.”
“He was there. He’s a cupid, Cole. He ties souls together.”
Cole’s eyes narrowed, still wet with tears and drowning in confusion. “What?”
“We’re soulmates… and I think your brother knew. I think that’s why he trusted me to watch you after he was gone.” I ran my finger along the line between us, the faintest hint of red, and his eyes widened and followed the motion. I could see the reflection of the crimson glow in his green gaze.
I stood silently, wondering if he’d understand what I was saying. If he’d realize the confession on my tongue was as foreign to me as it was wrong to him.
Love.
Of all the emotions I’d occasionally wondered about humans feeling, I’d never been curious about love. I’d watched hundreds of people break into pieces when the person they loved was taken from them. I’d seen crying mothers, broken lovers, children swallowed up in grief as their parents left them…
And until I’d let Wren shoot me through the chest with the Ardor, I’d never feltanyof it. It was agony to reap a soul now—drowning and bottomless, the grief and pain and fear, the life lost, the regret of a life not lived…
