“No.”
“This isn’t—“ I struggle for words.“I’m not good company right now.”
“I don’t want good company.I want honest company.”She stops a few feet away, close enough that the concern in her eyes draws me in.The vulnerability she’s trying to hide beneath her armor seeps through it.“Russia was bad.I can see it all over your face.”
My jaw tightens.“Joe shouldn’t have told you anything.”
“He didn’t have to.I can read you, remember?”Her voice softens slightly.“After Syria, you came back different.Closed off.And now this.Whatever happened in Russia, it’s eating you alive.”
I want to deny it.I want to put my walls back up and push her away like I’ve pushed everyone else away.But standing here, looking at her, I find I don’t have the energy for it.
“Russia was complicated,” I confess.
She waits.Doesn’t push, doesn’t prod.Just waits with that infinite patience that makes me want to tell her things I’ve never told anyone.
But I can’t.I can’t put that burden on her.I should protect her against my darkness.Still, I owe her honesty.
“The operation failed,” I hear myself say.The words feel like crunched glass on my tongue.“People died.Kids died.And I—“ my voice trails off.I clear my throat and add, “I froze.”
The admission hangs in the air between us, naked and raw.
Serena doesn’t flinch.Doesn’t look away.She just watches me with those whiskey-colored eyes, and I see something in them that looks like understanding.
“How long has this been happening?”she asks quietly.
“Since Syria.”
“That was years ago, Shelby.”
“I know.It doesn’t happen every time I’m on a mission, though.”
I don’t need to add that I wouldn’t have survived our world if I froze every damn time.She knows the dangers in my line of work.They’re the same ones her family faces.
She takes another step closer.We’re less than an arm’s length apart now, and the warmth radiating from her body wraps around me.Her floral scent makes me want to close the distance and forget she’s my friend’s little sister.
But I can’t think like that.SheisJoe’s sister.She’s off-limits.She’s?—
“Nothing about us is safe, Shelby.”Her voice is barely above a whisper as if reading my thoughts.“Not for me, not for you, not for either of our families.But at least when I see you, I feel like I’m not drowning alone.”
She stops, and that vulnerability flashes again in her eyes before she looks away.“That came out wrong.”
“No, it didn’t.”
I don’t know which one of us moves first, but suddenly I’m closer, my hand lifting of its own accord.I stop myself just before I touch her face, the memory of the last time I almost did this flooding back.A hallway at a fundraising organized by the Syndicate, three months and a lifetime ago.She’d been wearing red then, and I’d wanted to kiss her so badly all fucking night I could taste it.
I managed to stay away instead.
But right now, with her looking at me like I’m something other than broken, I can’t make myself walk away.
“I felt the same way,” I admit.“After Syria, you were the only person I didn’t have to explain myself to.”
“And now we’re here together,” she says, her eyes searching mine.“Are you going to pretend we don’t feel this?”
Everything in me wants to say yes.Wants to protect her from the disaster I’ve become.
“I have to protect you.From the darkness.From me.From the life we’re inheriting.”
“I don’t need protection.”She lifts her chin, and there’s steel in her voice now.“I need honesty.Can you give me that?Can you look at me and tell me the truth about what this means to you?Not strategically.Truthfully.”
