“Not really. Not enough to drive both of us.”
He frowned, studying me closely. “Are you lying?”
“Why the hell would I lie?” I shivered, unable to stop myself looking at the guards who’d been alive before I’d passed out and now were somehow dead. Then again, the ‘somehow’ was fairly obvious. Whisper padded toward us as if taking full credit—muzzle glistening red-black and golden eyes full of unrepentant pride. “You already know I’m useless.”
“You’re not useless,” Lucien murmured softly, his onyx eyes burning.
My gaze snapped to his and I suddenly wanted to hug him.
To wrap his bleeding chest with a thousand bandages and find a hundred doctors to stitch him up.
Guilt crashed over me in a suffocating wave.
I moved before I could stop myself.
Touching his chest, I cursed the hole in his clothing and him. The holeI’dcaused.
“You’re bleeding so much.” My voice cracked. “How are you even standing?” My fingers became coated in his blood, trying to reverse the damage by touch alone. “You need to sit down. You—”
“I’m fine,” he said automatically, clamping his hand over mine and stilling my frantic pawing.
“You are absolutelynotfine.” Panic punched through the pill’s false calm. “You were stabbed.Istabbed you.” The truth tasted horrific. “I didn’t mean to...I shouldn’t have...God, what was Ithinking?”
He went rigid, stunned.
He stared at me like he hadn’t expected me to care. Like he’d completely skipped over the part where I would hate myself—knowing his pain was entirely my fault.
Ripping my hand from beneath his, I pressed both of them over his seeping wound. I pressed hard, my red-covered fingers clumsy and unsure, trying to stop any more blood from leaking. “You can’t die. I don’t care how you’re standing or how long that pill will give you energy for but...it’s fake. It’s not real. You’re dying and the longer you pretend you’re not, the worse—”
“You have a talent,” he said under his breath, never looking away from me. “At confusing me.” His heart pounded beneath my palms as he tipped a little closer. “I can’t figure you out. Whenever I think I have, you go and mess me up all over again.”
I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t reply. Every inch of me tripped and burned.
“You’re the reason I’ve gotten this far, and you’ve made it impossible for me not to want you but...everything about you triggers my nervous system into thinking you’re the worst kind of threat.” He chuckled, shaking his head, causing droplets to scatter from his thick hair. “Honestly? You’re kind of exhausting.”
“I’mthe exhausting one?” I fought the urge to punch him right where I’d stabbed him. “It’s a constant battle not to pass out inyourcompany.”
“Yes well, you do that often enough, so you’d think you’d be well caught up on sleep by now.”
“I changed my mind. You can die if you want.”
He laughed out loud.
“How are youlaughing?” I glowered at him, tears stinging. “Is this what doctors talk about? That thing where people suddenly seem fine right before they die?” Terror choked me. “Are you feeling woozy? Tell me. Are you saying these things because youaredying? Oh God, youcan’t.” I mopped up his blood with my bare hands, trying to stuff the cooling liquid back into his body. “Forget what I said. You can’t die. I’m so sorry. I—”
“Rook.”
“Lie down. I’ll go get help. I’ll—”
“Rook.”
“Just let me—”
“Rook!” Something unreadable flickered across his face—shock and stubbornness and something dangerously soft. “Stop it.”
I froze in his stare, ensnared and lost and—
He kissed me.
