His voice throbs. “Lie with me.” His arm comes up, motioning. “Please, primrose.”
But when we touch,we burn.
I don’t say it out loud because admitting that would change me in ways I can’t accept.
“Please.”
I fill the hollow at his side hesitantly. As I feared, our flesh throbs and pulses together. Hot, live electrical impulse. I gasp, but he doesn’t hesitate, arm drawing me hard against him.
“I shouldn’t want this. Shouldn’t make you watch…” He stumbles over his words. I strain to make them out. “But Ineedyou.”
The last confession takes something from him. He goes silent.
A long inhale. Then an exhale. Warmth and breath—the steady beat of his heart—wrap around me.
His body relaxes beneath me, need vibrating clean to my bones. And something else, like a distant hum. A consecration.
His head falls forward, pressing a scarlet kiss to my temple. “Sorry,” he whispers, voice cracking.
“Don’t apologize for being hurt.”
The words land, but he doesn’t speak.
I listen to his breath heaving in his chest, pulse impossibly fast as slanted rays of light give way to the black of night. Then, his arm jerks—uncontrolled—like something inside him misfires.
Hours pass.
I don’t know how long.
Every moment is waiting for the next breath, counting the space in between.
The skin around his wound is puckered, drawn back. Impossibly dark.
I can’t look anymore.
The stars glitter overhead. Too beautiful for this night. They shouldn’t be allowed to shine like this.
Not with Kael fading next to me.
Tempest grazes across the field. I squint to make out her shadowy form, glossy coat glistening in the full moon’s light.
I stir, try to sit up.
Ineedto get help.
I’ll walk out. Whatever it takes.
But Kael’s arm is an iron band that won’t budge an inch.
His voice comes out low and dark. “Don’t go.”
I fight back tears, body sizzling against his. My hand comes up, feeling his forehead. It incinerates my palm.
Oh, God… he’s not going to make it. Maybe not even long enough for me to walk to the neighboring ranch.
The thought of him dying alone… Ican’t.
“Kael,” it comes out like a soft keening against his chest.
