“No way he didn’t help.”
“They’re protecting him.”
“Lock him up, too.”
I waited for something to snap inside me—for the panic to kick in. But nothing happened.
Was this what “no tears left to cry” meant?
When Jace swore, I looked up.
His face wasn’t angry. Not really. It was shocked, then tight with something like fear, like he’d just realized he was already too late to catch me before I fell.
“I remembered your password,” I said, because it was the only true thing I could find fast enough, “from watching you do it.”
I waited for myself to apologize—for my mouth to shape the wordsorrythe way it had been trained to.
It didn’t come.
I didn’t tell him what I’d read. I didn’t tell him about the headlines or the comments or the way my name lookedin all caps, dissected by people who had never once had a conversation with me.
I just felt tired.
It felt like the aftermath of a storm that had already passed, leaving everything soaked and flattened and too damaged to fix. Like when a tornado tears through a town, and the survivors just stand there looking at all the destruction.
“Elior,” Jace called, softly enough that it barely disturbed the air.
I looked at him.
“I didn’t—I told you—” He stopped himself. I saw it happen, the way he swallowed whatever instinct he had to take control of the situation. “How much did you see?”
I searched myself for the answer.
“A little,” I said finally, setting the phone down on the cushion beside me. My hands fell into my lap afterward, useless and heavy.
“I’m not upset,” I added, because his eyes were already darkening with worry. “I mean, I am. But not… like before.”
His brow furrowed. “That doesn’t sound better.”
I huffed out something that might’ve been a laugh if I’d had more energy. “I know.”
The exhaustion seeped deeper the longer I sat there, settling into my bones. It wasn’t sleepiness. It was the kind of tired that made existing feel too difficult.
“I think,” I said slowly, testing the words as they left my mouth, “I don’t have the energy to be scared anymore.”
That finally made him move.
He crossed the room in two long strides and dropped to his knees in front of me, his hands resting on my thighs.
I stared into his eyes, falling into those beautiful pools of abrown so dark it was almost black. With the tip of my pointer finger, I reached over and traced the strong lines of his face.
“I love you,” I murmured.
“What do you need me to do?”
I stared past him for a moment, at the dark television screen, at the faint reflection of us both in it. This was how we’d started, too, wasn’t it?
“I’m not sure.”
