His Shadows were there as usual, but far more importantly, he could seeher. That was all he wanted to see. He opened his mouth to tell her, but she huffed out a frustrated breath and spoke first. “The reason I was surprised by your Shadows earlier, by how painful they looked,” Riley said adamantly, “is that when you’re not forcing them, they look absolutely fine.”
His gaze flew to his Shadows. Theywerefine. They were flowing and dancing smoothly. Teasing and fluttering over Riley in a way that he’d thought would never be possible again. But even as he watched, as he focused, they started to falter. To fade and stutter and turn on themselves, broken once more.
“I don’t understand,” he whispered as much to himself as to her.
“James,” Riley said slowly, as if she was searching for the words she needed. “I think Ethan and Bryn already healed the damage the blood Shadows did to your body. Physically, there’s no reason you should be struggling. The problem is in your mind.”
He bristled. “You think I’m… what? Making it up? Doing this on purpose?”
“No.” She shook her head roughly, leaning back to look at him. “Not at all. Our minds are as valuable as our bodies. Just as precious. I think you’re still suffering from everything Gordon did. I think your pain is absolutely real. And as long as you have all that grief and rage and pain inside you, I think you’re going to keep… struggling.”
It was like a harsh light suddenly switched on in a pitch-dark room. Blinding. Painful. And horribly revealing. It felt like the truth.
But underneath that sudden flare of understanding, was another, harsher truth, and damn if it wasn’t almost as painful. “That’s why you kissed me? To prove a point?”
She flinched, retreating even further. “Maybe. Yes? I don’t know. I wanted to help.” She let out a breath. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry you kissed me?”
She shook her head, but she didn’t answer. She didn’t need to. Her silence and the frown creasing her forehead were enough of a reply.
She turned to go, and he didn’t call her back.
ChapterEleven
Elizabeth ranher finger along the grain of the wooden table as the clock ticked its way toward midnight, sipping at her cold tea and wishing for a glass of single malt instead.
The Circle had spent the afternoon discussing—arguing—about the best plan. Kay wanted to take the fight to Gordon. Straight into his house, wards and all, never mind the Council. Zach agreed, but he wanted Emma out of it. Emma wouldn’t stay out. David thought only he should go because he was responsible for not realizing that Gordon was a danger to them all. James stayed in his room. Bryn retired to a corner, promising to support whatever Kay chose. Riley came back from wherever she had disappeared to, her Shadows in disarray and her lips swollen, and sat silently beside Bryn, wisely staying out of an argument that went nowhere for several hours until everyone gave up and went to bed.
It was a bloody mess. But at least they were safe for now, so long as someone kept an eye on the wards.
The net of Shadows undulated gently along the ceiling. It didn’t take much concentration to keep it settled. Elizabeth cast her eye over the runes, sending her own Shadows to patch any frayed edges and nudge the symbols that had started to float adrift gently back into the mesh. No one could see in. No one could find them. Not tonight.
Watching the wards was the kind of task that was both essential and extremely boring, and it left her far too much time to think. She had volunteered for this midnight shift rather than risk getting too close to David, and now she was paying the price.
He was back, and she didn’t know how to handle him. He’d left her. He’d broken her heart and run so far and for so long that she’d fallen in love with someone else. She’d had a life. A good life. A fulfilling life. And if she still dreamed of him sometimes, if her Shadows still hadn’t got the message that he wasn’t for her, that was no one’s business but her own.
But now David was back. Telling her he loved her, that he always had. Telling her he would show her how much she meant to him. He listened to her. He respected her. He tried to protect her. He’d wrapped his arms around her and held her like she was precious to him. And damn, she’d been so alone for so long, she’d wanted to be held. She’d wanted to be held byhim.
But should she? All those long years didn’t just disappear. It was so much easier to hate him. So much easier to resent him for his hard heart and blocked ears.
She lowered her head to the table and rested her forehead on the wood. Part of her still felt like the young woman David had rejected—confused and fragile. She had lived through the ugly battle of sweeping the fragments of her heart into a broken pile and trying to get on with living when it was the last thing she wanted to do.
And it didn’t help that she was surrounded by Kay and Ethan, Zach and Emma, and the love they’d found.
She shook her head against the wood. No, that wasn’t right either. It wasn’tfound. Their love was hard-earned. Bled and wept over. Kay and Emma had fought for the men they loved.
And yet, here, she was, decades their senior, avoiding David and feeling sorry for herself like a teenager. She didn’t know how to fight for him. Or even if she should.
And then she would be reminded of the image in her vision. David stretched out, cold and lifeless, lost forever, and she knew she had never truly hated him. Deep beneath the layers of hurt, there was still a seed of love, burning and bright, just waiting for oxygen.
She’d told Kay that being hurt was inevitable. That forgiveness took courage. And that love was choosing a person—with all their flaws—over and over. But she’d also told Kay that everyone had free will. That, in the end, love was a choice.
She’d handed over her heart so easily the first time, and David had crushed it. Had he changed enough? Had she? Had they grown enough, learned enough, to become the people their Shadows had chosen? Could she give him the power to hurt her again?
It was time to make a choice.
Being a Seer didn’t help at all. The problem was never a shortage of visions. It was that she’d had hundreds of visions of David. Visions of him alone and visions of him with her. Visions of him happy and visions of him devastated. Visions of him with a cluster of bright-eyed, curly-haired children that she had been so very certain would be hers and then was equally certain would belong to some other woman. The woman he chose over her. A woman she detested on principle. But he never chose anyone else, and that vision faded into memory. Just another possible future that never came to be.
