James pressed a kiss to her brow and it felt strange—not like any kiss they had shared. It was affectionate, rather than passionate. He reached inside the duffel bag and withdrew something else. It was not part of the explosives; it was not a river rock—it was wrapped in a clean shirt. He unwrapped it, and then Dee drew in a sharp breath.
The object was red and gleaming, like a fist-sized ruby.
It was a heart.
A heart brought into a void. No wonder those burrowers had zeroed in on them. Dee looked up at James, uncomprehending. She did not—she did not understand why he would have carried that with him. How had he even managed to carry it? She would have thought a heart needed the warmth and breath of a body.
“James…?” she said, his name a question.
But James was smiling, truly smiling, as if he were looking at his final masterpiece, the greatest artwork he had ever created.
He said, “You’re not heartless, are you?”
And then he shoved the heart against her chest.
She had only a moment to gasp. The heart should have hit her clothes, her skin, but whatever power the Daemon used was still upon it. The heart passed through cotton and skin and bone as if they were not there.
It sank into her chest.
It hurt; it was like the snap of shoving a key into a lock, of fitting pieces together. She could not speak for the pain, could not think for the shock.
James kissed her. A press of heat, his mouth against hers, and it was too quick. Abruptly, it felt as if gravity had upended. Her fingers clawed at the air and she fell backward, wrenched away from James. She reached for him and caught only air.
Nothing living can enter the voids. Nothing with a heart.
She remembered the rats being spat out, hurled by some invisible force. The same force that gripped her. With a cry, she tried to hold on, tried to stay—
James was still smiling—and it made him look so beautiful her heart ached.
Her heart.
But it couldn’t be her heart—her time wasn’t up—
She understood. It wasn’t her heart.
It was his.
The weight of it dragged at her, a heavy anchor hooked through her rib cage, and then she was crashing downhill, no, not downhill there was no downhill, but she was falling, falling sideways and tumbling and staggering, all elbows and knees, sand catching in her hair, her stomach turning over, and then the pop in her ears as if the air pressure had suddenly changed.
She was flung from the mouth of the void, and as she went, she had enough sense to grab at Riley and the two of them hit the ground together. They rolled, still caught by the momentum, and Dee desperately tried to right herself. She scrambled to hands and knees, faced the void—still glittering and half there, and maybe there was enough time.
She lunged to her feet, rushed toward the void.
James.She was not sure if she thought his name or spoke it aloud, but—
The void imploded.
The world was saved.
A girl got her heart back.
And lost it in the same moment.
THIRTY-EIGHT
The second time James Lancer lost his heart, it was in Portland.
His two-year contract was up. The Daemon came to his apartment, a heart in hand.
