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"The mirror asked me a question," she says. "Five days ago. Ask him what you are to him." She turns around. "I never asked. I've been walking around it like a hole in the floor."

Now.

"Maren."

"I'm asking now."

My wolf is up and pushing at the inside of my chest and there is one true sentence sitting behind my teeth, and I’ve had it there since April.

I don’t want to tell her tonight standing in a kitchen with a monster hanging over the counter. With her hands still shaking, she has every reason in the world to grab the first solid thing anyone offers her.

My father took what he wanted from a frightened woman and called it love, and she was never the same.

I'd rather cut my own throat.

"You're..." I say.

And I stop.

I watch her hear me stop. I watch her put it beside every other sentence I've cut in half in front of her since the day we met, and add it up, and get a number she doesn't like.

Maren sets her hands on the counter behind her.

"That's twice tonight," she says. "You start something, and then you pull it back, and you look at me like you're the one hurt." She's not shouting. It would be easier if she were.

"Say it. Whatever it is. Say it right now, or I swear I'll go find someone in this town who will."

29

MAREN

STILL FIVE DAYS UNTIL HALLOWEEN

I've been collecting these. And, I’ve been so patient about it that I've started to disgust myself.

"Finish it," I say.

Gage doesn't move. He's got both hands flat on the counter and he's looking at the wood between them.

"I can't do it tonight."

"Can't or won't."

"Won't." At least he doesn't dress it up. "It’s not the right time. You'd take anything from anybody right now, after the day you have had."

I laugh. It comes out wrong, all edges.

"Do you hear yourself? That's another one."

"I know it is."

"So what am I supposed to do with you?"

He lifts his head, and there it is again, that look he keeps aiming at me like I'm the one bleeding out.

"Ask me a different question," he says. "Any of them. I'll answer it all the way to the bottom and I won't stop in the middle. Or just give me a little more time."

Fine. I’m so frustrated I could spit! But, he’s not wrong about the timing.