Like a balloon that was slowly being inflated, I began to rise. My lungs filled as his heat spread through every vein and my fingers began to tingle. The pressure in my head subsided. I swam in the intoxicating feeling that inundated me. My senses started to process the things around me again, and I was no longer in this numb and dim world.
He continued until I was able to move in his arms. I pulled myself up, gripping his arms, following him out of the dark abyss. I reached for him blindly. My lips brushed his and my world exploded in feeling. They shifted until I was able to comprehend and make sense of some of it. And they weren’t mine, not entirely.
What am I doing? If they find out what I’ve done…b ut I can’t lose her. I can’t.
I gasped for air, floored by the knowledge that I was hearing Daemon’s thoughts. He was talking to me—not like before when he was in his true form. This was different, like his thoughts and feelings were dancing around mine. Fear beat at me, as did something softer, even more powerful than fear.
Please. Please. I can’t lose you. Please open your eyes. Please don’t leave me.
I’m here. I opened my eyes. I’m here.
Daemon jerked back, the light fading slowly, slipping out of me, over my skin and back into him.
“Kat,” he whispered, sending shivers through me. He sat back with me still nestled against his chest. I felt his heart thunder violently, beating at the same rate as mine, in perfect sync.
Everything around us seemed…clearer. “Daemon, what did you do?”
“You need to rest.” He paused, his voice throaty, weary. “You’re not a hundred percent. It will take a couple of minutes. I think. I haven’t healed anything on this level before.”
“You did at the library,” I murmured. “And at the car…”
His head lowered against mine. “That was just to help with a sprain and bruises. That was nothing like this.”
The arm that had been broken didn’t even ache as I lifted it. I turned my head toward him, my cheek brushing his. I stared in amazement at the bent trees that folded around us in a perfect circle. My gaze fell to the ground and settled on the space Baruck once stood. The only trace of him was the scorched earth he left behind.
“How did I do that?” I whispered. “I don’t understand.”
He buried his head in the crook of my neck, breathing in deeply. “I must’ve done something to you when I healed you. I don’t know what. It doesn’t make sense, but something happened when our energies joined. It shouldn’t have affected you—you’re human.” I was beginning to wonder about that.
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
“Okay. Sleepy. You?”
“The same.”
I watched in silence as his curious eyes followed his thumb over my chin, and he traced along my lower lip.
“I think, for now, it would be best if we kept this between our-selves—the whole healing thing and what you did back there. Okay?”
I nodded, but stilled as his hands drifted around my face, removing the smudges our battle had left behind.
A tumble of black waves shifted over his forehead and a smile spread across his face, reaching his eyes, deepening them to a brilliant green. His fingers splayed across my cheeks and his head slanted, and I couldn’t help but think of what I’d overheard as his mouth brushed against mine. There was an infinitely tender quality to his soft kiss. It reached deep inside me, sending my heart into overdrive. It was innocent, intimate. Soul-burning as he tipped my head back and explored my lips as if it was the first time we’d kissed. And maybe it was—a real kiss.
When he finally pulled back, he laughed unsteadily. “I was worried that we’d broken you.”
“Not quite.” My gaze moved over every inch of his weary face. “Did you break yourself?”
He snorted. “Almost.”
I took a breath, a little dizzy. “What now?”
A slow, tired smile pulled at his lips. “We go home.”
Chapter 30
It literally hurt deep inside not being able to post my Waiting on Wednesday, but I still had several weeks before my birthday. And even though Dee would let me borrow her computer, I didn’t want to use it for that. Pouting, I grabbed the can of soda out of Dee’s fridge and went back into the living room.
Aliens could sure eat a lot of food.
“Do you want more pizza?” Dee offered, staring at the last slice with such longing that I was beginning to think that she and Adam needed to re-evaluate their relationship.
I shook my head. Dee had eaten enough to feed a small starving village and frankly, I wasn’t hungry. Eating while Dee and Adam stared at me was getting tedious and uncomfortable. Dee didn’t think I noticed, and Adam was currently on pause from asking another question about what happened that night with Baruck.
As far as everyone knew, Daemon had killed Baruck and I hadn’t been injured as badly as Dee had thought. Somehow Daemon had convinced her that I was just stunned. I peeked at them.
But it had been me—I’d killed someone. Again.
Surprisingly, the thought didn’t fill me with the same amount of dread and sickness as it initially did. Over the last couple of days, I’d come to a certain understanding with my actions. It was a level of shaky acceptance that made it easier to swallow even if I would never forget.
It was either him or me and my friends.
The alien asshat had to go.
Everyone was still staring. Lovely.
Dee sat down next to me and took a sip of her soda. Convinced or not, Dee knew something was up when I returned with Daemon that morning…and something was.