His space was exactly what I'd expected. Immaculate. Everything in its place. The bed was made with military precision. Books were arranged by height on the shelves. Even the bourbon bottle on the nightstand was centered perfectly on a coaster.
Except there was a pile of broken glass in the corner. And scratch marks on the wall near the window. And his knuckles were bleeding.
"What happened?" I asked, even though I already knew. The bond had happened. The realization had happened. The same spiral I'd been in for the past few hours.
"I broke some things." He didn't look at me. "I'll clean it up."
Of course he would. Because that was what he did. He cleaned and organized and controlled everything around him because it was the only way he knew how to function.
"Elias—"
"I tasted you." The agony in his voice ripped through me. "I tasted your blood and I knew, and I—" He broke off, jaw clenching. "I ran. I ran like a coward because I couldn't—I didn't?—"
I cut off his excuses. "I could feel you. Through the bond. You were hurting."
Something shifted in his expression. Softened and sharpened all at once. "You were hurting too. I felt it. Felt you trying to use your power alone and tearing yourself apart."
"I'm fine."
"You're bleeding."
I touched the skin below my nose, and my fingers came away red. I hadn't even noticed. The bleeding must have started again while I was walking over. "I'm sorry. I didn't notice."
Elias moved before I could process it. Vampire speed. One second he was across the room, and the next he was right in front of me with that hunger in his eyes, tilting my chin up with gentle fingers.
"You pushed too hard," he said, and there was an edge of anger in his voice that I didn't understand. "Without me there to ground you, you pushed too hard and you hurt yourself."
"I had to keep trying to find Alex?—"
"Not like this." His thumb brushed across my cheek, and it felt wet. More blood? Or tears? "Never like this."
The touch sent electricity through me and the mate bond flared bright and hot. Suddenly I could feel everything he was feeling. The fear. The need. The overwhelming desire to protect me mixed with the certainty that he was going to fail.
He deserved better.
"Stop," he whispered.
"Stop what?"
"Stop thinking you're not enough."
Chapter 7
Alice
The vision hit me as I stood in Aunt Judy's kitchen helping her prepare for what we all knew was coming. The mortar and pestle slipped from my fingers, and the ceramic shattered against the hardwood floor, sage and lavender scattering across the boards.
One moment, I was grinding herbs for a protection spell. The next, the world fractured into tiny pieces and then came together again.
I saw my brother.
Not the way I'd seen him in dreams or witch visions. This was different. More real. I could feel the cold seeping into his bones, taste the metallic tang of fear on his tongue. The twin connection we'd always had pulled taut between us like a rope stretched to breaking, and suddenly I was there with him. Trapped in a space that shouldn't even exist.
The walls around Alex shimmered with an iridescence that made my eyes water. They weren't solid, not quite. They phased in and out of reality like breathing, and I understood with sudden, terrifying clarity that he wasn't in any physical location we could reach.
Then the vision fractured, and I was gasping against the kitchen counter, my hands trembling so badly I had to lock my elbows to stay upright.
"Alice?" Aunt Judy's voice came from the doorway. "What happened?"
