“He has precognitive abilities. Don’t you understand how fucking useful that could be?”
“I understand exactly how dangerous it could be,” I counter.
“Sometimes you have to take the risk.”
“Cason.”
My voice comes out rough, as both a warning and a plea.
Because I would give him anything.Anything.
Butthis?
Malcolm’s life?
I don’t know if I can do that. Not after everything. Not after seven years of promising myself that this is how it would end, with my shadows tearing him the fuck apart.
Malcolm exhales quietly behind him. “You shouldn’t argue for me, Cason.”
That makes us both look at him, and he looks…tired. Like he’s ready for it all to end too.
“I’ve seen enough possibilities to know how this ends,” he says calmly, his eyes on his nephew. “How it was alwaysmeantto end. Not even I can control fate. Sometimes I just give it a little nudge. But it’s time to stop thinking I can fight it at every turn. I just needed you to know the truth first.”
He doesn’t sound afraid. He sounds resigned.
“Possibilities,” Cason repeats. “That means there are other possibilities?”
Malcolm is silent, and I think I have an idea as to why. Why he’s resigned, why he’s accepting this without more of a fight. Because hefearsthose other possibilities.
“Answer him,” I snarl as my shadows lash across the floor.
Malcolm looks at me instead. “There are futures where keeping me alive creates outcomes far worse than killing me.”
“For who?” I ask. “For us or for you?”
“You were always clever, Mr. Morgan,” he says with a faint grin, the light of which doesn’t reach his eyes. “The answer is both.”
“Well, if you’d rather die, I’m more than happy to oblige.”
Darkness spills down from the walls like waterfalls, writhing in Malcolm’s direction until the air itself feels colder. They stretch past my feet, but Cason immediately plants himself directly in front of me again. My shadows twist around him without touching, restless but protective.
He lifts both his hands cautiously, placing them against mychest. Grounding me. Or, at least, trying to.
“Listen to me,” he says.
“I am.”
“No, you’re trying not to murder my uncle.”
“Multitasking.”
Despite everything, despite the tension strangling the room, I see the faintest flicker of amusement cross his face. Because I’ve said that before. When it comes to my shadows, I’malwaysmultitasking.
“There’s my emotionally stable boyfriend,” he mutters.
I almost laugh as something warm blooms in my chest.
Then Malcolm moves behind him, and every violent instinct in me spikes again. My shadows whip around us hard enough that Cason has to brace against me. It was one step. That’s all it was, but it was nearly enough to have me completely forget what it is he’s asking of me and do it anyway.
