Tugging his hands off my face, I squeezed his fingers.I’m okay. Truly.
He frowned, not believing me.
Let me go. I’m alright.
Gritting his teeth, he reluctantly obeyed but stayed close as I locked eyes with Frank. Those kind, piercing blue eyes that must’ve always known and never told me.
“You’ve known all along, haven’t you?” My voice cracked. “That’s how we’re connected. Lucien and I. We’ve been connected my entire life.Beforemy life actually.” My chin rose with defiance for the truth. “We met seven years before I was even born.”
“What?” Lucien gaped. “How is that even possible?”
Frank’s eyes popped wide. “How...how could you possibly know that?”
“I saw it in a file. I didn’t understand it back then, but I just reread it.”
“You just...rereadit?” Frank frowned. “What does that mean? How?”
“Doesn’t matter.” I waved away the fact that I’d manipulated time again. Instead of splicing the future, I’d stepped into the past, and the less he knew about that the better. “Tell me. Tell me everything.”
“You saw the file on you and Lucien?” He tripped forward with urgency. “When? Where? That file was burned. No one outside your parents ever saw the original copy. I’ve searched foryears—”
“Don’t come near her.” Lucien stepped in front of me, shielding me as my insides ached with agony.
The betrayal. The loss. The pain of being used by my own parents kept building, building.
My parents had used me—not because they’d wanted a daughter but because they wanted to know if their DNA could survive the Requiem. They’d sacrificed me before I even knew I existed.
Fresh pain tore through my heart. The temperature in the tiny hut plummeted. Frost raced across the metal walls, shoving aside the chill from the glacier and replacing it with coldness far more dangerous. Ice bloomed beneath my feet, spreading outward in a glittering, jagged starburst. The overhead lightbulb flickered as my power surged, uncontrolled and desperate, devouring what was left of me.
Whisper snarled as snow started to fall.
I tried to pull the winter back—to stop it from killing me any faster than it already was, but...I couldn’t. The drain of wielding something I should never have been given hit me like a hammer. My knees buckled. The world tilted.
Lucien caught me instantly, strong arms wrapped around my waist. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.” Before I could catch my breath, his hand slid up to cradle the back of my neck and his lips met mine.
He kissed me—hard and deep.
The second we touched, his fire poured into me—golden and warm and achingly intimate. It flooded my mouth like liquid sunlight, chasing down my throat and spreading through my chest like a hearth flaring to life in the middle of a blizzard.
Everywhere the ice entombed, his fire caressed...melting me,warming me, dragging me back from the grave once again.
He stumbled as it cost him, giving up what meagre strength he had left.
His pain became my pain. My pain was his pain. We were one. A perfect circle. Not whole unless we were shared love and touch and energy.
I moaned into his mouth, clutching fistfuls of his shirt as I kissed him back. Smoke poured from his collar and frost coated my hair. I tried to feed him energy back. To patch up the holes his fire left behind. To balance him so he didn’t burn up and leave me.
For a few precious seconds, the rest of the world disappeared. There was only Lucien. Only us. Only this.
His other arm tightened around my waist, pulling me flush against him as the kiss turned deeper, desperate. The edges of my mind began to feather into darkness as the dreamscape tugged us—begging us to fall and heal.
Someone cleared their throat. Loudly.
We broke apart.
My cheeks burned for how quickly we’d lost ourselves. How desperate we were for more because we knew our time was swiftly running out.
Frank looked equal parts stunned and deeply uncomfortable.
