Page 146 of Pareidolia

Which, of course, is an issue. I was trying to run—at least, that’s what I’m going to tell myself—and I’d made it almost to the edge of the woods. I’d put a knife in Nox’s chest and watched him throw it to the side like a fucking toothpick.

I’d done my level best to get out of the situation I’d gotten myself into.

But I can feel a hard, cool body… two arms are thrown around my waist…

Nox’s chest doesn’t rise and fall evenly with sleep.

I don’t even open my eyes when I speak.

“Do shadows dream?”

He answers me without hesitation, proof that I was right in assuming he wasn’t asleep at all.

“I dream of devouring every emotion in the world, of stripping the power from the beings who created humanity and drinking it down for myself.” He shifts, rolling until I’m beneath him and he can run his tongue along one of the bites he left on my neck. It stings, but the cool sensation of his saliva also soothes. “I dream of chasing you through the woods until you’ve touched every inch of the forest and it knows the weight of your feet as you run.”

“Romantic.” I force my eyes open and see him staring at me with that curious, near-alien expression.

“Honest,” he answers, and I know it’s true. Nox isn’t saying something to try to woo me, or confuse me. He’s not luring me with his wings or making my brain go fuzzy with those damn shadow tendrils.

He’s just speaking his truth, and if I know it would probably make an entire subset of the population pregnant just from hearing his deep rumbles…

Well…

“I need to get up.”

I don’t want to get up. I want to lie on the earth and the rotten leaves until the detritus takes me just like my mind told me it would when I first got here. I want to die in the feeling that I have right now—fullness. Contentment.

I’m not searching for an emotion, not trying to understand.

I just…

Am.

“Didn’t you learn that going doesn’t work, Aspen?” He doesn’t even sound hostile about it, just matter-of-fact. It’s annoying because it’s true…

But that doesn’t change the fact that I’m right.

“I can’t just stay here.” There’s something about the protest that doesn’t hold quite as much weight when I’m lying with his broad body half draped over me like he was expecting me to try to run.

His low grunt just proves my point. “Stay.”

“I mean here. In this forest.” I glance around at the trees and the moonlight pouring through them. With his body wrapped around mine, I don’t notice the chill of the breeze that rustles my hair, but I know it’s only going to get colder as the days pass.

It’s fucked up that I feel like I’ve been here for months, even though it’s only been a few days. Something about Nox makes time pass differently… or maybe it’s just all the time he’s kept me unconscious.

“Go back to your little tower. I can find you just as easily there.”

I finally push myself up, shoving at his chest, and instantly I can feel the sting of the cold against my skin. The cool night that felt luxurious while he was touching me takes on a bitter bite when I’m not pressed against him.

“I can probably manage it for a week, maybe two… but if I’m going to stay⁠—”

“You are.”

“If I’m going to stay.” I say it again as though I have a choice. “I need something else.”

I need somewhere that Noah Daniels can’t just find me whenever he wants. As much as I love the fire tower, as much as I wanted to move a desk in front of the windows and look out over the trees while I wrote… I know I can’t do that if someone knows Alex Michaels is here.

I didn’t come back to this town for a reunion, or a homecoming, or for everyone to figure out what happened to Rory Daniels eight years ago because Nox turns me into such a monster that I lose myself and somehow give it away.