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He dips closer, his face in mine, and slides one hand so damn slowly up the back of my head, closes it around my hair and bends my neck back—like when he kissed it. My breath stutters, ragged at the images he stirs up—his mouth on mine, the desire I fight.

“Scared for me,” he whispers.

I shake my head, stilling instantly at the tug on my scalp. “No.”

He slides his lips down my neck with a steamy breath and pulls back. “I’m starting to think you lie more than me.”

The rest of the day goes similarly, each interaction and the moments in between brimming with tension—the perfect distraction from being a killer, from babies. From my mother and Kelter too. The occasional showers give way to a downpour as we round the base of a mountain. It blocks some of the wind, but none of the droplets that rap the top of my head.

My black shirt and pants hang heavy, drenched. I drag my boots through the mud, cold and wet on the outside, fuming and crackling with heat and fury on the inside—fury that I try to keep alight. But it’s harder to stay mad when Eli finds me a dry spot to sit and eat. When he stops every half hour, without fail, and hands me an open canteen. Or when he holds my elbow through the muddy areas, ensuring I don’t slip. That fury falters.

It’s late afternoon when I stop, panting, unable to take another step. I lean against a tree.

“Are you going to tell me now?” Eli steps in front of me.

“Tell you what?”

“What’s hurting you.” He scans my body.

“Nothing.”

“My little liar. You don’t have to be so strong all the time.” He leans in and slides his hand over my side and onto my back, as if he knows. “What do you want me to do? Touch you all over until I find where it hurts?”

Yes. I mean—“No.”

“Are you sure? You decide where these fingers start.” He taps them against my back. “I decide where they end up.”

“Is that all you can think about?”

“Mostly,” he says, shameless. “I can’t give you medicine if I don’t know what’s wrong.”

“You have medicine?” I hate to sound so hopeful.

He pulls away and sticks his thumbs under the straps of his pack. “Milo gave me one of everything he had.”

I give in. Pain occupies every thought. “It’s my rib. Back here.” I reach behind me. “I think it’s broken.”

Fists form around the pack straps. “Who the fuck hurt you?”

I startle, but can’t look away from the trembling line of his jaw, the failed attempt to calm the explosive breaths escaping him.

“Because they’re dead,” he adds in a tight whisper when I don’t answer.

Too late. I killed her.

“Youwilltell me.” He lowers his pack to the ground and kneels before me, digging through the contents—glass plinking—then pulls out a vial with a cork in the top. “One sip. It’s strong.” He hands it up to me, his head down, other hand still searching through the pack. But I’m utterly distracted bythe sight of him on his knees before me, so close…so perfectly positioned. It only worsens when he looks up at me—and smiles. “Wet yet?” he asks despite my sopping clothes, as if he could smell the arousal coiling in my core.

I take the vial. I have no idea what’s in it, but I swallow the bitter blue liquid—all of it—and give it back. Maybe it will take away more than physical pain. I dreaded the idea of the elixir robbing me of my free will, but I’ll swallow anything to feel numb, to forget, to pull me out of the frequent dark spiral that always lands me back on that patch of grass, the roar of the water blasting through me, the mist drowning me.

Eli stares at the empty vial in his hand and looks back up at me, straight-faced. “That’s quite a load to swallow.”

I close my eyes for an extra long second, suppressing the smile sneaking past my walls. “Your little comments aren’t helping.”

“I disagree—and so do your soaked panties.” He stands and slings the pack over his shoulder. “You might pass out from drinking all that.”

“I’m not sure passing out in your presence again is a good idea.”

“It’s not.” He grins, diverting the raindrops gliding down his face. “You’d miss all the fun. Either way, it won’t hurt anymore soon, and it’ll heal faster. Let’s go.” He turns to walk away.