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“I’m supposed to believethisis nothing?” I gesture between us. “Tell me I should think nothing of it.”

He hides his face with another look at the floor, his voice low. “What if I said you were just convenient? Could I make you hate me forever?”

Convenient?“Is that really what you want? For me to hate you?” I grip the excess length of my wet shirt, shaking. “Because I wouldn’t fucking believe you.”

Or maybe I would. That’s all I was to Reggie Junior and Maverick J.—a convenient fuck. Why would I be anything more to Eli?

He keeps his head down, his waterlogged ringlets the only thing visible. I pace along the wall, working myself up as I rant. “You lie to me. You lie to your friends. You told them you wanted to see how a Hollow takes magic, but you keep tellingmethat you need something from me, and of all the things you lie about, I don’t think that’s one of them.” I stop and lock my limbs. “So what is it?”

Because I’m not a Hollow like you thought. I don’t have whatever you need.

His hands grab at the cave wall, fingers curling like he wants to ball it up into his fists.

“What makes it worth getting yourself and all your friends in trouble? And almost killed?” My voice rises, trembling with cold and a bone-deep need for answers.

“Stop talking,” he warns, lifting his head.

“What makes it worth walking through the woods for days to find me? Who would do that?”

“Never…”

“What’s so important that you would put up withme?” I gasp, the weight of my entire past piling onto my chest. How could I be worth any of that? How could anyonecareenough?

“You are,” he yells and kicks off the wall, striding toward me with soggy stomps. Once his boots meet mine, he shoves my spine against the curly letters, an unsteady hand pressing my chest. “You want to know what I need, what I want from you?”

I stare at him. Now I’m the one grasping the wall, wishing I could hold on tight to keep myself from taking his troubled face into my hands. His brows cage his eyes, but nothing could contain the fear sparking in them, the despair leaking out.

“Do you?” he asks, his features breaking with emotion. He moves his hand to my throat, offering an air-stealing grasp before his touch softens along with his voice. “Do you?” His thumb traces down my neck and lands in the notch between my collarbones.

“I asked you.” I’m quieter than him.

He levels our faces and touches his nose to mine. His voice is tight, strained, as his thumb jabs into the hollow of my throat. “I need you to fix me.”

Chapter

Forty-Five

My fist flies up at Eli in defense, clobbering his face. He grunts and throws his hand over his mouth, his eyes wider than ever before. I don’t know if he’s more shocked by his own harsh touch or mine.

I hold my throat. “Fix you? How?”

Eli backs deeper into the cave and drops to the floor with his back against the wall. “You made me bleed.” His voice is muffled behind his hand.

“You fucking love blood.”

“Only yours.” He clutches his face harder, fingers depressing his cheeks. “No one makes me bleed.”

It’s the disbelief in his voice that has me crossing the cave and kneeling in front of him, the cold creeping back to me with theshift in my nerves. “Let me see.” I reach for his wrist and tug it away from his face.

“No.”

I scoot closer, my knees bumping his legs. Damp curls stick to his forehead. “Don’t be so damn difficult.” I pull again, but his hand is locked in place, squeezing with a bruising strength. “You’re such a baby.”

My own words crush me. The babies. The falls. Cam.Killer.

Maybe it’s the destroyed look on my face, or the way the shivers take me so violently, or the soothing blue walls, or maybe it’s something in him that I can’t see behind the black and brown and gold-flecked pools of his eyes, but he lets his hand fall away. Blood dribbles from the side of his mouth and down his stubbled chin, almost black in the dark of the cave. His darkness peels away, leaving behind a lightness, a warmth that slips through me.

“It’s only blood,” I say, steadying my hand the best I can. It reminds me of the blood on Kelter’s face the last time I saw him. One firm stroke of my thumb at a time, I wipe the blood from Eli’s face, already thick and sticky, cooled by his skin. Then I shift to his hand, rubbing it into my palm until the blood rains down in dry flakes. He watches me, pain in his eyes that’s all too familiar. The scent of the cave air strengthens around us, and I force myself to back away.