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The guilt in his voice produced a pang in my chest. “I shouldn’t have distracted you.” A reminder that the buzzing inside me from earlier was gone. “You killed them all?”

The quiver on his back was half-empty, and the arrows he’d recovered dripped with black blood. And not once did I hear gunfire.

My eyes widened. “What about Georges and Tallis?”

“They’re fine, patrolling nearby and making sure I didn’t miss any.” He sighed against my shoulder. “Thank you for not leaving the pond.” His chuckle huffed out, short and strained. “I was convinced you were going to come crashing through the woods, naked and unarmed, and get yourself killed.”

“I thought about it.”

I ran my nose along the pulsing vein at his neck. The action felt…normal. Even our surroundings, the pond, the gloomy skyline, all of it felt normal.

After a period of silence, he trailed fingers over the swell on my cheek. “The Drone didn’t enter the water?”

“No. He backtracked when I splashed him.”

“Then we know his weakness.”

“The safest place in the world is in the water,” I mumbled, absently, eyes on the sky. “Fuck, Jesse. He’s alive.”

“We’ll get him again, and this time we’ll cut him up and burn the pieces.” He dragged his whiskered jaw from my brow to my temple. Man, that felt nice. Even better was his warm breath on my face. “When we’re done with this road trip, let’s retire on a boat.”

“Deal.”

But could I even hope for such a thing? I just needed to cure every nymph on the planet. Survive a fall from a cliff. Gather enough supplies to live offshore. Evade pregnancy, possibly dooming the human race in the process. Oh, and kill the Drone. Again.

Heavy thoughts. I could tell by the sudden grooves in his forehead he was thinking the same things.

For now, I was content to stand in the protection of this pond, wrapped up in Jesse, for as long as he’d allow it. “You know that creepy feeling I had when we first came out here?”

“It’s gone.”

I leaned back for a better look at his face. “You felt it, too?”

“I feel you.” He shrugged. “You’re easy to read.”

It was more than that, like the man was attuned to my every thought. It made me feel naked, and not in the physical sense.

I glanced at the shore, searching for my weapons. “Uh huh. What am I feeling now?”

“Vulnerable. Unarmed.” He lowered his chin, his gaze brushing over my chest as he stroked a finger down my back. Then he looked away and nodded at the tree line. “I hid your guns under the brush.”

I shook my head, smiling. “Lucky guess.”

When my eyes flicked back to his, he asked, “What did the Drone say?”

Prickles iced down my back. “He knew what his bite would do to Michio.”

He inhaled through his nose and leaned in to— Holy shit. Was he going to kiss me?

I held still as his mouth lowered to mine, hesitantly, maddeningly erasing the inches. He paused, angled his chin up, and kissed my brow.

Well, it was something, and damn if I didn’t memorize the brief brush of his lips, the heat of his exhale, and the tightening of his fingers against my waist and neck.

He lowered my body, steadying me until my feet touched the muddy bottom. Then he reached beneath the surface and tugged a beige bar from his pocket.

I raised an eyebrow. “You have…soap in your pocket?”

“You can thank Georges.” He lathered it up. “He tossed it to me when I told him to guard while we bathed.” He looked away, his eyes shuttering, and glanced back. “I shouldn’t have left you alone.”

I strained my vision to examine the surrounding woods, and off in the distance, the shadowy outline of Tallis’ shoulders came into view. “But now we have soap.” I attempted a smile, and it came easy because Wow. I hadn’t seen soap since, hell, a lifetime ago. “Wonder what else Georges is keeping from us.”

“He found some girly supplies in one of those buildings.” He nodded to the structures off to the south.

What did Jesse consider girly?

“Like what?”

“You wanna highlight your hair?”

Ridiculous. I shook my head.

“Paint your nails?”

I crinkled my nose.

“How about some Midol for your crabby moods?”

Funny guy. I hadn’t had a period in four years because of the IUD. “I’m not crabby.”

“Lower your head.”

I did, bracing my hands on my thighs beneath the water. He combed the bubbles through my hair, rubbing the bar over my scalp as he went. His fingers were attentive, distracting, magical. All I could do was breathe. So I breathed some more, sucking air as quietly as humanly possible.

“What else did the Drone say?”

He expected me to have a conversation right now? Sweet pissing hell, this was torture.

Bent slightly forward, my upper body was still unnervingly exposed above the waist-deep water as I scrubbed the edges of my fingernails. “He said we want the same thing. Nymphs.”