Page 105 of This Blood that Bonds Us

“I like the sound of that.”

I pushed myself up to kiss him. I loved the smell of him, the lines in his forearms, and the way he never pushed me away. He leaned in, scooping me closer.

“Kim, I want you to promise me something.”

My heart drummed faster, and I pulled back to meet his gaze as he grabbed my hand to rub his thumb over my knuckles.

“Okay . . .”

“If something does happen to me . . . I want to know you’re going to still try. NoRomeo and Julietsacrifices.”

“You think I’m going to stab myself in the chest?”

“If one of us dies, we have to try to keep going. You have to promise you won’t give up. You’ll keep going.”

I stared into his amber eyes, and a lump gathered in my throat. What a strangely horrible thing to ask of me.

“What if I don’t want to . . . What if I can’t?”

“You can.” Aaron’s palm was hot against my cheek. “I know you can. The world needs Kimberly Burns. My brothers would need you . . . like I need you.”

I fought against the emotion of his words. I didn’t want to open myself up to the possibility. Even a second of doubt would send me down a bad road, so I shoved it down.

“But what if I need you. We all do.”

“I guess I’ll just have to make sure we all survive then.” He said it with one easy breath and no hint of doubt, just a calm reassurance that it had to happen.

“I just don’t want this to be the end.”

I couldn’t think about lasts. Last kisses. Last dates. Last laughs. The mere mention brought tears to my eyes.

“It will never be. No matter what, I’ll find you again. Somehow, I will. Do you believe me?” The warm brown of his eyesbeckoned me into the future. To warmer days and sunshine just up ahead if I’d believe.

I nodded and held my hand out to him. “I promise to try. But you have to promise too.”

“Kim, if you die, that means I’m already dead.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do.”

“Promise me anyway.”

He leaned in to kiss me, and I savored it. The softness of his touch and the warmth of his breath. The way he smelled . . . Aaron was mine. No matter what happened. Death couldn’t take him from me. Our love would still be there.

“I promise.”

Forty-Six

Aaron

The eclipse was coming, and things were changing again, but some things never changed, like Mom sitting on the porch sipping her coffee. It was the only time she’d ever looked relaxed back in Brooklyn.

When I was home for the evenings, I made sure to spend my mom’s last hour awake with her. Sometimes, it was hanging out and watching TV or her watching me play the only video gamewe had available—a Nintendo Wii given to her by a friend—but at night when it wasn’t too windy, she’d light a fire in the furnace on the porch and we’d swing together. Sometimes, it was all three of us and sometimes, just us two, but on this night, it was just Mom and me sitting in the silence.

“You look tired,” she said, eyeing me while sipping her coffee. She moved a salt-and-pepper strand behind her ear and laid her head back to watch me.

I tried to soak it in and make up for all the time we’d lost, but time always slipped away from me in Alaska. The faster I tried to grab it, the faster it fled. The daylight was brief, and the moon was more of a companion than it had ever been.