“I’m trying to protect myself from you.”
“What do you mean? I said I’ll stop if I’m draining you, we can both stop.”
“No, Rose, not from you taking my energy, but from you taking my ability to stay inside myself and protect myself from hurt. I want you. But not just the part of you that I physically crave; I want us.”
The sadness etched on his features, in his downturned mouth and confused expression, tugs at my heart. “Then you have to give yourself to us.”
“I’ve already given you a lot more than I ever have before – alive or as this. This terrifies me because everything I feel is so sudden and out of control.”
“That’s the energy connection, though.” Is he really saying he feels more than that?
“Can you see I’m saying these things without touching you? To prove to you this is more than the physical ache I have around you?”
“Alek, you’re carrying a lot of pain with you. I don’t know if it’s from your isolation or from your life before you died, but let some go instead of turning it to anger.”
He touches my cheek with his fingers. “I’m trying; but you make me feel vulnerable, as if you’ve got your hands around my heart and you could tear it out at any moment.”
The usual physical intensity between us is eclipsed by the words and the painful truth in his eyes. We’ve been pushed together, into a shared reality, and touched part of each others’ lives. We’re lost souls who have connected; and what’s growing between us is more than physical.
And that scares me more than anything else, too.
“Let me in, then. If you feel vulnerable, don’t lash out at me, or that’s what will happen.”
Alek strokes a damp strand of hair from my face. His lips touch mine; a soft buzz sparks into life whatever lives inside me that wants Alek physically. He inhales and we both fight the growing intoxication. I turn my head away and bury my face into his chest, and Alek, hesitantly, wraps his arms around me. We haven’t held each other since the night in his bed, as if we only can if everything else is satiated.
“Help me make this right,” he whispers into my hair. “Make me believe someone as beautiful inside and out as you could possibly have room for me and my darkness.”
My heart flips at these words coming from Alek, at the sad earnestness from the depths of a lost soul. As he strokes my back, I know this can’t last and we’ll give into the building surge of arousal. But in this moment, I can understand how Alek feels about me - us - is more than I believed; how I feel for him is more than I admit.
Chapter 20
The Alek I wake up with the next morning has loosened, his eyes less guarded than before. We shared a bed last night, despite my better judgement. Inevitably, our comforting embrace became something physical and intensely sexual, but we fell asleep together, and I awoke wrapped in his arms. A voice niggles I’ll regret him using me again but after our conversation last night, I’m more comfortable with the situation.
Alek sits at the table as I get ready for my hospital shift, eating toast as he watches me move around.
“Are you working tonight?” I ask him.
“I’m not leaving you alone in the house until we figure out where the stronger Shades are coming from.”
“I fought the last one, Alek. I’ll be okay.”
“Maybe, but I don’t want to risk losing you.”
I don’t want to revisit last night’s conversation. “We’ve been invited to a party.”
“A party? Whose? You don’t know anyone.” He smirks. “Don’t tell me... the ghostbuster?”
I hit him on the head with the teaspoon I’m holding. “He’s not a ghostbuster. Why are you so horrible?”
“Because he’s a sad geek?”
“One day, I think you’ll eat those words. He’s helping you. Us.”
“I’ll think about it.” He shoves toast into his mouth. Funny, we still have to sustain our bodies; the need for people’s energy is in addition to food and not instead of it. In a way, I’m happy; I can’t imagine a life without junk food.
I haven’t seen Lizzie since yesterday and when I mention her, Alek gets cagey. A creeping feeling he’s not telling me everything grows.
On the way to work, I check my phone. There are a couple more messages from Finn, which I ignore, but ignoring Finn forever isn’t an option. I check my jobs list when I arrive for my shift and groan when I spot ICU on there. Suspiciously, Finn’s roster always matches mine, so I suspect he’s working today.
Finn goes one better and hovers outside the entrance to the porters’ locker area as I arrive for work. He leans against the scuffed, magnolia-painted wall, legs crossed at the ankles and hands folded across his chest. He isn’t dressed in nurse’s blues; instead, he has long legs in dark denim and a black shirt over a T-shirt. His tattoo is visible, snaking around his wrist.
“Hey, Rose,” he says as I approach.
“Finn.”
“I really need to talk to you.”