WE’RE SEPARATED BY ONLY A SMALL SPACE, AND THEN WE aren’t because Jackson steps closer, so close that the faint citrus scent his shaving cream left on his skin lures me. So close that I have to tip my head back to meet his gaze.
Pulse racing, I stand perfectly still as he reaches up to pull the covered elastic from my ponytail. He takes his time, leaving me plenty of opportunity to stop him, to step away. My hair slides down over my shoulders. My breath stops as he takes a thick handful and drags his fingers through to the ends, then lowers his face so his nose traces up the side of my neck to my ear.
“You smell like strawberries,” he whispers.
“Shampoo.” I barely have enough breath for even that single word. All my senses are filled with him, the feel of his chest against mine, his lips on my skin, the beat of his heart thundering in time with my own.
My breathing turns ragged. I’m grateful for the solid weight of his forearm pressing against my lower back, drawing me closer, holding me up because my legs feel like noodles, my head spinning.
He drags his mouth over the angle of my jaw, my cheek, to my lips.
Fire bursts inside me. My lips part under his. Coming up on my toes, I fist my hands in his hair and kiss him back, sharing the flames that lick at my soul. I breathe as he breathes, liquid heat in my veins.
He kisses me like I am water and he is parched. Like I am air and he is drowning. He kisses me like he is dying and I am his lifeline. He is gentle and rough, taking and giving. In that moment, his kiss is all I know, all I ever want to know.
I come up higher on my toes and my lips cling to his as he pulls away. I’m left shaken and out of my element. I’ve never been kissed like that. I never imagined such a kiss existed.
I stare at him, stunned. We’re both breathless. His pupils are dark and dilated, surrounded only by a thin rim of iridescent gray.
“What was that?” I whisper. I’m cold without his body next to mine. I feel cheated that he’s stepped away from me.
“My one chance,” he says with a hint of his dark smile.
“For what?”
“To kiss you. To live the moment I’ve been wanting since the first second I laid eyes on you.”
I’m shaken to the core. He’s wanted to kiss me all along? Like that?
“Why didn’t you?” I ask, thinking of all the times I thought he would kiss me, all the times I wanted him to. All the times he pulled back, stepped away, leaving me disappointed.
“I didn’t want to hurt you.”
I laugh softly. “Trust me. That didn’t hurt.”
He drags his fingers back through the shaggy layers of his hair in a totally un-Jackson-like gesture.
“But what I’m going to tell you now will, and I swear to you, I’m sorry for that, Miki.” He takes a deep breath and turns away. “You’re here because of me.” His tone is flat. He doesn’t look at me, doesn’t touch me now. I feel the absence like a blow to the gut.
“Because of you?” I wrap my arms around myself, my lips still tingling from his kiss, my heart growing wary. “Explain.”
“I was first pulled when I was twelve.” He spins to face me, his expression icy and cold, and false. He’s in agony, suffering, I can see it beneath his carefully cultivated veneer.
Images assault me. Bright lights. A truck. The scream of metal on metal. The scent of blood in my nose, the taste metallic and salty on my tongue.
And then I’m broken. Like I was broken in my nightmare about the car accident. Pinned in place.
Dying.
Such pain, in my body, in my heart.
Not mine. Jackson’s. Jackson’s pain.
In a snap the images vanish.
“That nightmare you had,” he says, turning away once more. “It was mine.”
I frown, but I’m not exactly surprised. If anything, I’m more surprised by the fact that what he’s saying actually makes sense to me. As if somewhere inside, I knew it all along.
“I saw your nightmare? That night, I dreamed what you dreamed. Did you send it to me on purpose?”
He shakes his head, his posture stiff, his back toward me. I wish he would face me. I wish he would close the yawning distance between us and put his arms around me. “I was thinking of you before I fell asleep. I must have held you in my thoughts and sent you my dreams without meaning to.”
“Has that happened to you before?”
Again, he shakes his head. “Not that I know of. Only with you.”
“And now, right now, you put your memories of the accident in my head.” He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t need to. I knew he could do that even before I met him, that very first day when I heard him calling my name in my mind. I gather my thoughts, sorting them before I speak. “Your eyes are Drau. And you have their ability to”—I pause, searching for the right words—“to be telepathic, like them. That’s how you were going to question the Drau on our last mission. That’s how you could speak in my head.”
“Yes.”
“When you spoke to me that first day, you told me, Miki! Now! . . . to save Janice’s sister.” I tip my head to the side. “What would you have done if I hadn’t heard you? If I hadn’t run?”