Her eyes told me more than anything she could have said out loud.
She was worried.
“I don’t want to be here,” she said, not moving. “But your meltdown is going to force me into a meltdown. I’m going to need you to pull it together.”
I laughed lightly, shaking my head and moving past her to sit on the edge of my bed. “Like you’re doing any better. I can’t feel you like you can feel us, but I can see the gears turning in your head from all the way over here.”
“Of course they’re turning, Lanier,” she bit out, frustrated. “You make it seem like you hate me. You can’t stand this bond, and I can fucking feel it.”
A fucking blade was just shoved through my abdomen, I was sure of it.
I sighed, leaning forward and placing my face in my hands. I spoke through my fingers. “I don’t hate you, Annalise.”
“A part of you does,” she corrected, her voice strong. “Why?”
I wasn’t planning on telling her. I wanted to keep my past to myself. It was easier that way—on all of us—but the look in her eyes, the agony written on her face, it was all caused by me, and she just wanted to know why.
I could, at the very least, give her that. “Because four Nephilim killed my father.”
I couldn’t look up; I didn’t want to see her face. She liked to wear a mask, but it never hid anything from me. I couldn’t handle pity—or worse, her lack of caring. I hated it, but I wanted her to make it better, I wanted someone—anyone—to make thoughts in my head disappear, but I had let that dream die long ago.
“My father was Human; my mother was an Angel. When an Angel gets pregnant, she goes back to heaven after giving birth, leaving the Human father to stay on earth and raise the baby. My father knew about Nephilim and knew what I was. He used to tell me that he loved my mother more than anything else in this world. Even knowing that she was going to die, he held her hand until the very last moment. He never hid the details of her death from me. He wasn’t the type of man to go easy on me, but he was the most supportive and decent man I’ve ever met.”
Annalise moved away from the wall and came over to sit on the bed next to me. I didn’t move, just waited until she got comfortable—her leg brushing up against mine, her body tilted in my direction.
I continued, “He raised me in an orphanage that was run by a mated Nephilim couple—Aunt Rachel and Uncle John. Together, the three of them raised Cabe and I, plus a few other kids, but our house never felt like an orphanage should. They treated us all as their own, and my father? He fucking loved his job.” My voice came out cracked and full of gravel.
Annalise reached down and squeezed my thigh for just a second before letting go and placing her hand back in her lap. I closed my eyes and kept going, “I was six when they came for him. A group of Nephilim, four of them, came to our house and ripped my father out. I had no idea why, still don’t to this day, but I watched from the front yard as they hit him over the head and beat him until he was gone. They hadn’t seen me hiding behind a tree.”
I hated this story, the memories, the smell of grass and tree bark and fucking blood. “I hid, Annalise.”
“You were a child, Lanier,” she whispered.
“Yes, of course I was, I was only six, but I was fucking Nephilim. I was just like the men that killed him. I could have done something, anything. I could have at least made my presence known, but instead, I sat there and cried. I held in my screams, I bit down on my tongue so hard that I learned what blood tasted like. I. Fucking. Hid.”
“Before I say anything, I need you to explain to me what that has to do with me,” she stated, as if she were holding back on what she wanted to say. But that was Annalise, she was calculated and thoughtful. She wasn’t impulsive. She needed to plan and figure out all the facts before she made any rash decisions.
“I don’t hate you, Annalise. I hate myself.” I turned to look at her, pulling one leg up to rest on the bed, the other still on the floor. Her face was blank, but she was holding it like that on purpose. She wanted more. “I hate what I am because it failed me back then, and it failed him. I deserve to Fall. How could I live my life—enjoy my life—while knowing that a creature like me kicked the shit out my own father while I watched. I stood there while he died, Annalise. I did nothing to help him.”
I took a deep breath and looked into her lilac eyes, wishing that I could drown in them, float endlessly in her warmth. “So, no, I don’t hate you. But this bond is torture, it’s a fresh kind of hell. I could take everything from you, I could give everything back, we could be something, Annalise, but I can’t choose between my father and my feelings. I did that once before and it cost him his life. Now I live with the consequences and get what I deserve.”
She was only still for a moment before her features shifted and she gave me a sad smirk. She stood up and put a hand on my shoulder, tugging until I moved to face her, where she now stood between my legs.
She lifted her hands to either side of my face gently, pulling my gaze to hers, “I won’t tell you that I agree with what you’re doing, because I don’t. I don’t think you should hate an entire race based on the actions of a few people, but I will tell you this. I know a little something about self-hatred. I live with it every day; our demons must be on speaking terms. They come for us the same way, with the same vile thoughts and fucked up morals. Because of that, I know that your mind is made up and you’re going to do what you want to do.”
She paused, her eyes bouncing between mine. “I’m going to help you find the solution to this fucked up system, and we will deny the bond, but in the meantime…trust me. I know that I’m asking a lot when I say that…and if I were in your position, I would tell you to fuck right off, but I can’t live like this, Lanier. I can’t deal with your torment singing in my head, it hurts too much. The other two will notice, and it will fuck everything up. I feel you the strongest, I hear you the loudest. What you feel, I feel, and I need you to be clearheaded and strong while I follow your lead. I’ll back you up, I’ll help you out, but trust me with this bond.”
“I’m not sure what you’re saying,” I replied honestly. She nailed everything on the head already, and it was almost scary how well she could read me. I felt myself relaxing as she talked, she was continuing to level with me, giving me the chance to lead with her at my back, but I wasn’t sure what she meant about trust.
I didn’t give that freely—I didn’t think I had any left to give.
“I’m saying that I can fuck you without falling for you; I can support you and help you without you having to fear that I might trick you into loving me. Trust that I understand your need to deny the bond, your need to walk away from this world. I don’t understand everything, because this isn’t a world that I know very well, but I do know something about a mission, a plan, revenge. I know that once you start down that path, you’ll stop for no one.” Her eyes bounced between mine, leveling with me. “I’m no one, in the end of all this—I’m a complication, a kink in your plan, but I don’t have to be. Whatever it is you need from me, I can give it to you, but please stop shutting me out. Stop pulling on this fucking bond and then throwing it away when it feels too good. This is your thing, your plan, but you said yourself that we can’t do anything about it right now. So, if it feels good, then let it feel good while we figure this out.”