Unhinged (Splintered, #2)(100)

It doesn’t matter if everything somehow works out and we defeat Red. I still can’t be with Jeb tonight. Not with the vow I made to Morpheus. Maybe it would be easier for me if he really was gone, captured by Sister Two and trapped in her web. But I can’t let myself imagine it might be true. I want him to survive.

The leaves rattle around us and thunder shakes the ground.

“We should hurry.” Jeb pulls a plastic box from behind him. Inside is a wrist corsage made of miniature white rosebuds, the tips airbrushed the same periwinkle as the lace gloves I’ll be wearing, all held together with navy blue ribbon and a bow.

I catch my breath as I look at it closer. I knew Jenara was making this. What I didn’t expect was a silver ring pressed into the middle of one of the roses. A dozen tiny diamonds sparkle in the setting: a heart with wings.

My whole body feels at first heavy, then light. “Is this …?”

Jeb looks down, dark lashes cloaking his eyes. “I got the idea for the wings from my paintings of you. Had no clue how spot-on they’ve always been till today.” He swallows. “I was planning to give it to you at the studio after prom tonight. But just in case—” He stops himself, as if speaking the worst might make it materialize.

He pops open the plastic lid and plucks the silver circle free, then lifts me to my knees, so we’re eye to eye. My heart is pounding in my ears. Grass tickles my knees, but I don’t dare scratch the itch because Jeb’s looking me in the eye, and the expression on his face is the most somber I’ve ever seen.

“Alyssa Victoria Gardner.” Hearing him speak my full name makes my toes curl in anticipation. “You once told me on a rowboat in Wonderland that one day you wanted to have two kids and live in the country so you could hear your muse and answer when it called. I’m telling you now, here in our sanctuary, that when you’re ready for that life … I want to be the guy to give it to you.”

He waits, mouth half-open in anticipation, crooked incisor casting a shadow across his straight white teeth. All that’s familiar about him spins around me: the green eyes that know me like no one else’s; the paintings that bare my soul; the arms that promise power and strength each time I’m in them.

Only Jeb, with his human flaws and vulnerabilities, can fit the human side of my heart. He’s been planning to ask me this since before he knew everything, and he still wants it even now.

As for me, I’ve known ever since our first summer years ago how deep my feelings run. Yes, I want to spend a lifetime with him. But I have two possible futures. Two lives to live. Two parts of my heart. How can I commit to either of them until I’ve thought everything through?

Then another doubt surfaces unexpectedly, something I haven’t considered until now. “Wait. Is this how you and Dad worked things out? You caved and told him you’d marry me before we got to London. Is that what’s going on here?”

Jeb’s hopeful expression falls. “No. That’s not—well, yes, it played a part in the timing. But you gotta know, Al. This is what I want. It’s what I’ve always wanted. A future with you. A life with you, my fairy bride. Forever.”

“Always said … the boy … was a bloody wordsmith …”

My heart skips as the familiar cockney accent fills my head.

A moth dives into the canopy, surrounded by blue static. It struggles against the wind, and the static spreads, reaching up to the branches, as if to hold it in place. Jeb and I scramble backward as the insect transforms into a man, slumped to his side on the dirt. His breathing is labored and his wings drape across him, hiding his body.

“Son of a—”

“Morpheus.” I interrupt Jeb’s outburst, lifting one of the satiny wings so I can see his face. I’m thrilled he’s alive, but he doesn’t look like he will be for long.

“Hello, luv,” he says through a thick curtain of blue hair. “Hope I’m … interrupting.” He draws his knees to his chest, coughing.

The leaves rattle overhead as the rain begins.

I touch his forehead, shocked at how hot he is. “He’s burning up. We have to get him inside.”

Jeb hesitates, mistrust shadowing his face.

I put my hand on his arm. “We need all the help we can get tonight.” I can’t tell Jeb that I care beyond that. Not yet. We don’t have time to sort through that mess.

Gritting his teeth, Jeb takes the heart pendant from my neck and laces the ring through the chain. He holds it out for me. “Will you hang on to this? Until we can talk later?”

I nod and loop the chain around my neck.

Jeb drags Morpheus out from under the leaves and hoists him onto his shoulder. “Get those, Al.” He gestures to the wings dragging on the ground behind him.

I maneuver Morpheus’s wings, trying to curl them around his body so he won’t get wet. Mom meets us at the back door in her robe. She looks as confused and panicked as I feel but ushers us in.

“Take him to your room. Hurry. Your dad just pulled into the driveway. I’ll get the sedatives in him. Let’s hope they work fast. We only have an hour till we need to go.”

We trudge down the hall, leaving wet prints on the carpet. Morpheus’s wings scrape the walls, knocking a few of my mosaics crooked. Mom follows and shuts the door to my room from the other side. I hear her straightening my mosaics as she heads toward the living room.