Opposition (Lux, #5)(14)

And I hadn’t stopped him.

Opening my eyes, I saw my arm tremble as I lifted her right hand. The moment our flesh met, a charge jumped from her skin to mine, stirring me. Carefully, I tugged down the hem of her shirt, my knuckles brushing across her stomach as I covered her, the contact brief but torturous.

Then I caressed her, and I was f*cking lost.

My fingers drifted over her cool cheek, brushing a strand of soft hair back from her face. I don’t know how long I sat there, tracing the line of her jaw and the curve of her lips, and I really wasn’t aware of healing her, but the bruises faded from her skin and I knew the bleeding had stopped. I wanted to pick her up, clean her, but that would be too much.

It could already be too much, and then what?

Color now infused her cheeks, a sweet pink flush spreading across her face, and I realized she would wake soon.

I couldn’t be in here.

Gently, I removed her shoes and then lifted her legs, tucking them under the blanket. There was more that could’ve been done, should’ve been done, but this . . . this had to be enough.

Closing my eyes, I lowered my head, inhaling the sweet, unique scent that was solely hers, and then I kissed her parted lips. Sensation rushed over me, a jolt of something close to being described as sublime, and I forced myself to lift my head and stand and back the hell away from her before it was too late, even though a dark voice whispered that it probably already was.

There were a hundred ways all of this could play out, and I couldn’t see a happy ending with any of them.



{ Katy }

I had to fight my way through the fog of unconsciousness, and my brain was slow to come back online. Lying still for several moments, I was kind of surprised by the fact that I wasn’t in any serious pain. There was a dull ache in my shoulder, and somewhere deep behind my eyes, there was a faint throbbing, but I’d expected more.

Confusion swirled inside me as I played back those precious minutes before I landed headfirst in la-la land. The poo had hit the proverbial fan at the market and the Luxen had been everywhere, taking on human DNA at such a rapid pace that it had done something to the humans, killing them. I prayed that little girl had made it to safety, but where was it safe? They’d been everywhere and . . .

My heart sped up as I remembered feeling Daemon, seeing him in his true form, knowing he’d seen me, but then he’d disappeared and . . . and Dawson had hit me with a blast from the Source. Why would he have done that? Better yet, why hadn’t Daemon come to me?

In the furthest reaches of my consciousness, there was an insidious whisper that spelled out the answer. Luc and Archer had suspected as much, but I couldn’t let myself believe that they had been right and that our greatest fear had come true.

Just thinking that Daemon could be different now, could be one of them—whatever they actually were—made it feel like a fist had seized my heart.

Taking a deep breath, I blinked my eyes open and immediately sucked in a startled breath, jackknifing up so fast my head felt like it would fall off my shoulders.

Two emerald-colored eyes stared back into mine, framed with heavy black lashes. All at once I was tossed back to last summer, the morning after I’d discovered Daemon Black wasn’t quite human—when he’d frozen time, stopping a truck from turning me into roadkill. I’d woken up to find Dee staring at me.

Just like now.

Perched on the foot of the bed, Dee sat with her legs drawn to her chest and her chin resting on her knees. A curtain of dark hair fell over her shoulders in thick curls. To this day, she was probably the most beautiful girl I’d seen in real life, just like Ash, but Ash . . . she was no longer with us.

But Dee was here.

Relief loosened the tense muscles in my back as I stared at her, at the girl who had become my best friend, was still my best friend even after the tragedy with Adam. Dee was here and that had to mean something good, something great. I started to move toward her, letting the blanket fall to my waist, but I stilled.

Dee stared at me, unblinking, the same way she had that morning. But something was off about her.

Throat dry, I swallowed. “Dee?”

One perfectly shaped eyebrow rose. “Katy?”

Unease rose at the sound of her voice. It was different, colder and flat. Instinct warned that I stay back, even though that didn’t make sense to me.

“I was beginning to wonder if you’d ever wake up,” she said, loosening her arms from around her legs. “You sleep like the dead.”

I blinked slowly, glancing around the room. I didn’t recognize the green walls or the framed photos of breathtaking landscapes. None of the furniture looked familiar.

Neither did Dee.

Pulling my legs up, away from her, I tried to swallow again as I glanced at a closed door near a large oak dresser. “I’m . . . I’m so thirsty.”

“So?”

My gaze bounced back to her, reacting to the sharpness in her tone.

“What?” Her eyes rolled as she unfolded her long, slender legs. “You expect me to fetch you a drink?” She laughed, and my eyes widened at the strangeness of the sound. “Yeah, think again. You’re not going to die of thirst anytime soon.”

Dumbfounded by her attitude, all I could do was stare at her as she stood and smoothed her hands down the sides of dark denim–clad thighs. Maybe I had really damaged my brain back in the market or woken up in an alternate universe where sweet Dee had turned into bitchy Dee.