Page 84 of Scarlet Wars
He gave a lazy shrug that meant nothing to his face. “Pretty sure you’re still the same person under all that steel. But that’s not the real question, is it?”
I arched a brow. “Then what is?”
His tone shifted, lower now, intimate enough to raise the hairs on my arms. “Do you still love me?”
I stared at him, heart thudding. “What?”
“You heard me.” He stepped closer, until the air itself seemed to shrink between us. “In spite of everything I’ve done, every lie, every threat, every dark thing I shoved down your throat, and will spend the rest of my life trying to atone for…tell me, Emma.” His voice broke on the edges. “Do you still love me?”
My own voice was barely more than a whisper. "I fell in love with a guy who pushed me to grow. Who forced me to see a world I’d been blind to for years. I loved a guy who saw me so clearly, even when I didn’t know who I was anymore."
My throat tightened. “Are you still that guy?”
Stalemate.
He didn’t answer. Didn’t move. Just stood there, his jaw tight, his attention locked on me with a look, that said everything when he said nothing at all.
I smiled with sadness. “I think you still love the version of me that needs saving. The one who’s all light and bright, as you say. The one who doesn’t scare you. But I’m not that girl anymore, James. I’m no longer Emma Thompson, daughter of two brilliant scholars with an amazing law career in her future.”
I swallowed hard, my chest burning. “I’m Emma Thompson, Offensive. Mutilated. Betrayed by the people I trusted most. And—” the word snagged like glass in my throat— “orphan.”
James winced as though I’d struck him, but I didn’t stop. “I’m not sorry for the person I’ve become.”
“Nor would I want you to be,” James whispered. “All I want for you to know, in considering your options, is how I feel. And this is how I feel.”
I took a slow, steadying breath. “My options. Right. Well, if you’re serious about taking a stand against the United Chiefs, I’d be honored to fight them with you.”
James nodded, spine straightening as if he was setting himself up to carry something heavy. “I am serious about it. And I think there might be even an easy solution to all of this.”
An easy solution for a complicated problem? I raised a brow. “Which is?”
“I think we should fake the bond.”
The words landed with a crooked, bitter laugh in my head. Oh, the irony. I could just hear Caden’s voice roaring at me the instant James said it:that’s placating them, not fighting them.
Naturally, it took James repeating my own idea for me to realize the worst possible thing: Caden was right.
Which was a truth I’d never admit out loud if that guy’s ego had to stay sort of manageable.
But I couldn’t deny that the notion of pretending—of putting on a lie that would wrap itself around our lives—did feel like a cold trade. It might buy us time. It might even save people. It might also chain me in ways I couldn’t yet see.
I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, fingers finding the seam of my sleeve. “It could be a last resort,” I said steadily even as the words tasted like surrender. “But we have other options.”
James lifted both brows. “Like what?”
For a breath I let myself picture the impossible: all of us standing together, not hiding, not bartering away pieces of ourselves. “We could fight them,” I said, softer than I meant. “Take an actual stand against them.”
James barked a laugh that had no humor in it. “Really? You want to fight fifteen of the most powerful Offensives who ever lived—the ones who command the Offensives of every Collective on the planet—with what? Kanata C, Crown, and a magic-less Cyclos?”
My jaw clenched until I tasted metal. “We have other alliances. Like Slava.”
He shook his head, the motion crisp. “Still a death sentence for anyone who joins us.”
“Then I’ll do it by myself,” I snapped, as heat flared in my chest. “I have the power of the Elder in me, James. I can best fifteen Chiefs if I have enough close support.”
He answered me flatly, like it was a fact he’d been rehearsing: “Emma. Let’s make this very clear. Whatever happens,youcannot fight the Chiefs.”
“Excuse me?” I must’ve misheard him. “Why the hell not?”
