Page 120 of Harbinger

But his hands remain at his sides. “He wasn’t like me.”

Wasn’t.

It’s strange how a single word can sound so final.

I stagger back a step, needing to put space between us, but my knees buckle. Pain spears up my legs, ripping through tissue and muscle as if the fire isn’t finished with me yet. The room lurches sideways.

He catches me before I hit the ground.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs, lips too close to my ear. Grounding me. Saving me again. I want to hate him for it.

“I’m fine,” I say through gritted teeth.

He doesn’t bother arguing. He simply lifts me into his arms with infuriating ease, just like he did in the clearing.

But I’m not going to escape this. Whatever this is.

Bishop lowers me onto the edge of the bed and reaches for the glass jar of salve. “Your burns need attention.”

I make a weak sound of protest that dies in my throat as he kneels in front of me.

He twists off the lid. The bitter, medicinal scent is so pungent that I can taste it, but his fingers hover above my skin. Waiting.

“Vessica said you didn’t want a stranger’s hands on you,” he says quietly.

Something about the way he says it makes my chest ache. There’s understanding there. And beneath it, something fierce. Anger, maybe. Or fear. Or the kind of violence that’s better kept leashed.

“Not after …” I whisper.

I don’t finish.

But he nods. “Tell me if you want me to stop.”

My muscles tense in a way that has nothing to do with the coolness of the balm as he kneels at my feet and smooths the salve over my skin. The pain dulls to something manageable, and in its place, there’s only his touch.

His focus slips for half a second. Just long enough for something unguarded to surface before he reins it back in. His hands are steady. Controlled. Never lingering longer than necessary. But something reverent burns on his face, in his eyes, in that gentle, patient touch.

He’s holding back.

I brush a hand over his forehead, and our eyes lock, something raw and electric passing between us. His breath changes. Mine does, too. He rests his head against my palm, his eyes shuttering, and for one reckless second, I want to close the space between us. Until the grief coiling in my chest strikes. Guilt follows close behind. Relief. Anger. Want.

All of it tangles together until it’s impossible to separate.

I choke back a sob, but he hears it.

A muscle tenses in his jaw, and he shifts back again. I lower my hand, but neither of us looks away, the space between us humming with everything we’re not saying.

Until I break the silence and admit, “I didn’t think you’d come after me.”

“You ran,” he says, not bothering to look up.

“Why?” We both know what I’m really asking.

He opens his mouth, forming a word that never leaves his lips before he drops his gaze to my wounds, returning to the task at hand with lethal concentration. As if focus is the only thing keeping him from answering.

Part of me doesn’t want it to be. The part of me that wants to feel proof that I’m alive.

But I’ll never forgive myself for it.