“That wasn’t so bad,” he said as we stepped out of the brownstone.
“You thought my dad would tell you he has a shovel and a handgun?”
“Something like that.” He shifted, seeming unaccountably nervous. “I’ve just … I never picked a girl up like that before.”
With a face like this, how was that possible? “You don’t date?”
Kian sighed. “Work makes it … difficult.”
“Oh, right. There’s no good way to tell your girlfriend that you’re up to your neck in a dangerous game. What does the winner get, anyway? Lifetime supply of car wax? Rule the world for all eternity?”
“More of the latter,” he said somberly. “But to be honest, I don’t think that’s entirely it.”
“Wow, so there’s more? High stakes. But how do they know if they win?” I followed him to the car and got in when he opened the door.
“I don’t have all the answers, Edie. At this point, you’re more important than I am.”
“Then I need to find a way to parlay that value into information. Where’re we going?”
“There’s something you need to see, and this is the best time.”
“So this isn’t a date.” Part of me was glad I’d dressed for trouble, but a tiny corner felt … disappointed.
“Did you want it to be?” Kian started the car and drove toward downtown.
I don’t know why I said it; possibly my mouth detached from my brain. “Yes.”
His hands actually jerked on the wheel, running us toward the curb, and he corrected course quickly, before daring to sneak a look at me. I wondered what he saw in the streaky darkness, illuminated only by passing streetlamps and the occasional flicker of fluorescent from an open store. For my part, I was watching him in turn, trying to figure out what he looked like before. Was he thin or heavy; what flaws had been smoothed away?
“Are you screwing with me?” he asked finally.
“What? No!” I was honestly offended. God, this is so backward. Isn’t he supposed to be able to tell when a girl’s into him? “You remember I asked you to kiss me, right? Maybe it wasn’t anything to you, but that was kind of a big deal for me.”
After I said it, I wondered what Wedderburn would make of this. Kian was supposed to be making me fall for him, and this was the kind of thing I’d say if his efforts were paying off. So maybe it didn’t matter that his boss might be listening to how we really felt. Well, how I did, anyway. The constant tension and uncertainty was excruciating.
He didn’t say anything straight off but at the first opportunity, he pulled into a convenience store parking lot. After he stopped the car, his knuckles whitened on the steering wheel, but not before I saw that he was shaking. Okay, what the hell. Kian didn’t look at me, his gaze fixed straight ahead. A liquor store next door had a broken neon sign, so it flashed red across his skin in stutters and skips.
“After my life imploded,” he said softly, “I tried not to feel anything because it only seemed to get worse, until … well, you know where I hit bottom. And when. Working for Wedderburn is like … limbo. I have a life, but it doesn’t belong to me. And … I don’t have a great track record.”
First crush equals dead girl, check. That should’ve given me pause, but I didn’t think he had anything to do with that. Maybe there was a hidden monkey’s paw after all, or like he’d said, she was a victim of the opposition. Her death got him demoted from catalyst to indentured drone, so it wouldn’t make sense for him to get her killed on purpose.
Unless he didn’t know his fate was tied to hers until it was too late …
“I don’t have any track record,” I answered. “Unless you count that kiss.”
He shifted so I couldn’t see his eyes. “There was that summer guy, Ryu. Do you still talk to him?”
Are you jealous? But it seemed cruel to ask. “Yeah, now and then.”
Should I reassure him? Hard to know when I had no idea what was happening between us or if I should even want the things I did from him.
Roughly, he whispered, “Our kiss meant something to me, too. But I thought once you knew I could’ve helped you before you hit extremis, it would change things.”
“I’m not pissed, if that’s what you mean. I was shocked. It’s horrible, knowing you saw everything firsthand. But … if it doesn’t make you think less of me—”
“Why would it? It’s all on them, not you.” But I could hear the doubt in his voice.
“Then what’s wrong?”
“I am afraid.” Those three measured words sounded dredged from the bottom of his soul, limned in shadow and salt.
“Of what?”
“Having you. Losing you.”
“I don’t understand.”
I wanted to touch him, and for the first time, I felt bold enough. Reaching over, I brushed the hair out of his face, and he turned instinctively, nestling his cheek into my palm. The heat of his skin felt incredible, as if a small star burned at his heart. I traced downward, conscious that it wasn’t his true face I was touching. On the surface, he was heartbreakingly beautiful, but that wasn’t the core of him. Instead, he was a bundle of fears and scars, and I was so afraid I could love those imperfections.
“It’s two sides of the same coin. Right now, there’s nothing they can take from me.” He lifted his shoulders in a graceful shrug. “Even the cabin was just a place where I lived, so it didn’t matter when it burned. WM&G wrote me a check today. I’ll buy a condo this time.”
This time implied that Dwyer & Fell had gone after him before, probably trying to mess up somebody else’s timeline. That raised the question of who, why, and when. Kian had never told me about the other catalysts he worked with, before being assigned solely to me. Maybe one of them got too attached to him, so Dwyer & Fell tried to take Wedderburn’s pawn. From that angle, it wasn’t hard to understand his reservations.
But I tested my theory to be sure I was right. “If you let yourself care about me, you’ll have something to lose.”
“It might even be part of Wedderburn’s plan. To get me so wrapped up in you that I’ll do anything he asks, anything to keep you safe.”
Anything was a big, deep hole of a word, an abyss Kian could fall into without ever hitting bottom, and I saw cognition of that in the sorrowful gaze he turned on me. His voice dropped, so low I could barely hear it over the air pushing through the vents. “I’m not far from that point now. God only knows how I’d be if you were mine.”