Logan frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Think about it,” I said. “Linus told me, told all of us, that he wouldn’t trade the candle for my grandma. But what’s to stop the Reapers from trying again? Maybe next time, they’ll go after someone closer to him. Someone like . . . you.”
Logan blinked. “You think the Reapers would kidnap me?”
I shrugged. “Maybe Linus would feel different if you were the one they were threatening to kill instead of my grandma. Maybe then, he wouldn’t be so stubborn about things and unwilling to part with the candle.” I couldn’t keep the anger and the bitterness out of my voice.
Logan didn’t say anything, but hurt shimmered in his icy eyes, and his shoulders slumped. He was right. Every time it seemed we were finally on track, something else came up to knock us off course again. And most of the time, it wasn’t even anything either one of us had done to the other. But as long as the Reapers were still out there, as long as Loki was free this was our life—for better or worse.
I just hoped we could survive the worse this time around—especially since I was going to be the one to inflict it on us.
“Look, I know you’re sorry about all of this,” I said in a low voice. “And I am too. I really don’t mean to take my anger out on you. I know it’s not your fault. None of it is your fault. Not the Reapers kidnapping my grandma, and not your dad refusing to hand the candle over to them either. It’s . . . just our life, and right now, it sucks.”
Logan looked at me. “So what can we do to make it better? What can we do to make it right?”
I shrugged. I didn’t know the answer to that any more than he did. Logan kept staring at me, his gaze dark and troubled. Yeah, I knew the feeling.
Still, I also knew this might be the last moment we ever had together, given what I was planning on doing tomorrow. So I crawled across the aisle to where Logan was sitting. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and drew me close. I let out another sigh and rested my head on his shoulder, enjoying the strong warmth of his body seeping into mine.
“I love you,” I said. “No matter what happens, no matter what we do, no matter who or what comes between us, I love you, Spartan. I will always love you. I want you to know that.”
Logan put his other arm around me and hugged me tight. “I know, Gypsy girl. And I love you too. I always will.”
I turned my head, and we kissed. I felt all the love radiating off Logan and flowing into me, along with fear, sorrow, and frustration about everything that was going on. His feelings mirrored my own. After a few seconds, we broke apart, and I rested my head on his shoulder again. Maybe for the last time.
I just wondered how much he would hate me when he realized how I’d lied to him and everything I’d done.
Logan and I stayed back in the stacks until Nickamedes called out in a booming voice that it was time for the library to close. The two of us went back to the checkout counter. I slid Vic into the scabbard on my waist and gently shook Nyx awake. The wolf pup let out a sleepy yawn and licked my hand. I scratched her head, and she sighed in happiness.
Logan walked me back to my dorm. Alexei followed us, then split off to go back to his own room for the night. Logan and I stood outside in the pool of golden light cast by the streetlamp closest to the dorm steps.
“I’ll talk to my dad again,” he said. “We’ll find a way to save your grandma, I promise you that.”
I nodded, although I didn’t tell him that I seriously doubted Linus Quinn ever changed his mind about anything once it had been made up.
“Thanks. I appreciate that.”
“See you in the morning at weapons training, okay?” Logan said.
I nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”
We kissed, and the Spartan turned around, stuck his hands in the pockets of his black leather jacket, and walked away across the grass, which was already covered with that killer frost once again. I watched him go, then went up the steps, slid my ID card through the reader, and trudged up to my room, with Nyx following me.
I shut the door behind me and locked it. I put Vic on the bed, then sank down beside the sword, letting out a long, tired sigh.
“What’s wrong?” the sword sniped, his English accent a little more pronounced than usual. “You don’t like lying to your boyfriend?”
“Of course not,” I snapped back. “But you know I can’t tell him what I’m going to do. He’d try to stop me. Or worse, tell his dad.”
Vic didn’t respond.
We sat there in silence for a few seconds before my phone beeped. I pulled it out of my jeans pocket and stared at the message on the screen.
We’re here. U so owe me for this.
And I’m sure you’ll make me pay, I texted back. C U tomorrow.
I also sent the info about Vivian’s order to turn the candle over by noon, along with the address that the Reaper girl had given me.
“Is that who I think it is?” Vic asked.
“Yep,” I said. “Our friends are here and ready to rock
’n’ roll.”
I put the phone away and looked at the sword. Vic stared back at me, his purple eye as serious as I’d ever seen it.
“I still think this is a crazy plan—at best,” he said.
“I know. Me too. But crazy is sort of what I do, right?” He didn’t return my halfhearted grin.
I sighed. “Look, if you don’t want to go with me tomorrow, I understand. I don’t want you falling into Reaper hands any more than you do. So it’s okay if you want to stay here.”
Vic rolled his eye. “I said it was a crazy plan. That’s all. I didn’t say anything about not going with you, Gwen. C’mon. At the very least, there will be dozens of Reapers there—Reapers that I can kill. You know I would never pass up a chance to do that.”
This time, I rolled my eyes at his bloodthirsty words. Sometimes, I thought the only reason Vic hung around me was so that he could kill Reapers, since I was like a magnet, always attracting them whether I wanted to or not.
“Besides,” he continued. “I was your grandmother’s sword long before I was yours, Gwen. I want to save Geraldine as much as you do.”
I nodded. Sometimes, I forgot that Vic had had all of these other lives before me—that he’d been the weapon for all the women, all the Champions, of the Frost family over the years. And that he’d seen a lot of them die too, in the same sort of battle I would be facing tomorrow.