Page 3 of Illusory

My heart broke for him. For the time he’d lost and for the life-changing decision that had been stolen from him. If only there had been more time, some other way to save him...

But there hadn’t been, and it was time for me to face the music.

“I’m so sorry, Trace. I never wanted any of this to happen to you. You have to know that. I…I had no other choice. It wastheonlyway.” The words fell flat even to my own ears. They weren’t enough. Nothing would ever be enough to erase what had been done to him.

“The only way towhat?”His brows pulled together, his pained eyes searching mine frantically as though he hadn’t trusted his ears the first time around. “What are you saying to me right now, Jemma?Youdid this?”

Guilt pressed down against my chest as I lowered my head in a disgraced nod.

It didn’t really matter which way I tried to slice the truth and serve it to him, there was no one to pin this on but myself. At the end of the day, this was done bymyhands, whether I tried to put the blame on my future self or not. We were one and the same and I deserved to face the fallout just the same. Besides, it wasn’t as though I’d tried to stop her. I probably could’ve if I really wanted to, but I wanted him alive more than I wanted to do therightthing and for that reason alone my hands were just as bloodied as hers were.

“Why?”he hissed, his eyes and voice equally wrecked by my admission of guilt. “Why would you dothisto me?”

The knife in my heart twisted deeper. “Because you were dying, Trace—right before my eyes, and there was nothing any of us could do to stop it.Nothing.If there had been another way, another option…but there wasn’t. She did this to you on purpose! She knew what would happen if she broke the talisman and she did it anyway.”

His head jerked back at my abrupt switch of gears, and then my words registered. “Nikki broke the talisman?”

I nodded again, watching warily as all the blood drained from his face. “She destroyed it knowing it was the only thing keeping the wall around your memories protected, and she did it onpurpose. Right in front of my eyes. If she couldn’t have you then no one could, and definitelynotme,” I said,my voice cracking as I recalled the horror of that day on the bridge with her. “The minute she broke it, you were gone—trapped in some unconscious sleep state that no one could wake you up from.”

His jaw muscles flexed as he tried to process everything I was telling him.

“Weeks went by with absolutely no sign of life from you. Not a blink or grunt or even a twitch of your muscles, and the more time passed, the further you disappeared into yourself. I couldfeelyou slipping away from me. You were dying and I was so desperate I would have tried anything to save you. Ididtry everything. Well, everything I knew to do anyway. I mean, I even tried making a deal with the Senior Magister,” I admitted, rambling without forethought. “Ifthat’snot desperate, I don’t know what is.”

“What do you mean you tried making adealwith the Senior Magister?” interrupted Gabriel, his brows drawn together in distress. “What deal?”

In my rush to defend myself, I’d forgotten that I hadn’t actually shared that particular detail with anyone yet. I’d only shared that the Council had set me up but had not divulged the part about the deal that had almost lured me there had it not been for my Alt warning me about the trap.

“Is that what I said?” I laughed nervously, feigning innocence. “I’m pretty sure I meant—”

“What deal, Jemma?” he repeated, not buying my crap for a minute.

I threw my hands in the air and quickly gave up the charade. There was no point in trying to deny it any further. “The only deal Icouldmake,” I admitted, trying to keep my voice as even as possible. I wanted to appear confident for once, steadfast in my idiotic decision to turn to my enemy for help. “I agreed to become the Fourth Horseman in exchangefor Trace’s life being saved.”

There. Now they knew everything.

“You did WHAT?!”Gabriel’s voice boomed across the room, jolting me.

Well, shit. So much for the truth setting you free.

“I had no choice, Gabriel. It was the only leverage I had,” I defended as tiny beads of sweat began prickling the back of my neck. “Didn’t you hear the part about how I wasdesperate?”

“I heard you loud and clear and that doesn’t even begin to excuse you from doing something so incredibly careless without even bothering to discuss it with us. Dammit, Jemma!” he snapped, his moss green eyes overflowing with so much hurt and disappointment that I had a hard time meeting his eyes then. “How could you keep this from me?”

“I mean, I didn’t go out of my way to keep it from you,” I murmured, hoping that might lessen the sting a little. “It just sort of slipped my mind with everything else that was going on.”

He ran his hand down the length of his face as if to reset his expression and gather his thoughts. “What exactly was the conversation you had with him? The verbiage used? Was anyone else present? For all we know, you may have unwittingly entered into some kind of binding contract with the lot of them. Did you even consider that?”

I definitely hadnotconsidered that.

“Well, I didn’t sign any papers or spill any blood if it makes you feel better,” I offered, forcing a smile.

He pinched the bridge of his nose as though my idiocy were giving him a migraine. “How could you do something likethatand not tell me?” he asked again, his tone softer then as though he were incredibly wounded by it and needed to know where this had come from.

But the answer was simple.

“Because you would have tried to stop me. What else was I supposed to do, Gabriel? Watch him die?” I held his troubled gaze and firmly shook my head. He had to know I couldn’t do that. Iwouldn’t.

Everyone had a limit of what they were mentally and physiologically capable of handling. Well, losing my soulmate once was it for me. It was all I could tolerate in one lifetime and no amount of shaming me would ever change that.

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