Page 111 of Touch

“That you’d just put an arrow through my heart. Literally instead of figuratively this time.”

For a moment, Love ducks her head. They lay sprawled across the floor, having not moved an inch since the third round of fucking.

“It was wrong to deny you a choice about when I’d take aim.” Her eyes sting. “But I ran out of time. That limit had been reached, which I also hadn’t mentioned, but as I said, The Court would have killed you, and—”

“Look at me.” When she does, his mouth quirks. “I would raise hell about this if I weren’t a forgiving man. There I was, with my mate-to-be, expecting sparks to fly, but all I felt was the wind knocking the shit out of me. Holly felt the same when younailed her in the chest. The storm was brutal, so Georgie had to stop Holly from bolting to Griffin’s house in a panic. After the shock of what happened, she was desperate to be with him. Meanwhile, you ran off into a deadly storm, wearing nothing but my coat and a half yard of fabric.”

“You’ve seen me handle winter,” Love berates.

“That’s not how my instinct works when it comes to you. Love goes into a tempest, I go after her. By the way, I want names.” Andrew takes her bandaged hand, his eyes flaring a mercenary shade of gray, like a forged weapon. “Who did this to you?”

Despite the venom in his words, Love admires the way he traces the dressing, triple checking that it’s been tied correctly. Although Sorrow had stitched the injury, Andrew had been the one to staunch the bleeding first, after carrying Love to the cottage.

Calmness settles over her. She speaks while watching his fingers caress her bandage, the contact bringing solace to her wounded hand. She tells him what happened in the bookshop and the forest, how the arrow hadn’t worked on him, that she’d cut herself with her own weapon, that it hadn’t affected her, and why.

Love sees the moment it hits Andrew. His touch stalls. He lifts his head, his gaze traveling along her skin, then reaching her eyes.

“You’re mortal,” he rasps.

“Yes,” she says.

Finally, the truth comes out about The Stars, the myth about loving a human and thus becoming one. This mortal should be mesmerized. However, Love knows him better than that.

Andrew’s expression darkens with vengeance as he examines her human irises and wingless body. “That’s why they’re gone.”

Her voice cracks. “I wish…”

That she had appreciated the wings when they’d been there. That she’d flaunted them with pride instead of doubt. That she’d fluttered them at Andrew, impressing him with the vastness of her wingspan, the majesty of her plumage. She wishes that she had let them flare wide while fucking him, that she’d used them to flirt, to fly into the hemisphere, to take joy in soaring.

Andrew understands what she leaves unspoken. He clasps her against him, brushing the scars. “Do they hurt?”

“No,” she croaks. “It happened while we slept. They just faded.”

“I’ll kill those fuckers for this.”

“The Court had nothing to do with it.”

“You didn’t see what that explosion did to your wings. You weren’t conscious in the aftermath.”

“Fair enough, but The Court did not amputate them. The transformation simply happened. Still I… miss my wings… more than I imagined. I wish you had seen them sooner.”

Andrew makes startled noise, awe gripping his voice. “That’s why I was able to see you in the first place.” When Love furrows her brow, he explains, “It’s only fucking hitting me now why neither of us figured out which passage tapped into the truth about deities. The key isn’t in my current books. It’s in the one I’m working on. I’ve been writing a new series about gods and goddesses, and the main character is the only deity of her people who has wings—a feature she resents because they set her apart. Eventually, she takes a blade to them.”

“Except I never slashed my wings. I kept them hidden.”

“But by concealing them, denying their existence, rejecting them, you might as well have severed yourself from the wings. It’s an allegory. And don’t allegories reflect the truth of existence? Not least of all, I never knew your reasons for hiding them. That’s why I didn’t make the connection.”

He sketches her wing scars. “My sight doesn’t come from the truth about all Dark Gods. It comes from the truth about you.”

Love’s breath hitches. That must be it. All this time, she hadn’t considered the key to his sight residing in a future work.

Even before he knew her, this mortal had thought of Love, shaped an image of her in his mind, linked himself to her. As if this had been fated.

They stare at one another, digesting this revelation. In hindsight, it’s incredibly simple, therefore easy to overlook.

Andrew holds her gaze. “With or without those beautiful wings, your heart is still the same. Like your strength, your courage, and your worth. You’re still you, Little Myth.”

Nonetheless, he wavers. “How do you feel about being human?”

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