"Last night was what?"
"I don't know." The admission scrapes my throat raw. "I don't know what it was. I don't know what any of this is. I just know that I'm scared and I'm tired of being scared alone and I—"
I want you to hold me. I want you to make me feel something other than this countdown in my chest. I want—
"I need you."
The words come out barely above a whisper. Not a demand, not even a request. Just truth, raw and unvarnished, offered up like evidence I can't take back.
Cole's hands curl into fists at his sides. I watch the tendons stand out along his forearms, the visible effort of restraint.
"You need to go back to your room. Someone was in your chambers fifteen hours ago." His voice is steady. The voice he probably uses for threat briefings. "I need to be watching those screens."
The rejection hits like a slap and blood rushes to my face so fast my vision goes bright at the edges. My stomach drops, the same lurch I've felt every time Adrian's mood shifted and the temperature in the room changed before I understood why.
"What?"
"If you stay here—" He stops, his jaw working and he seems to consider his next words. "And if you come to me like this, scared and vulnerable, I won't be able to stop. And you deserve better than that."
"Better than what? Better than wanting you?" I hear the edge in my own voice, the hurt bleeding through despite my best efforts to contain it. "Better than needing something for myself for once?"
"Better than a man who takes advantage of your fear."
"That's not—"
"Yes. It is." He steps back, putting distance between us. "Fifteen hours ago, someone left a death threat on your desk. You're terrified and exhausted and not thinking clearly, and ifI touch you right now, I won't be able to tell the difference between you wanting me and you wanting to feel alive."
He's right.
The realization lands cold and unwelcome. He's right, and I hate him for it.
"So what?" I wrap my arms around myself, suddenly aware of how thin my pajamas are, how exposed I am standing in this doorway. "I'm supposed to go back to my room and lie there alone, counting down the days until someone puts a flower on my grave?"
"You're supposed to let me protect you." His voice drops, rough and strained. "Even from myself."
"I don't need protection from you."
"Yes, you do." He moves toward me, slow and deliberate, until he's close enough that I can see the war playing out behind his eyes. "Because if you stay, I will take you back to that bed and I will make you forget every fear you have. And tomorrow morning, when the fear comes back, you'll wonder if any of it was real. If you actually wanted me or if you just wanted to feel something."
His hand comes up. Hovers near my face without touching.
"I need you to want me when you're not afraid. I need it to be a choice, not an escape."
Adrian never waited for a choice. Adrian took what he wanted and called it love.
The thought surfaces unbidden, sharp and clarifying. Cole is standing here, feeling desire—I see it in the tension of his shoulders, the grip of his fists—and he's saying no.
He's saying no because he cares about the why.
"When this is over." His voice is barely a whisper. "When the threat is neutralized and you're safe and you've had time to think clearly—if you still want me, I will be here. I will be right here."
"And if I don't have time?" The words come out cracked. "If twenty-four becomes twenty-three becomes zero and I never—"
"Then I will have failed you." His hand finally touches my face, thumb brushing my cheekbone with aching gentleness. "But I will not fail you tonight. Not like this."
He steps back. Lets his hand fall.
"Go to bed, Angelina."