“Trin?” he whispered hoarsely, and a ragged breath punched out of me. “Trin.”

I started to move, to crawl forward, but somehow I ended up scuttling back a foot or more. “Are you...?” I cleared my throat. “Are you Zayne?”

Those beautiful wings rose slightly and then lowered, and his eyes closed briefly. “It’s me.”

Pressure clamped down on my chest, twisting and squeezing as a hundred different emotions erupted inside me, flooding me. Hope and yearning crashed into uncertainty and even fear. What if this was some kind of trick? He hadn’t sounded like that when he said my name before. In the back of my mind, I recognized that, but I realized then I hadn’t really prepared myself for this actually working. I was afraid that this wasn’t real. Sorrow tangled with joy, and my body felt weak.

“I’m—” He straightened as if to rise.

I jerked back, falling onto my butt. It seemed like I had no control over my movements. A conflicting mess of emotions ruled me, and I was too afraid of the crushing disappointment if I allowed hope to seize me.

Zayne had halted, and in the chaos of my mind, I knew that meant something. “I’m not going to hurt you. I could never hurt you—” He cut himself off, his shoulders tensing. “But I did. I hurt you. I had...” He rocked back, still on his knees as he looked down at his hands. “I hurt you—”

“No. You didn’t hurt me,” I whispered, thinking that it actually sounded like him. There was inflection in his tone. Warmth.

“I didn’t?” His hands closed. “I remember.” Those wings lifted again, startling me as they stretched high and away. He tore his gaze from his hands then and looked over his shoulder. There was a curse under his breath as the breeze ruffled some of the smaller feathers, exposing the streaks of grace. “I...I keep forgetting that they’re there. They don’t feel like my old ones. Neither does shifting. Most things don’t feel the same.”

He looked at me again, and the glow of his skin pulsed intently, causing me to flinch. His feathered wings folded back, tucking inward, and then they were...they were simply gone, as if they’d seeped into his skin—into his back—or vanished. The luminous golden shine faded, and he looked more like...well, more like Zayne and not the psychotic Fallen.

“Is this real?” I heard myself ask. The disappearing wings sort of made me think that I was still lying on my back with a head injury. “Did it really work? This is you, really you? You remember me? And you aren’t about to...well, call me ‘little nephilim’?”

“This is real. I’m real.” His voice was rough. “I hate that you have to ask that. I’m sorry. I’m so damn sorry, Trin. I couldn’t stop myself...” His gaze dropped to his hands again, to where they hung by his thighs, palms up. “That’s not true. I could stop myself. I did, but it was...it was too late.” He shook his head as he continued to stare at his hands. “It was like something was missing in me. Memories. Access to them—to what they felt like and meant. They warned me, and I thought I could handle it.” His gaze returned to mine. “But it’s me. I promise you, Trin. It’s really me. Ask me something only I would remember.”

I stared blankly at him. “I can’t think of anything right now. My brain is too full and too empty.”

He smiled then, and my heart jumped. It was his smile, one that was warm and open, and I never thought I’d see that smile again. “Okay. Let me think of something.” He sucked his lower lip in between his teeth, and if I had been standing, I knew my legs would’ve given out on me. Zayne...he did that all the time, but he’d only done that once after the Fall. “I got it. You have a constellation on your ceiling.”

I truly stopped breathing then. Honest to God, my lungs seized right up as I stumbled to my feet.

“I put it there,” he continued, slowly standing. “I called it the Constellation of Zayne, and what happened after I showed you that ceiling has to be one of my fondest memories of all time.” His voice deepened as he bit down on that lip again. “You showed me just how much you loved me. You gave me everything—your body, your heart, your trust.”

For the second time, the world slammed to another halt. I wasn’t aware of moving. The achy protest of muscles and bones didn’t stop me as I threw myself at him. Or attempted to. My balance was off, my movements too jerky and stiff, and it was more like falling at him—

He was a blur of speed as he snapped forward, moving so fast that I didn’t even have a chance to be startled. He caught me, his arms sweeping around me, and the moment my hands connected with the bare skin of his chest, I knew.

This was him. It was his skin against my palms, and it was warm, no longer cool to the touch, his breath coasting over my cheek. It was him holding me.

It was Zayne.

16

Somehow, we ended up on the ground again, but this time with Zayne sitting upright and me in his lap. I turned into a total octopus, wrapping my legs around his hips and clamping my arms around his shoulders.

“You really remember,” I whispered, burying my face in his neck. Each breath I took was full of him.

“I remember the first time I saw you,” he said, and I shuddered as I felt his hand curl around the back of my head. “You were hiding behind a curtain, where you weren’t supposed to be. You were eavesdropping.”

“I wasn’t eavesdropping,” I denied, my words mostly muffled by his skin.

He chuckled, and even though it sounded hoarse and shaky, it did strange and wonderful things to my heart. It wasn’t that cold, apathetic laugh of a Fallen. “You were totally eavesdropping.”

I totally had been.

“I also remember that you took a swing at me when I tried to introduce myself.”

I frowned against his neck. “That’s because you snuck up on me at night, in the middle of the woods.”