me to stop?”
“You have no reason to be good to me,” he said.
I couldn’t help noticing that he’d avoided my question. “I have every reason to be good to you.”
“After what I did?”
Perhaps he was right, but I had to try and fix this. I didn’t want to be angry with him. He was too important to me for me to hate him. “After what I did.”
He deflated with a sigh. “Ellie …”
“I’m sorry,” I said faintly, forcing it out of myself. “For everything. For running away from you. For blaming you.”
“It’s okay.”
“I thought running away would protect you,” I admitted. “It it was probably right to leave my friends and family behind, but not you and Nathaniel and the others. I didn’t do anything to punish you, please know that. I wouldn’t hurt you on purpose.”
He nodded. “I would never mean to hurt you either.”
I fought back a sob. “We’re both pretty messed up.”
He smiled. “We’re not meant to be perfect, and we never will be.” He bent over to kiss my cheek and let his hands fall to his side.
“Are you going to get a few hours of sleep before we hunt tonight?” I asked.
“I should. I need the energy.”
“Can I lie down with you when you do?”
He watched me gently, hesitating. “Of course. You should get some rest, too.”
“Let me make you lunch first,” I offered.
I took his hand and led him down the stairs to the kitchen. We ate with little conversation, and when we finished he helped me clean up. When we got to Will’s room, I rolled up the blinds and let the afternoon sunlight pour in before I climbed into his bed. He watched me quietly, and when I laid my head against the pillow and brought the blankets up to my chin, he climbed in beside me. I curled close to his chest, breathing him in, and he kissed my hair. All the tension melted away from me as we lay in the warm late-winter sunlight and fell asleep.
23
THE NEXT MORNING WAS COLD, SUNLESS, AND misty, and I was tense with frustration after last night’s unsuccessful hunt for Bastian and his goons. I went for a run with Will and took a hot shower as soon as we returned. When I came downstairs, I caught a glimpse of something large through the sliding glass doors in the kitchen.
Wings.
My breath caught in my throat, and I opened the door and stepped out onto the porch. After a moment, I recognized that it was the back of a shirtless Nathaniel, but I’d never before seen his wings, which gleamed a coppery sheen in the sunlight. They stretched as wide as they could go before relaxing and folding to his back, but they didn’t vanish. His shirt was sitting on the swing bench a few yards away.
I approached him cautiously. “Hey, Nathaniel.”
He turned his head to me as I stopped right beside him, and he smiled warmly at me. “Ellie.”
I marveled at his wings, at how they seemed two shades at once. When the sun caught his feathers, the color matched his eyes. “What are you up to?”
“Stretching,” he replied.
Prying my eyes away from his feathers was difficult. I didn’t often see reaper wings up close unless I was in a fight, and on those occasions I couldn’t stop to admire the view. Even Will was shy about his wings, and I could count on one hand how many times I’d seen them. “Will ought to do that once in a while,” I suggested with a grin. “He probably wouldn’t be so grumpy then.”
Nathaniel laughed softly, and his wings folded into his back and disappeared. “Perhaps, but I’m afraid he may be a lost cause.” He tugged his shirt back over his head. “It’s going to rain today.”
Sure enough, a dark cloud was rolling in from the west.
He sat down gracefully on the swing and patted the spot next to him. “Come sit with me.”
“I’m sad it’s so much colder today than yesterday,” I said, hugging my arms to my chest against the chill and lowering myself onto the seat.
“Temperature fluctuations are to be expected.” He pushed the swing back and forth slowly with his boot on the mushy, slippery ground. “It’s been wonderful having you here, Ellie. Reapers love being around you. It goes beyond how close Will and I are with you, how well Marcus knows you. We feel better when you’re around.”
“Better?” I asked. “Knowing that you’re able to protect me?”
“Yes,” Nathaniel