I wanted to tell him it was okay—that I needed someone to hold me until the pain melted away.
Someone who wouldn’t let go.
I wasn’t capable of saying the words, but Jared heard them anyway. He hooked a finger through my belt loop and tugged me closer. He kept his gaze locked on mine, and it felt like he could see the fears I was trying so hard to hide.
Can you see me?
Everything about his expression said yes. He closed the distance left between us and wrapped his arms around me. I buried my face in his chest. Jared’s hand slid under my hair, his thumb trailing along my neck.
I forgot how to breathe or think or do anything except hold on. “I’m not the one. I never was.”
Jared’s cheek brushed mine, as he whispered in my ear. “You’re the only one.”
A tear slid down my cheek. “You don’t have to try to make me feel better.”
“I want to.”
“Why? I’m always screwing up and making things harder for you…” I bit my lip, wishing I hadn’t said anything.
Jared pulled back, his hand still on my neck. “You think you make things harder for me?”
“I know I do.”
He leaned in, bringing his mouth to my ear. “Only because I worry about you.”
“You don’t have to feel responsible for me,” I said, my voice raw.
Jared ran his finger down my cheek, tracing the line where a tear had fallen. “That’s not the reason.”
I opened my hand and rested it against his chest without thinking. Jared’s heart beat against my unmarked skin. “Half the time you won’t even look at me.”
His fingers slid down the back of my neck. “And the other half, I can’t stop thinking about you.”
I closed my hand, balling his shirt in my fist. “Jared—”
His face clouded over, and he stepped back. “I shouldn’t have said anything. It was a mistake.”
For a second, the words didn’t register. Not when he just chased me and held me in his arms and said—
It was a mistake.
I was a mistake. That’s what he meant.
This wasn’t the first time I’d heard those words. Heat crawled up my neck where his hand had been only a moment ago. I wanted to be anywhere but here—standing in front of the boy who didn’t want me.
Jared reached for my arm, and I backed away, determined not to let him touch me again.
“Kennedy, you don’t understand—”
I swallowed hard, struggling to find my voice. I didn’t want him to know how much I was hurting. “There’s nothing to understand.”
I started to turn away.
Jared caught my hand again. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. I know what I want.” He bit his lip and stared at the gravel beneath our feet. “I just can’t have it.”
“Why not?”
Jared’s blue eyes drifted back up to meet mine, too many emotions fighting for control. He let my fingers slip out of his.
“I screw everything up, and the people close to me are the ones who get hurt.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and nodded behind me. “Just ask Lukas.”
I stood there paralyzed, as Lukas and Priest walked toward us.
Lukas’ smile faded, anger and jealousy warring in his eyes as he mentally calculated the distance between Jared and me. He had no way of knowing that we were miles apart in every way that mattered.
Priest didn’t seem to notice. “We know you’re one of us, Kennedy. And I think we figured out why your mark didn’t show up.”
The mark.
Jared’s rejection had temporarily distracted me from the fact that the universe had rejected me, too.
“We need to compare notes to be sure.” Priest kept talking, but I was only half-listening. Jared wouldn’t look at me, and Lukas wouldn’t stop looking at his brother.
The words registered slowly. “Wait? You don’t know how they work?”
Priest paced across the asphalt. “Our families didn’t go into a lot of detail. It was sort of like ‘destroy a vengeance spirit and you’ll get your mark.’ ”
“That’s pretty self-explanatory.” I didn’t realize how badly I wanted to be one of them until the possibility disappeared.
Lukas pushed his way past Jared until he was standing next to me. “There were lots of things they didn’t tell us about, like the Shift, or the fact that one of the members of the Legion had dropped off the grid. This is probably another one of those things.”
I thought about all the moments when the four of them seemed to be figuring things out as they went along. Their relatives probably never imagined they would all die on the same day, leaving the Legion in the hands of five teenagers who’d have to ditch class to protect the world from a demon.
Lukas nudged my shoulder with his. “Come back to the van, and we’ll explain why your mark didn’t show up.”
He sounded so sure.
But what if he was wrong?
Alara was sitting in the back of the van with the doors open, her journal resting in her lap. “Did you tell her?”
“Not yet.” Priest hopped up next to her, buzzing with excitement. “So check it out. I got my mark after I destroyed Millicent’s spirit in the well with the bolt I made, right?”
Lukas continued without missing a beat. “Mine showed up after I took out a Lady in White whose patterns I had tracked for months.”
Alara fidgeted with her eyebrow ring. “And my mark manifested because I used protective wards to take out the dybbuk—holy water to drive it into the cabinet, and fire to destroy it.”
“But I drew the Wall,” I countered. “I helped.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Priest said. “The fire’s what actually destroyed it. Think about it. The bolt I made, the spirit Lukas tracked, Alara’s wards…”
Jared’s eyes lit up. “It makes sense.”
“I’m glad it makes sense to someone,” I said.
“Weapons isn’t your specialty,” Priest continued. “The mark didn’t show up because you shot the vengeance spirit with a gun.”
“I don’t understand.”
He turned to Jared. “How’d you get yours?”
Jared closed his hand around the place where his mark lay dormant. “A cold-iron rod. Had the spirit in a headlock, and I drove the rod through his rib cage.”
Alara rolled her eyes. “We wouldn’t expect anything less.”
I might still be one of them.
“But I don’t have a specialty.”
Alara raised her eyebrows. “You’re kidding right? You drew the Wall from memory.”
My eidetic memory didn’t seem like an impressive weapon in a battle against deadly spirits.
Priest shook his head. “More than that, the ability to draw symbols is directly related to invocation. Summoning and commanding angels and demons.”
“I can definitely draw, but I can’t summon anything—let alone an angel or a demon.”
Priest looked right at me. “Then you’re in luck because you don’t have to invoke a vengeance spirit. You just have to kill one.”
CHAPTER 24
The Only One
I stood outside the coffee shop and watched Lukas through the window as he paid the barista. After sleeping in the van all night, I would’ve killed to sink into one of the leather armchairs inside. But the shop was tiny, and even though we were fifty miles from Sunshine, we decided the possibility of someone recognizing me was too high.
Standing out here was still better than being stuck in the van.
Priest and Jared had headed into town to pick up supplies as soon as they woke up, while Alara pored over the journals, searching for a clue that might lead to another piece of the Shift. She had only lasted twenty minutes before she insisted on a caffeine run, and we jumped at the chance to see something other than the inside of a journal.
Lukas came back out with a cardboard drink carrier and handed me a steaming cup. “This one’s yours.”
“T
hanks.” I took a sip. “You put cinnamon in it.”
He shrugged. “I remembered you like it.”
Of course he did.
Lukas walked down the street and I fell in step next to him. “Is everything okay?”
He gave me a weak smile. “You mean besides almost getting killed and setting a store on fire?”
“It feels like you’re mad at me.”
Lukas took his coin out of his pocket and rolled it over his fingers a few times before he answered. “I’m not mad. Just disappointed. I didn’t think Jared would have a chance with you. You’re not like the girls who usually fall for him.”
My stomach lurched.
How many girls was he talking about?
Heat spread through my cheeks. I walked faster, hoping Lukas wouldn’t notice me blushing.