He was hers. On the trail, he was just like her.
And then she remembers that she’s supposed to be his Guardian, and a sharp spike of guilt shoots through her. “It was easy to find you,” he says. “Like we were meant to be there together.”
“Colin, I know what Henry says about me protecting you, but . . . I mean, you could have frozen to death. You could have drowned.”
He leans forward, carefully kissing her bare shoulder next to the strap of her top. He pushes it aside and kisses the spot where her heart should beat. What feels like pure white electricity shoots through her. She wants to put her hands in his hair and hold him there.
“I don’t think so,” he says. Lucy opens her mouth to argue the obvious, but when no words come out right away, Colin shakes his head. “Just listen. Okay?”
She nods, unable to protest convincingly. She has no idea how much time she has with him. It lends a certain urgency to every minute. She wants him in the water, on the trail, in the underwater starry sky, with her.
“What if I could go into the lake again and have an hour with you every now and then? Just us, curled up together in the snow. Luce, the world was crazy there. It was silver and light and, like, alive.” When he pauses, she can’t find words, and in her silence he barrels on, encouraged. “I have to see it again. Jay could come with us and pull me out fast. . . .” She remembers feeling his skin and his lips and his laughter. She remembers tasting his sounds and feeling how they fit. He kissed her like he was discovering a new vibrant color.
And while she remembers other kisses, smiles pressed tightly to hers, she knows it was never like this. Still, the temptation tastes wrong somehow, a vinegar-dipped sugar cube. “I don’t know if he would be up for that. . . .” She trails off shakily.
“After you walked away in the hall, this girl Liz came up.
She said her cousin fell into this lake in Newfoundland. He got out, but was unconscious on the ice for four hours.” Her eyes snap to his. “What?”
“Four,” he confirms, grinning at her reaction, as if she’s already signed on to this.
She stands, moving to fiddle with a cup full of pens on his desk. She lifts it easily, as if it weighs nothing. Before she has a chance to marvel at the achievement, he stands and walks over to her, buttoning his shirt.
“I read about the story, Luce. It’s true. It was all over the local news. And it’s happened before. Apparently, there’s at least one story about it every winter. The reporter is one of the guys on the forums now. He’s totally obsessed with it.” He puts a hot hand on her shoulder and squeezes gently, but this time she barely registers it. She wants more information. “I think if we’re careful, we can make it work. Plus,” he says, quieter now, “that kid didn’t even have a Guardian.” “If I let you do this, I’m not a Guardian,” she says, stepping out of his grip. “I’m something bad.” She tries to keep her voice light, but the truth keeps the words stark, blown bare like a smooth tree trunk.
“You’re definitely not bad,” he says with the kind of conviction that she’s certain she’ll never have. “Do you know how I know?”
She looks up and melts. In the dark room, his eyes are deep amber, his lashes long and his blink so slow and patient.
“How?”
“Because I’ve lost everyone I loved. Instead, I got you. The universe might have taken the others away, but it sent you back.”
“But don’t you ever wonder why you need a Guardian, and why it’s me?”
“I used to.” He glances out the window and then down at his shoes, kicking at something on the floor.
She watches him closely. With a small tug of anxiety beneath her ribs, she realizes he’s kept something from her.
“What changed?”
He looks up again and meets her eyes. “I think we’re connected because I was the kid who saw your murderer take you into the woods. I told Dot, and she called the police.” Lucy stills, her hands bracing on the desk chair behind her.
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
Colin speaks over her, apologizing immediately. “I was afraid that if you had closure, if you knew all the details, that you’d go away.” He reaches out, touches her arm as if to convince himself that she is, indeed, still here.
“So they caught this guy because of you?”
He shrugs. “I think so. That’s what the article said, anyway.”
She feels her smile form on her face and spread down into her chest, where she never feels hollow when she’s with him. “I may have only a pocketful of memories about anything useful, but I do know one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“You were my Guardian first, then.”
His grin matches hers, but it has a distinctly cocky twist to it. “I like to think so.”
Chapter 24 HIM
C OLIN IS POSITIVE THAT LUCY IS INTO THE idea of returning to the lake. Her eyes are this crazy orange, as if her entire brain is on fire with the possibilities, and the light passes back through her irises like a telegraph to him: Do this. Do it.
“This can only end badly.” But her voice wavers a bit, and he wonders if it’s something she’s thought about before today too.
Days turn into weeks, and the snow keeps falling, blanketing everything that doesn’t move. Colin doesn’t push, doesn’t talk to Lucy about going into the lake anymore. Instead, their conversations slowly grow heavy with everything left unsaid.
One morning she asks him what he’s thinking about and his starkly honest answer, “How you felt on the trail,” makes her turn and walk away, arms crossed over her middle as if holding herself together.
But she finds him later, after class, a small apology in her eyes and in her smile.
He says his aloud. “Sorry. I know you don’t like the idea.” And holds her face between his palms, repeating it against her lips.
They walk together, hands entwined, back to his dorm. She reads on his bed while he does homework, lying on her stomach, her legs bent, feet slowly kicking back and forth. Colin gives up pretending to read for outright staring at her, remembering the trail, her hungry kisses, her solid weight. There was nothing insubstantial or unsatisfying about the kiss on the trail. He felt her laughter.
“Lucy.”
She hesitates before looking up, as if sensing something particular in his tone. “Mmm?”
He watches her fingertips stroking her collarbone while she stares at his hands. Her eyes flash warm and deep amber when she catches him looking at her throat, at the spot he first parted his lips and tasted her skin. It was sweet and the tiniest bit salty. She tasted of girl and rain and relief. He doesn’t say anything else, only looks at her, thinking, Please. Please.
“I can’t,” she says. “ You can’t.”
“Why?”
“I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if we did that.” He can’t help it. He smiles when she says this, and her mouth twitches at the corners.
“Colin, I’m serious.”
But he can’t stand the thought that it won’t happen again.
His curiosity feels like an itch across every inch of his skin. “I need to know if what I saw was real.” Her eyes melt to the color of warm honey before she turns back to her book, her fingers making a tight fist around his comforter.
“There’s nothing in the world as good as what happened on the trail,” he says.
When she looks up, she looks so miserable. “I know.”
“But we don’t have that here,” he whispers. “It isn’t the same.”
She squirms, pulling her hair over her shoulder and squinting at the words on the page in front of her. He ignores her feigned distraction, crawling toward her in a way that makes him feel like a predatory cat hunting prey.
“Lucy.”
Her eyes remain trained on the page. “What?”
“Let me try this.”
“Try what?”
He reaches for her, gently urging her to twist and lie on her back, easing her down onto his pillow.
It takes nothing to undress her. The slip of a button, a tug of a zipper. Soft fabric pulled over her head. He pinches a simple clasp and exposes a world of smooth, bare skin.
And then she remembers that she’s supposed to be his Guardian, and a sharp spike of guilt shoots through her. “It was easy to find you,” he says. “Like we were meant to be there together.”
“Colin, I know what Henry says about me protecting you, but . . . I mean, you could have frozen to death. You could have drowned.”
He leans forward, carefully kissing her bare shoulder next to the strap of her top. He pushes it aside and kisses the spot where her heart should beat. What feels like pure white electricity shoots through her. She wants to put her hands in his hair and hold him there.
“I don’t think so,” he says. Lucy opens her mouth to argue the obvious, but when no words come out right away, Colin shakes his head. “Just listen. Okay?”
She nods, unable to protest convincingly. She has no idea how much time she has with him. It lends a certain urgency to every minute. She wants him in the water, on the trail, in the underwater starry sky, with her.
“What if I could go into the lake again and have an hour with you every now and then? Just us, curled up together in the snow. Luce, the world was crazy there. It was silver and light and, like, alive.” When he pauses, she can’t find words, and in her silence he barrels on, encouraged. “I have to see it again. Jay could come with us and pull me out fast. . . .” She remembers feeling his skin and his lips and his laughter. She remembers tasting his sounds and feeling how they fit. He kissed her like he was discovering a new vibrant color.
And while she remembers other kisses, smiles pressed tightly to hers, she knows it was never like this. Still, the temptation tastes wrong somehow, a vinegar-dipped sugar cube. “I don’t know if he would be up for that. . . .” She trails off shakily.
“After you walked away in the hall, this girl Liz came up.
She said her cousin fell into this lake in Newfoundland. He got out, but was unconscious on the ice for four hours.” Her eyes snap to his. “What?”
“Four,” he confirms, grinning at her reaction, as if she’s already signed on to this.
She stands, moving to fiddle with a cup full of pens on his desk. She lifts it easily, as if it weighs nothing. Before she has a chance to marvel at the achievement, he stands and walks over to her, buttoning his shirt.
“I read about the story, Luce. It’s true. It was all over the local news. And it’s happened before. Apparently, there’s at least one story about it every winter. The reporter is one of the guys on the forums now. He’s totally obsessed with it.” He puts a hot hand on her shoulder and squeezes gently, but this time she barely registers it. She wants more information. “I think if we’re careful, we can make it work. Plus,” he says, quieter now, “that kid didn’t even have a Guardian.” “If I let you do this, I’m not a Guardian,” she says, stepping out of his grip. “I’m something bad.” She tries to keep her voice light, but the truth keeps the words stark, blown bare like a smooth tree trunk.
“You’re definitely not bad,” he says with the kind of conviction that she’s certain she’ll never have. “Do you know how I know?”
She looks up and melts. In the dark room, his eyes are deep amber, his lashes long and his blink so slow and patient.
“How?”
“Because I’ve lost everyone I loved. Instead, I got you. The universe might have taken the others away, but it sent you back.”
“But don’t you ever wonder why you need a Guardian, and why it’s me?”
“I used to.” He glances out the window and then down at his shoes, kicking at something on the floor.
She watches him closely. With a small tug of anxiety beneath her ribs, she realizes he’s kept something from her.
“What changed?”
He looks up again and meets her eyes. “I think we’re connected because I was the kid who saw your murderer take you into the woods. I told Dot, and she called the police.” Lucy stills, her hands bracing on the desk chair behind her.
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
Colin speaks over her, apologizing immediately. “I was afraid that if you had closure, if you knew all the details, that you’d go away.” He reaches out, touches her arm as if to convince himself that she is, indeed, still here.
“So they caught this guy because of you?”
He shrugs. “I think so. That’s what the article said, anyway.”
She feels her smile form on her face and spread down into her chest, where she never feels hollow when she’s with him. “I may have only a pocketful of memories about anything useful, but I do know one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“You were my Guardian first, then.”
His grin matches hers, but it has a distinctly cocky twist to it. “I like to think so.”
Chapter 24 HIM
C OLIN IS POSITIVE THAT LUCY IS INTO THE idea of returning to the lake. Her eyes are this crazy orange, as if her entire brain is on fire with the possibilities, and the light passes back through her irises like a telegraph to him: Do this. Do it.
“This can only end badly.” But her voice wavers a bit, and he wonders if it’s something she’s thought about before today too.
Days turn into weeks, and the snow keeps falling, blanketing everything that doesn’t move. Colin doesn’t push, doesn’t talk to Lucy about going into the lake anymore. Instead, their conversations slowly grow heavy with everything left unsaid.
One morning she asks him what he’s thinking about and his starkly honest answer, “How you felt on the trail,” makes her turn and walk away, arms crossed over her middle as if holding herself together.
But she finds him later, after class, a small apology in her eyes and in her smile.
He says his aloud. “Sorry. I know you don’t like the idea.” And holds her face between his palms, repeating it against her lips.
They walk together, hands entwined, back to his dorm. She reads on his bed while he does homework, lying on her stomach, her legs bent, feet slowly kicking back and forth. Colin gives up pretending to read for outright staring at her, remembering the trail, her hungry kisses, her solid weight. There was nothing insubstantial or unsatisfying about the kiss on the trail. He felt her laughter.
“Lucy.”
She hesitates before looking up, as if sensing something particular in his tone. “Mmm?”
He watches her fingertips stroking her collarbone while she stares at his hands. Her eyes flash warm and deep amber when she catches him looking at her throat, at the spot he first parted his lips and tasted her skin. It was sweet and the tiniest bit salty. She tasted of girl and rain and relief. He doesn’t say anything else, only looks at her, thinking, Please. Please.
“I can’t,” she says. “ You can’t.”
“Why?”
“I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if we did that.” He can’t help it. He smiles when she says this, and her mouth twitches at the corners.
“Colin, I’m serious.”
But he can’t stand the thought that it won’t happen again.
His curiosity feels like an itch across every inch of his skin. “I need to know if what I saw was real.” Her eyes melt to the color of warm honey before she turns back to her book, her fingers making a tight fist around his comforter.
“There’s nothing in the world as good as what happened on the trail,” he says.
When she looks up, she looks so miserable. “I know.”
“But we don’t have that here,” he whispers. “It isn’t the same.”
She squirms, pulling her hair over her shoulder and squinting at the words on the page in front of her. He ignores her feigned distraction, crawling toward her in a way that makes him feel like a predatory cat hunting prey.
“Lucy.”
Her eyes remain trained on the page. “What?”
“Let me try this.”
“Try what?”
He reaches for her, gently urging her to twist and lie on her back, easing her down onto his pillow.
It takes nothing to undress her. The slip of a button, a tug of a zipper. Soft fabric pulled over her head. He pinches a simple clasp and exposes a world of smooth, bare skin.
