Page 86 of Creatures that Breathe

Seduction, I want to say. Or sex appeal or whatever he’s doing to me right now. “Your tongue?”

His eyes light with dark fire, tongue in question darting out to wet his lip. “I’m a ghost. Most can’t even remember the color of my skin, let alone the length of my hair, the color of my eyes. Mannerisms, food preferences. They don’t know my name. They think of me as a shadow. Sometimes they say ‘Cross’ to my face, talking about the male they believe haunts them. As if he exists.”

“And who am I with then if he doesn’t exist? Three children stacked in a trench coat?”

“Cross isn’t my name.”

“Of course it is.” It’s how he introduced himself. It’s what Lev calls him, or maybe Lev never said his name. Neither has Atlas. Or anyone. I go stiff. “Your name is Cross, you told me.”

“Cross as in the cross of your fingers behind your back when you lie, the supposed protection. That’s me. If you don’t cross your fingers when you lie, if you feed me false information, I end you.”

“Crossing your fingers? That’s you.” I blink, not computing, watch white foam bubble in my pint. “Are you telling me I don’t even know your name?”

He genuinely seems surprised. “Does that bother you?”

I consider flipping over our table. “You’ve been inside me,” I hiss.

Cross goes completely still for a moment.

I freeze too, panic spreading like wildfire through my stomach, embarrassment, mortification, insecurities I never realized I had. Does he regret being with me?

But before I melt beneath the table and crawl hand and knee over sticky bar flooring, Cross says quietly, his gaze pinned on me, “Hardly as much as I’d have liked to be.”

My knees shake. My heart struggles to pump blood anywhere but my ears. My mouth dries.

A swallow. He twists away, glides strong fingers around his beer and drinks. And drinks.

And drinks.

When he finishes, he bites apart the orange slice on the rim. His eyes flutter shut, big hand white knuckling the glass. I think he might leave to refill it, think he might put his head under the draft and drink until his liver collapses than admit to what he said.

He clears his throat. “I only mean that—”

“What is your name?”

His head tilts, letting a few strands of soft brown curls fall into his forehead. “I don’t know,” he admits. A phrase I never expected to hear from him.

“What do you mean?”

He shrugs, and when he looks at my beer, I slide it directly in front of him. Receive a nod.

“It’s a gift,” he says again. “I’m skilled at what I do and Kadmos made me better. If I have no one—not even myself—I can never be exploited, never be convinced to switch allegiances. I grew up in Mayfair, twenty years and I can’t even tell you which street I lived on or what color the flowers were in the window boxes.” He sends my beer back, reaches for his over-steeped tea. “Cross is as much my name now as Leni is yours. I don’t remember any other one.”

My stomach sinks. Not remembering your childhood, your name, that’s a desolate loneliness. My biggest nightmare. “What about your family?”

“Dead, I presume, unless they too swore fealty to a descendent of the Gods and gained immortality. And in the unlikely event that they did, they still wouldn’t miss me.”

Dark. He’s so dark right now.

“I’d miss you.”

A dull silence follows. Muted and thick. I sample my beer, immediately decide it’s not for me. Bitter, odd, not fizzy enough and yet too fizzy. Still, I consider choking down the hazy amber. One go. Erase the sting.

I don’t know how to comfort him, if it’s even possible. But misery loves company right? I can give him a bit of that. “I feel constantly exposed,” I confess, folding my napkin to its limits.

“Perhaps blue was the wrong choice.”

So obsessed with my hair.

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