Page 105 of Your Soul to Keep

“What about Zoe?”

He shook his head. “She’s her mother but she’ll never be her mommy.”

“I went to the doctor,” I blurted out.

His brow wrinkled in confusion.

“I asked her about the possibility the cancer in my family was genetic.”

He lurched forward, eyes wide in alarm, his voice rasping. “Shae-baby, are you sick?”

I waved his concern away. “No, no, but I could get sick, like my mom or dad, or even my Nan. I don’t want to leave Dylan the way my parents left me.”

He reached for my hand and held it tight. “The story playing in your head is not real.”

I scoffed. “Feels pretty fucking real, Gabe.”

“That’s because you’ve lived on the dark side of midnight for too fucking long,” he acquiesced. “But the light of a thousand suns is waiting for you right here with me. With us.”

An unexpected surge of anger flared. I tugged my hand away and jumped to my feet. “And what will you have if it all turns to shit?”

A chill raced down my spine as I backed toward the door to the hallway. “I can’t even remember my mother! Do you know that? I can barely picture my father’s face, and I can’t remember my mother at all!”

He watched me, eyes alert, brain missing nothing.

I continued. “What will Dylan have if I get cancer like my mother, and my father, and my nan? Because that’s what happens when tomorrow comes, Gabe. What then?” I turned and stalked into the living room, needing a margin of space to think.

A low rumble came from his chest as he leapt to his feet, his chair scraping along the floor as he followed me. Throwing his hands out to his sides, he snapped, “And what if it never comes? What if you throw it all away for a tomorrow that never comes?”

“Gabe!” I exclaimed, my eyes wide, face flushing with heat. “Tomorrow always comes! For me, it always comes! What willIdo?”

His eyes searched mine for a long moment, then he settled back on his heels. His face as serious as I’d ever seen it, he tipped his chin down and looked at me from beneath his brow. “You’ll remember. You’ll remember us if tomorrow comes.” Stepping forward, he cupped his hands around my face and tilted my face up to his. Brow deeply furrowed, he whispered, “Please, Shae. I need you to hold onto me until tomorrow.”

I tried to laugh but it turned into a sob.

He stepped closer. “I want this with you,” he murmured. “And if tomorrow comes with you, I’ll take that, too.”

I sniffed and tried to shake my head. “You want that kind of pain? You want to be in love with a memory?” I beseeched him to understand. “You can’t touch it, hold it, talk to it. It won’t keep you warm—”

He interrupted, “It’s kept me warm all these years, Shae-baby. You were the one sliver of bright in an otherwise dreary life.”

“What about Dylan?” I challenged even as I questioned why I was making him work for something I wanted so desperately, something we’d been steadily, knowingly, working toward these past two months.

“She’s a completely different kind of light,” he explained softly. “It’s not the same as having a woman you’d sell your soul to keep.”

I stopped short and cupped my hands around his. “You’d sell your soul to keep me?”

His mouth twisted with humor. “I’m hoping I won’t have to,” he answered dryly. “Because when tomorrow comes, I fully intend to be with you on the other side.”

“I’m scared,” I admitted.

His face softened though his eyes remained intent and focussed. “Everybody’s scared, Shae. The story in your head says bad things are going to happen and it’s true. But it’s not the whole truth. Midnight’s going to come, again and again and a-fucking-gain, but you and me? We’ll be chasing the dawn.”

I searched his handsome face. How was it that he felt free to embrace the risk while I agonized over it?

His thumbs swept along my temples. “Lift your face to the sun, Shae-baby.”

A smile sprouted deep inside me and tentatively bloomed on my lips. “When did you become such a poet?”

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