Page 167 of Elven Shadow

Apparently, the image of Shade’s new Elven leader moving through the compound with their Head of Security right behind her still hadn’t lost its novelty.

It was all she could do not to snap at everyone to mind their own business and quit staring, but that wouldn’t have helped her cause at the moment.

Fortunately, her feigned coughing fit was enough to keep everyone else at bay as well. No one tried to approach her for more questions or conversation or stopped her to ask if she was all right.

Then again, that might also have been a product of Maxwell following so closely behind her.

By the time she reached her private room, though, Rebecca wasn’t entirely sure she was faking it anymore.

The most recent wave of magical emergency energy was already starting to fade again, even faster this time than with the last vial. Rebecca’s pulse hammered through her veins for real now, and it felt like someone had parked an eighteen-wheeler on the center of her chest.

Of all the ghostly voices from her past that came back to haunt her from time to time—from her first life, the life from which she’d been running all this time—the gruff, compassionless voice of her trainer chose this moment to fill her memory with its coarse bark.

“That’s the magic of a perfect lie, Kilda’ari. And the danger. Give it the liberty to run, and it’ll makeitself your truth. It’ll end up being the only thing you see.”

By the Blood, she’d been so sure she’d gotten rid of that voice in her head a long time ago.

Unfortunately, she’d known old Theodil was right back then, and he was still right.

She had to pull back on the leash she’d fastened to this particular lie before it completely took over.

“All right,” she croaked, stopping in front of her bedroom door, and lifted a hand for Maxwell to stop. “I’m going in, and you’re not. So feelfree to—”

Her knees buckled, and a cold tremor surged up and down her entire body and out to the end of every limb in a matter of seconds before she realized she was dropping toward the floor.

But the smack of her flesh on the linoleum and the cool hardness pressing up against her cheeks never appeared the way she expected.

Instead, there was that warm, encompassing embrace again. The prickling tingle racing up and down and through her, battling the severe cold seeping in and threatening to overwhelm everything else.

She was really fucking sick.

Somehow, it felt like a miracle that she could feel anything at all.

But it wasn’t a miracle when she realized why she hadn’t hit the floor.

Maxwell had caught her.

With a groan, she tried to steady herself on her feet again, but they wouldn’t take her weight. “No, no… I’m fine. Really. Just…tired.”

“I didn’t say anything,” he muttered before walking her toward her door again, keeping one arm around her waist and bracing her with his other hand gently supporting her elbow.

His arm around her waist, huh?

If she hadn’t been so damn weak right now, she would have pushed him away from her.

Never in her life had Rebecca been grateful for a physical weakness she couldn’t fight off or ignore, but for some reason, she was grateful for it now.

Almost as if Aldous’s touch, his warmth encircling her while she struggled even to stay upright, was the only thing keeping her away from oblivion’s edge.

Why the hell would she eventhinksomething like that?

“But now that you brought it up,” he added, “are you sure you should be going anywhere tomorrow?”

Rebecca blinked to clear her blurring vision. When she finally succeeded, she realized she was staring right up into those glowing silver eyes, noticing the way they crinkled at the corners, even when the look he gave her now was filled with so much concern, she might almost have called it tenderness.

But that didn’t make sense. He didn’t even know her.

Maxwell didn’t care so much about what happened to her specifically. This was his concern forShadetalking. He’d already made that crystal-clear, as well as his feelings abouther.

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