poised for Giana’s next words. “You’re going to pay for that.”
 
 The shaky gulp she dragged in was flooded with the scent of
 
 perfume and desire, dark secrets and darker anguish. It was all
 
 Giana. Sinfully her. Exactly as Coralyn remembered breathing
 
 her in before. She smelled the same, but she wasn’t the same
 
 now. That Giana was probably the excavated one, the soul dug
 
 out from the hard shell and all the debris and rocks and layers
 
 or ruination.
 
 Giana let the words sink in. Her mouth was so sensual, even
 
 if she didn’t smile. Her cruelty, her secrets, the duality of
 
 before and now, only added to her allure. Her eyes were
 
 stormy and beautiful and wrecked. She was too serious. She’d
 
 seen far too much, far too young.
 
 “I need it,” Coralyn admitted, sacrificing herself right there,
 
 slaying her pride. “You’re the only thing that’s made sense to
 
 me since my mom died. The days I spent with you, that made
 
 sense. Not every moment, but some of them. You came for me
 
 when I needed you most. You held me. You didn’t let my feet
 
 touch the earth.”
 
 “And then I remembered, and I sent you crashing down, so
 
 why are you really here?”
 
 “You didn’t leave me all alone!” Was it so wrong to fight for
 
 something that she really didn’t understand why she needed?
 
 Wrong or right, it was the fight of her life. She’d lost so many
 
 of those fights, but not this one. “You knew everything about
 
 where I was. I know you had someone following me. The
 
 same car drove past my apartment every half hour. I hid
 
 behind the blinds and looked out and a guy had a camera
 
 pointed right at my apartment. I wasn’t scared. I knew exactly
 
 who sent him.”