His dark eyes met mine, and he let his hands fall to his sides. “Yes, I need to.” He stared down at me for a long moment, and then squared his shoulders like he was facing an opponent in battle. “I can’t do this, Lela. I was arrogant and stupid to believe I could.”

It took me several seconds to process his words, and when I did, my mouth dropped open. “You’re quitting? Jeez! Jim might be doing the same thing, and that’s bad enough. You can’t quit, Malachi. I’ll never be able to do this without you.”

Pain flashed in his eyes, and then it was gone, smoothed over. “No, that’s not what I meant. I’m not quitting. Even if I could, I wouldn’t, because you need me.”

“Exactly.” I shuffled forward on my aching legs, needing to feel him, to be in his arms. “You scared me for a second there.”

He caught my wrists before my hands reached his body and whispered, “But I can’t do this.”

My heart picked up a frantic, uneven rhythm. I stood, with my arms out to my sides, held there gently in his hands. “You can’t do … what?” I mouthed it more than said it. My throat had closed.

“If I am your Lieutenant, I shouldn’t be anything else. I can’t touch you like I have.” His gaze dropped to the floor. “And you can’t look at me like that.”

“But you said—when we were in front of the Judge, you said …” He’d said he loved me. He’d said it. I’d heard him. The moment was etched onto my heart in vivid detail.

He closed his eyes. “Regardless of what I said, this is over between us. I can’t do my job like this. What happened today proved that. I was so consumed with fear of you being hurt that I killed an unarmed boy. Someone who needed my help. A person you were trying to save.”

“Anyone could have made that mistake,” I argued, my voice cracking. “You had a split second to assess the situation.”

“I have been a Guard for seventy years, and I have never made a mistake like that.” His eyes opened, and in them I saw myself, pleading and desperate. “Even if I had, it’s different here. We are in the land of the living. That boy was innocent, and I deprived him of his life.” He released my wrists and took a giant step back. “Because of my feelings for you.”

I stood there like an idiot, my arms still out at my sides, reaching for the comfort of his body, for him. “I know it’s taking some time to adjust to this new place. But it’s not me—it’s not us.” I knew how pathetic I sounded, but I didn’t care. “Please. We can talk this through.”