Zayne didn’t answer for a long moment. “There was a lot of confusion. A lot of feelings and thoughts I didn’t understand, but it was all very consuming. That’s the only way I can describe it, and what I felt...” His jaw tensed against my palm. “It was so much anger and arrogance and this, I don’t know...sense of twisted righteousness? Like I suddenly had all this hate toward angels and anything with grace in it, but I also hated demons—all demons. I believed I was better than demons and more... I don’t know. More aware than those who hadn’t Fallen? I just hated everything and everyone, and it was like...like being aware of what I was doing and saying, and either not connecting with it or not understanding it.”

Zayne’s entire body had tensed against mine as he continued. “They warned me it could happen, but I thought I could handle it. I guess I already had a healthy dose of arrogance going into it, but I can’t even describe what it was like being bombarded with all these...powerful, violent emotions that suddenly felt right, like they had always been a part of me. This belief that I was judge and jury, and could do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted.”

“You sound like a lot of humans,” I said.

His laugh was dry and short. “But I... I remember what I’ve done,” he said, and guilt threaded his voice. “When I saw you after I Fell?” His eyes closed again. “I knew you. When I saw you, I knew you and your name, and then I just lost those memories. The reason why you were important to me. You were an enemy I had to...” Lines of tension bracketed the skin around his mouth. “I had to dominate. That’s all I knew until you kissed me in the park, and I don’t know how to explain it, but it was like being electrocuted. All of the sudden, I was hit with all these other emotions that weren’t hate, and when I saw you again—in that pool? I still didn’t understand what I was feeling, but all I knew in that moment, was you. All I knew was that I wanted you. That I had wanted you and that was me. Zayne.” His eyes opened then, meeting mine. “I’m just so damn sorry, Trinity. I know what I did. I know how you tried to reach me, and I—”

“Stop.” I cupped his face with my hands. “Don’t do this to yourself. That wasn’t you.”

“But it was,” he said quietly, dragging his hands up my arms. “That was me, Trin. I was in there—”

“And that’s why you never really hurt me.”

“Never hurt you?” Disbelief joined the guilt. “I threw you around like a rag doll.”