When he met Frankie and their soulmate marks appeared, I’d been gutted. For the first time since Riah dragged Cooper away from the light at the end of the tunnel, I understood why he wanted to step into it and give it all up. I wanted to live but watching my nightmare come to life before my very eyes made me want to die. It was everything I feared it would be . . . and then it was just gone. Fake. They weren’t soulmates at all. Somehow that was so much worse because now it meant I’d have to do this all over again: the waiting for the apocalypse and then the inevitable torturous death. It was living the worst day of my life and then waking up to have to do it all over again. There were horror films less traumatic than this.

A new girl would eventually come and be his.

And I will want to die all over again.

Someone knocked on my door. Without thinking, I turned and opened it—then gasped.

It was Cooper.

He just stared. Fresh tears slid down my cheeks. His face scrunched up in pain and then he reached for me and all of my control snapped. I fisted his shirt and dragged his mouth down to mine. Our lips crashed together in a panicked frenzy as our feet carried us deeper into my room. I heard my door slam shut, then both of Cooper’s big, warm hands gripped my face. We stumbled backwards until my legs crashed into my bed and gravity sent us crashing onto the fuzzy blankets. That Irish Spring soap scent of his invaded my senses, melting me from the inside out. His body pressed into me, pushing me into the mattress and sending electric heat pulsing through every inch of my body. We rolled a couple of times and then the reality of what we were doing crashed back into my mind like a bomb.

I pushed off of him and scrambled off the bed as a broken sob ripped up my throat. I stumbled toward my door and hot tears spilled like lava down my face. “I c-c-an’t⁠—”

“Savannah—”

“I can’t⁠—"

“I didn’t come up here for that⁠—”

“Then what did you come up here for?” I snapped, my voice breaking. I pushed my hands into my hair and pulled. “Why? What are you trying to do to me?”

“To talk”