His parents didn’t love each other and might not have even loved him, and my parents were Mark and Carol fucking Dallon, we were parahumans, and none of that mess was easy. When he’d been given the unique ability to resolve conflicts by laser-punching people with emotion and reading their feelings, I’d been handed the conflict resolution ability of breaking people. Neither of us had been able to use our innate, shockingly powerful capabilities on each other. Of course we’d bounced off each other. But love drew us back in. Each time, a couple of the romantic illusions were shaken off, and romantic realities replaced them. We’d had to learn to communicate, to figure each other out.

That one night with Dean had redefined things for me. Something I’d carry with me always when it came to putting ideas to the word ‘love’.

And, because it was the elephant, the abomination in the room, I would think of years spent pining. A love I knew and had known was fake and manufactured that had stayed with me for two years, threatening to wash away and taint every other kind of love.

Now, the mirror to that. In an uncomfortable, vaguely alien world, surrounded by coldness and restrained tension, staring across a gap and feeling emotion somewhere between disgust, outrage, and betrayal roiling inside of me, I could genuinely say I hated her.

I looked away, out the window, and there was nothing there. Only snowdrifts, glass opaque with the snow that rested against it, and vague shapes of buildings. Maybe there would be more of a view when the wind died down.

I looked at my teammates instead, and they were doing their duty, holding their own, being good, keeping an eye or an ear out. Vista was helping Tristan keep an eye out, her hands folded over the top of a chair leg that jutted up beside her, chin resting on hands. She was more worried for Miss Militia than anyone, I suspected.

Tristan, Vista and Kenzie were making sure Miss Militia was safe. If something happened, we could spring into action.

But looking at my team meant they looked back, and I wasn’t sure I wanted them to see my expression or read something into it. For this moment I held it together. If Sveta or Ashley tried to be nice and help me then that’d jeopardize that stability.

And if I wasn’t looking in Amy’s direction, wasn’t looking out the window, wasn’t looking at my team—I looked at the guards.

A few of them looked at me with that same hate I’d so recently found so painfully clarified. They reminded themselves of their guns. I was left to wonder if they’d be any more ashamed than Yosef if they ended up gunning us down.