“That would mean telling the Order I exist.”

“Well, yeah…that’s inevitable. You’ve seen Influence’s work. You’re the only one who can stop it.”

She takes a breath.

“Anora.” I whisper her name, coaxing her to look at me. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

She looks frustrated and fierce. I want to kiss her so badly. “I don’t want to trust you.”

“I know,” I say, stepping closer. She doesn’t move away. Instead, her head tilts back as she holds my gaze before her eyes fall to my lips, and I don’t think as I press my mouth to hers. I’m not sure what I expected, but it isn’t what this becomes—something heated and frantic. My hands settle on her hips, and I pull her to me as I kiss her before guiding her back until she rests against the trunk of the willow tree. Her hands press to my chest and then twine into my hair, and when I lean into her, she gasps. My tongue clashes with hers, and she is sweet and new and familiar. She fuels the heat in the bottom of my stomach.

I could drown in her and die happy.

I hitch her leg over my hip, wishing to be closer, and then images flash through my mind: heated kisses and bodies coming together, desperate to feel, and suddenly we’re not close enough. I’m not kissing her enough, and there are too many layers between us.

And for some reason, Chase is in the back of my head. I think about how he gained her trust and broke her heart. How often he embraced her and kissed her. How many lies he told her.

And how am I different?

I’m not.

Because at the end of the day, she is human, and I am Valryn, and we can never be together.

I pull away from her, studying her beautiful face, wanting to memorize every part of her.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

I blink, unsure of what she means. “Like what?”

“You look so intense,” she says and touches my cheek. My eyes fall to her kiss-bruised lips.

“I don’t mean to,” I say, but the truth is, I’m struck by this feeling that she’s the embodiment of my heart, and she’s walking around outside my chest, and I’d do anything to protect her, no matter the cost.

Even if I can’t be with her.

Chapter Thirty

Shy and the Past Life

By morning, I haven’t slept a wink.

I stayed out with Anora another hour until the sun peeked over the edge of the horizon. Then I returned her home with the promise that I’d see her in a few hours so we could retrace Lily’s steps, but I’m already eager to be near her again.