She cut him off, on a roll now. “When I travel, there’s a fresh start at every arrival gate. New people. New places. Hotel rooms. Rented villas. Room service. All of it is…formless, nondescript, anonymous. Nothing to fuck up. Nothing to get attached to. Nothing to grieve for when I move on.”

“Look at me.”

“But the thing of it is…in the end, none of it matters. It’s all just bullshit. I think I’m avoiding being cornered by emotion, by commitment, and by potential loss, but really it’s just another trap. I know that because of my sister. She was the only person who ever really mattered in my life.” Before you. A tear drop rolled down her cheek and she wiped it away. “When she died, I grieved so hard my soul twisted. It was the worst pain I’ve ever felt, but I would never, ever have given up loving my sister to have saved myself that pain.”

“Isabelle…”

“So you see? It’s a catch twenty-two. You either have nothing and feel nothing, or you have something and eventually lose it, thus feeling everything…in a bad way. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.” She laughed. It sounded harsh to her own ears. “And I’m really damned, Thomas. You don’t know the half of it.”

“Isabelle, look at me.”

Slowly, Isabelle turned to face him.

Emotion moved over his face, breaking the anger into something like sorrow…or maybe love…for a moment. Her own emotions ran too high for her to get a read on his now. “I’m not leaving here and I’m not letting you leave me.”

“Thomas—”

He pulled her into his arms. When she pushed at him, he only held on tighter. “I love you.” He whispered it into her hair.

Isabelle made fists, trying not to grab on to him with both hands and never let go. Her fingernails dug into her palms. “Thomas, please don’t do this.”

“I love you, Isabelle,” he whispered again. “I’m not letting you go. I’m never letting you go.”

Her eyes filled with tears. The words just spilled out, easy as a river flows into the ocean. Nothing in the world—not even a demon—could’ve stopped them. “I love you, too.”

He stroked her hair. “I know.”

Isabelle clung to him for a moment, trying to gather enough strength to push him away and say something cutting, something so horrible it would make him leave. Possibilities polluted her mind. Each one she disregarded. Thomas saw straight through to the heart of her; anything she told him he would know was a lie.

Thomas tipped her chin up, forcing her gaze to his face, and kissed her. His lips slid over hers like silk at first, then the pressure grew harder and more demanding.