“Lena, we can figure this out.”
“No, we can’t, Ethan. Not this.”
“Haven’t we made it through everything else together?”
“No. Not together. You don’t know anything about me anymore.” For a second, something passed across her face. Sadness, maybe? Regret?
I wish things could be different, but they can’t.
She started to walk away.
I can’t go where you’re going, Lena.
I know.
You’ll be all alone.
She didn’t turn around.
I’m already alone, Ethan.
Then tell me to go. If that’s what you really want.
She stopped walking and turned slowly to look at me.
“I don’t want you here, Ethan.” Lena disappeared across the dance floor, away from me. Before I could take a step, I heard the rip—
John Breed materialized in front of me, black leather jacket and all. “Me neither.”
We were only a few feet apart. “I’m going, but it’s not because of you.” He smiled, and his green eyes glowed.
I turned and pushed my way through the crowd. I didn’t care if I pissed off someone who could drink my blood or make me jump off a cliff. I kept moving because more than anything else, I wanted to get out of there. The heavy wooden door slammed behind me, shutting out the music, the lights, and the Casters.
But it didn’t shut out what I was hoping for. The image of his hands on her hips, swaying to the music, her twisting black hair. Lena in the arms of some other guy.
I barely noticed as the alley turned from modern-day asphalt and filth back to cobblestones. How long had it been going on, and what had happened between them?
Casters and Mortals can’t be together. That’s what the visions were telling me, as if the Caster world didn’t think I understood by now.
I heard the sound of footst
eps echoing against the cobblestones behind me. “Ethan, are you okay?” Liv put her hand on my shoulder. I hadn’t realized she was following me.
I turned around, but I didn’t know what to say. I was standing on a street out of the past, in an underground Caster Tunnel, thinking about Lena with some guy who was my polar opposite. A guy who could take whatever I had, whenever he wanted. Tonight had proven it.
“I don’t know what to do. This isn’t Lena. Ridley and John have some kind of hold on her.”
Liv bit her bottom lip nervously. “I know it’s not what you want to hear, but Lena’s making her own decisions.”
Liv didn’t understand. She had never seen what Lena was really like before Macon died and John Breed showed up. “There’s no way you can be sure. You heard Aunt Marian. We don’t know what kind of powers John has.”
“I can’t imagine how hard this is for you.” Liv was speaking in absolutes, and there was nothing absolute about what was happening to Lena and to me.
“You don’t know her—”
Liv’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Ethan, her eyes are gold.”
The words echoed in my head, like I was underwater. My emotions sank like a stone as logic and reason fought their way to the surface.