Then, slowly, she turns back to the window and refuses to say another word.
4
WILLOW
We drive for fucking ages.
The last half hour has been spent off-roading, bouncing over unpaved terrain. Wherever we’re headed, I’m willing to bet it’s far more difficult to find than the fortress in which I’ve ensconced for the last eleven months.
I try and stare out the window for as long as I can, but I can feel his gaze like a physical touch. It’s as distracting as I remember.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Oh, are you talking again?” he asks.
Once I do glance over, it’s hard to look away again. My memories of him had grown fuzzy. I remembered him in broad swathes, like an abstract painting. The finer details had been blended out.
But now, he is flesh and blood again.
The scar on his neck stands out, as intricate and frightening as ever. I’d forgotten how square his jaw is, how his nose slopes down at a perfect angle. His features are harsh in isolation, but when combined, they form the most handsome man I’ve ever laid eyes on. Even after everything we’ve been through, everything he’s done to me, I can’t deny that.
Sitting next to me in the car, he blocks the window. He seems taller and broader than I remember.
Suddenly, I wonder if I’m strong enough for this. I want to be. It’s what I’ve worked towards for eleven endless months.
But being confronted with the reality of him now, my ambitions seem far-fetched. Hers do, as well.
I have never been more aware of him.
Or of my own body.
A body that betrayed me several times in the early months of life with my birth mother. We were together nearly a year, but there’s still a detachment. A wariness I can’t shake, a distance I can’t cross.
“Where are my parents?” I ask, knowing full well the consequences of asking.
He studies me with a cold, unmoved expression. “If you expect me to answer your questions, you’re going to have to answer mine.”
I’m actually warm in my layers and boots, but goosebumps dapple my skin. Apparently, dying and being reborn as someone new isn’t enough to undo the way my body reacts to his.
“What do you want to know?” I’m proud of the dispassion in my tone. It’s a skill I’ve been practicing. One I intend to master.
“You know exactly what I want to know.”
I ignore the twisting pain of the memories and focus on remaining in control, neutral. “It was a boy,” I tell him softly.
He doesn’t so much as flinch, but I know him well enough to know that information is a blow. His legacy, dead in the womb.
I continue without being prompted. “I started bleeding out in my fourth month. A team of doctors came.”
“She didn’t take you to a hospital?” he growls.
“I was bleeding out too fast,” I speak in the voice Anya uses when she tells me a story from her past. As if it happened to someone else. Mere fact, no emotion. “If they’d moved me, I might have died, too.”
He doesn’t speak. If he has any feelings about the idea of my death, he doesn’t reveal them. I can’t say I’m surprised.
“I was bedridden for a month afterwards,” I continue. “I was unconscious when they buried him. He’s on her compound, if it means anything to you.”
“Where?” The single word vibrates with barely contained emotion.
“An unmarked grave,” I tell him. “Since I didn’t name him, it seemed fitting.”
“You should have named him.”
The anger surges out, cutting through the distance between us. But I welcome it. Because the truth is that I want him to suffer. I want to make him feel the sting of loss. The same I’ve had to grapple with.
“What I should have done is not your concern,” I snap. “You weren’t there.”
“Is that an accusation?”
I have to bite down on my tongue to keep my emotions from spilling out. Show them nothing but indifference, and they won’t be able to use your feelings against you. Her lessons feel timeless, though I’ve barely scratched the surface of understanding her world, Leo’s world.
“I’m just stating a fact,” I say. “You weren’t there.”
He’s staring at me, but he says nothing. No explanation or apology. It’s foolish to even consider that he might offer me some form of closure.
The man was never in this for me.
He was after my name. Nothing more.
The car finally comes to a stop at the end of a crude gravel path. It seems to lead nowhere.