Simone kept her face hidden in her hands. She'd just asked Shayn for the truth, but did she want to hear it? Her head was swimming, the pounding of her heart nearly drowning out the sounds around her.
"Can you look at me?" Shayn asked gently.
Simone grimaced, knowing it was best she face the truth, whatever it might be. She tried to bolster her courage, and turned around, lowering her hands from her face.
"You don't have to," She tried. "It's been.. A lot today. We can postpone this discussion."
"I was asked for the truth, and I intend to give what I can of it." Shayn frowned. "If you still want to hear it."
She nodded a little reluctantly and held her breath until he began.
"You frustrate me." His first words were not what she expected, and Simone flinched. "You infuriate me in a way that I cannot avoid, and then you pull me in like a magnet. Like gravity. I'm drawn to you, and I can't…"
He paused thoughtfully, and she dropped her eyes to the ground.
"I'm wrecked." He admitted after a moment. "My life, for years, was myself and my brother. And he…" Shayn's voice broke. "He almost murdered me today. My closest friend. My brother. And here I am, cast off and finding only you here to anchor me to this world. To keep me from wishing for death. And that is too high a burden to put on a person. You should not have to bear it."
Simone's eyes widened. This was not at all what she had expected, and yet, some of it seemed too obvious to deny.
"I cannot say for certain what my feelings are toward you, being that… well, you already know. Today has been…" He stuttered to a stop, and Simone's throat closed with emotion. "I can't… I don't know. I'm sorry I can't provide you with clarity. I want to say so much more, but I do not trust myself to say it. You deserve the truth when there isn't this cloud over me, obscuring my thoughts and making me question my whole life. I…"
Shayn broke off again, seeming to choke on his words. He looked away, his green eyes stormy and brimming with hot tears. He had wiped hers away before, and she reached up a hand to brush one away.
"I feel alone." He finished, glancing off to where Kyler had disappeared.
"You're not alone." She whispered, and threw herself forward to wrap her arms around his waist. He all but collapsed against her, sobs of grief wracking his body.
"Shhh," She hushed gently, hugging him tightly. "We'll get him back, somehow. I don't believe he's gone forever."
Shayn spent his tears into her shoulder, and she closed her eyes. Remembering the feeling of Kyler's sword against her neck made her shudder. The coldness in his gaze as he'd mused her death and Shayn's was nothing short of chilling. It had to have been so much worse for the younger brother to see that look directed at him.
It made her ache, to feel Shayn so broken. The arrogant, snarky, overconfident, infuriating man was replaced by the grief of a lost brother.
"I don't know how the magic works, but we can ask Gwen for help. She can't do much by herself, but maybe the rest of the Fae will arrive soon and be able to break the hold of Beast. This can't be forever, it won't be the way things end." She gulped, hoping that her words were true.
He pulled back from the hug, his arms still around her, and looked down into her eyes. She kept her gaze steady. How did they move forward after what had transpired?
Shayn searched her face, and heat crept up her neck when they settled briefly on her lips. Her heart raced, and she took a steadying breath. His kisses had been every bit as full of fire as his verbal barbs had been early in their acquaintance. She would have to be more careful not to get burned.
And yet, like a moth, she was drawn to the flame.
'We shouldn't do anything either of us might regret later' he had said earlier that morning. Did he regret it now? He hadn't said so, but she hadn't directly asked that particular question. Shayn had admitted to turmoil and confusion, maybe he didn't know, himself.
"Thank you," He finally said, pulling her in for another hug. "I… don't know how things would have gone without you here, and even though you're completely crazy, I'm… I'm glad you were."
The words were soft, nearly whispered against her ear. It didn't sound like he regretted their kiss, but maybe he just meant her talking Kyler out of killing him, which was understandable.
"Me too." She nodded, her face pressed into his neck. She could feel his pulse there, erratic and quick. Before she could lose her nerve, she blurted out her real question. "Does that mean you don't regret…?"
She grimaced, and he put a hand to her cheek, pulling back to look down into her face. It took enormous self control to meet his eyes, but she managed. The emotion there was tremulous and unguarded, but complicated.
"If I die today or live to be a hundred, I won't regret kissing you. That much I know." He said quietly.
Her heart fluttered, and her stomach knotted. He thought he'd kissed her? She'd thought she was the one who shamelessly threw herself at him! Her cheeks burned again.
The thought had flitted through her head as a way to distract him from the foolhardy, suicidal notion that he was going to track Kyler down by himself, but she'd immediately rejected it as manipulative and wrong.
But then, his eyes had turned from angry to vulnerable for a fraction of a second, and her reaction was nearly involuntary. She wanted–needed–to comfort him, hold him, show him that even though the dearest person to him in the world had abandoned reason and sanity, he was not alone.
She supposed the message got through a little more loudly than she'd intended it to.
"Do you?" Shayn interrupted her thoughts. "Do you regret… should I apologize? I'm not well-versed in all of this."
The notion surprised her. His kisses had been… well, she had no prior experience to compare them to, but they didn't seem like the awkward affairs that some of the older female apprentices had described their first kisses to be before they left the library to be married to their beaus.
She blushed deeper as she realized how glad she was that he didn't have a lot of experience in this arena. At the time, she had been certain that he was mocking her when he mentioned being so charming that he had to flee the city to escape his admirers, but she only realized now that she'd been secretly afraid it was somehow true.
"No," She whispered, "I don't regret it."
A little crease between his eyebrows disappeared, and he heaved a sigh.
Judah chirped at them happily, causing the couple to jump apart. Since Judah didn't speak, Simone had an occasional tendency to forget how cognizant he was of their actions and surroundings.
"Some chaperone you turned out to be," She chastised the enormous cat. "We need to get back to civilization so that we can have a proper one."
"Do you actually want one?" Shayn glanced at her, and she was sure her face would catch fire from the burn of her blush.
"You're lucky I haven't spoken to my father since he sent me away," She avoided the question. "He would have quite a bit to say about spending the night out here alone with you, I'm sure."
She wasn't sure, but it seemed like something a good father would do.
"He'd probably make me marry you." Shayn said absently. "Maybe I'll meet him someday."
Simone blinked in surprise, not sure whether the two thoughts were connected or completely separate. She decided to avoid the question.
"I doubt it, he never bothered to contact me. He may have forgotten I exist." The lingering pain of familial betrayal stung, especially on the heels of watching Kyler's horrifying transformation.
Shayn's mood darkened, and she frowned.
"Judah, are you better?" He asked tentatively. "I don't know if someone will come looking for us after Kyler reports in, and I don't want to be here if that happens."
The creature huffed and nodded his big head, indicating he was fit to travel. The humans quickly packed up the camp, the sudden grumbling of Shayn's stomach reminding them that they hadn't eaten breakfast.
They finished breaking camp and climbed up on the increasingly anxious animal while quickly downing a hasty meal of preserved food. Simone could have sworn Judah was pacing impatiently over the slow humans.
"Well, let's be off," Shayn took his place behind Simone and she took a steadying breath, having strongly mixed feelings that they were about to be leaving the scene of their near death experience and passionate embrace.
She was glad, however, that Shayn's strong arms were around her once more.