“So, your question?” he asked.
Ah, yes. The one I’d wanted to ask for weeks.
“What’s supposed to happen now? With us, I mean?” I braced myself for Logan to tell me how he’d eventually leave, but instead, he started laughing.
“Are we having The Talk?” Logan emphasized the words, grinning at me playfully. “Oh, no, it’s the infamous Talk!”
“Don’t make fun, we were supposed to have The Talk weeks ago.” I swatted at him, and he caught my hand, giving my fist a kiss before setting it back down.
“Well, what do you want to happen?” he asked me. “I don’t think what’s supposed to happen really applies to us.”
“It’s selfish, but...I don’t want you to leave.” Sorry, everyone Logan would have saved from demons. I wanted him to stay with me, so sucks to be you.
“Why is that selfish?” he asked, bewildered.
“Well, Aiden’s not going to be a threat forever, so I know your time here has to come to an end at some point.” I frowned. “And besides, I can’t ask you to make that sacrifice.”
“It’s not a sacrifice if I want to do it.”
“You just told me about how you’ve wanted nothing but revenge since you were nine,” I reminded him. “I don’t know what the protocol is here, but I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t give up your lifelong mission for vengeance because your girlfriend is being extraclingy.”
Logan ran his thumb over my hand before rolling onto his back, tugging me with him.
“Come here.” He caught me as I fell onto his chest, his right arm curling around my waist, keeping me snug against his side.
“You were too far away. This is better,” he said matter-of-factly, cushioning his head with his other arm. We lay like that for a moment until he spoke again.
“What if I’ve already talked to Rego about this?” he asked quietly, and my head popped up to stare at him. His face was a perfectly composed, serene mask.
“I’m leaving him. Them. All of it. They can fight their own war. I’m done.”
“But—I thought you were—I thought revenge was what you wanted,” I stammered, shocked. “Your mom, she’s a prisoner.”
Logan blinked his eyes slowly, exhaling a long breath.
“Paige, both of my parents are dead.”
He sounded so defeated as he said those words, and I wrapped my arms around Logan as far as they would go.
“I’m sorry,” was all I could say.
“I was about fifteen, and I was just exhausted. I was burned out—my life was nothing but kill, move on, kill, move on,” he said, his fingers idly running down my back as I rested my chin on his chest, facing him as he spoke. It would have been a sweet embrace, if not for the gruesome conversation topic.
“We’d just moved to some new place, again, and I found this photo of me and my parents that I hadn’t even remembered in that old backpack. It was from my last birthday party. They really played up the part of human parents, you know? We looked normal. And I’d looked so happy with them, holding up that stupid toy car. I started to remember things—things I’d suppressed under a fog of revenge. I remembered how much they didn’t want me to be a part of this life, and here I was, some kid slaughtering demons. I was tired of being a killing machine and never hearing anything about how it was helping get my mom back.
“So I went to Rego and proposed we make a deal for my mom. I had a pretty fearsome reputation at that point. After all, I was the big bad proditori, right? The Regents couldn’t have been happy that I was running around, some nameless, faceless killer, infiltrating hives of demons and assassinating them all. I suggested that if they returned my mom, they could strip me of my powers.”
Seeing my confused face, Logan explained, “There’s a spell that can strip warlocks and demons of their powers. It’s painful on the part of the spellcaster and the subject of the spell. And apart from the loss of magic, it would make me physically weaker than your average human. But,” Logan said with a wistful smile, “it would have been worth it to free my mom. I figured we could live as humans somewhere on this side, start a new life. Good plan, right? I mean, it’s not like my mother had been some terrifying warrior to begin with—she was just sitting in their dungeon. What did they have to lose?
“Rego finally got word that she’d been killed months earlier—a public execution to caution demons against associating with warlocks,” he revealed, his hand stilling on my back, clutching the fabric of my shirt in his fist. “I thought I wanted revenge before, but after that, it was all I lived for. I had nothing and I hated everyone. I hated Rego, for not being my father. I hated myself, for being the very thing I hated. I hated my mom, for being idealistic and going back to help, for picking the greater good over me. And then I hated myself all over again, because I was mad at my mom when she was dead. I begged Rego for assignments, so I could kill as many demons as possible. But it didn’t dull the pain.”
Logan sounded lost, his voice taking on a desperate tone. “After a while, I just felt hollow—like a shell that was filled with nothing but death and rage. No wonder this isn’t the life my parents wanted for me. Hell, this isn’t the life I wanted for me,” he said, his palm rubbing against his stubbly jaw again.
“Nothing I do will bring my parents back. What do I think I’m doing? Avenging them? I’m disgracing them. They didn’t want this for me. Spending my life fighting, killing, seeking revenge—this doesn’t honor them. It’s the worst thing I can do to their memory.
“But this,” Logan said, taking my hands in his, “this is living. This is what I want.”
I looked down at our joined hands, at the way they fit together perfectly.
“Are you sure?” I whispered, trying to keep the hope out of my voice.
“I’d finally have a life worth living,” he said, squeezing my hands for emphasis. “I could stay in school, figure out what I want to do with my life. I like English class, so maybe I could be a writer. Replace the sword with a pen, see which one really is mightier,” he added with a wink.
“I think both are pretty potent in your hands,” I muttered, remembering his letter, and Logan smiled modestly in reply.
“I could actually take you on a date,” he said wistfully. “Besides, someone’s gotta protect you.”
He’d bared his soul and more tonight. He’d told me he loved me. And that should have been enough to kill the toxic voices that had started questioning the prospect of Logan staying here. For good.
He’s only staying to protect you. He’s making all the sacrifices. He’s going to get tired of you and resent you.
“Don’t do this just for me,” I mumbled, giving voice to my insecurities. “What if we don’t work out?”
“Yeah, we’re going to break up because you didn’t text me back quickly enough,” he said sarcastically, squeezing my side. “You know, it would be nice if you had a little more faith in us. Life-altering relationships don’t come around all that often.”
Logan pulled me closer, his lips just inches from mine. “This is my decision, and you’re the one overthinking it. Your initial reaction was happiness. Go with that.”
My head and heart warred—with my heart screaming to let Logan leave it all behind and stay with me while my head whispered that he’d resent me later. But when I closed the distance between us, kissing him fiercely, I realized that logic never stood a chance against my heart.
Chapter 14
“YOU TALK IN your sleep.”
Familiar arms wound around me as I stood in front of the bookshelves in the school library on Wednesday.
I narrowed my eyes and whirled around to see Logan standing there with a playful grin. Ever since I fell asleep in his arms last Friday night, he’d been telling me that I called his name in my sleep. And walked in my sleep. And did a strip tease in my sleep.