Inquest (30 page)

“Please don’t
say that,” I say.

Milo kisses my
forehead and leaves his mouth hovering over my skin. “Until that
night, I thought not becoming a Guardian was the worst thing that
could ever happen to me.” The bitter tinge to his voice is buried
deep, but not hidden. Shallow dreams cut when they shatter just as
much as the more profound ones.

“I won’t make
that same mistake again, Libby,” Milo says. “I may not have any
dreams of becoming anything now, but I have other things to live
for. I won’t let go of you, and I won’t let my parents do the same
things they’ve done to me to Celia.”

“Milo,” I say
with more than a little hesitation, “I would have been pissed about
the way your parents handled things too, but they were trying to
protect you weren’t they?”

I don’t know
how I expected him to react, but laughing wasn’t on the list at
all. Until the anger in his voice turns it into a growl. “Their
idea of protecting me was to bribe the Inquisitor and nearly kill
me, then throw me back to the wolves. I went back to school two
days later with bandages all over my wrist. I was the only one
wearing a sweatshirt in May. The Guardians were tipped off somehow,
and they came after me in the middle of the night. The idiots
started in the wrong room, though. Celia woke up screaming. I was
right across the hall from her, but by the time I got to her room
one of them had a knife to her throat.”

My throat
tightens at a similar memory.

“I didn’t even
think, I just barreled into the room and tackled him like I was
back on the field. Strength and Speed couldn’t match me with how
caught-off-guard he was. The second one, he was on me before I hit
the ground. Celia ran for my dad, but I knew he’d never get there
in time,” Milo says, his voice growing darker with every word.
“Somehow I managed to get one of their knives, and the first chance
I got I put it into the first Guardian’s throat.”

My breath
catches in my throat and my stomach twists painfully. He killed the
Guardian? A subtle shiver runs down my spine at the violence in his
eyes as he says it. I have no love for the Guardians, but I have no
desire to kill them if I can help it, either. I shudder at the lack
of regret in Milo’s eyes. I understand the need for deadly force
when you’re protecting people, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel
the effects of it. I don’t know whether I killed the Guardians that
came after me at the mall, but I have nightmares about what I did.
Milo’s expression makes it clear his sleep wasn’t disturbed because
of his actions. When he speaks again, I feel myself flinch
involuntarily.

“The second
Guardian laid me out with a blow to the back of my head and started
dragging his friend out the window,” Milo said. “I told my parents
we should have left as soon as I woke up after my botched Inquest.
I still don’t understand why the Guardians want me, but I knew
staying where people knew us and knew our names was a mistake. But
they swore the Inquisitor’s bogus report about my Inquest would
hold up. They didn’t want to upset our lives.”

“And Celia
almost died,” I say quietly, trying to put aside my discomfort with
Milo’s story and focus on what he needs now.

“If I hadn’t
gotten there in time they would have murdered her to get to me. My
parents let that happen by staying there. I won’t forgive them for
that. For everything else, maybe, but not for that.”

“So it was
your idea to move?”

“Out in an
empty little border state we could fade into the background and
hide from the Guardians. Celia could be safe out here where the
closest major Guardian training compound is five hundred miles
away.” Milo pauses and strokes my hair. “I hoped that Celia would
be safe here, and that if her Inquest went as badly as mine did, I
could get her away from my parents and disappear into the desert
before anyone could stop us.”

I sigh and
curl against him even more tightly. He responds in kind.

“Meeting me
has to be the worst thing that could have happened to you,” I
say.

“Not
hardly.”

Shaking my
head in frustration, I say, “But you constantly have to dodge
camera crews around me. If one of the national reporters gets you
on tape the Guardians will know where you are. And I’ve already
nearly gotten Celia killed once. I am horrible for you, Milo.”

“No,” he says
firmly. “Libby, you’re the best thing that could have ever happened
to me. I wouldn’t change meeting you for anything. I love you.”

Every time I
hear those words on his lips my heart dances to the sound of his
voice. My joy is dulled under the weight of what he’s saying this
time. He loves me and says he doesn’t regret getting close to me,
but life is never that simple. He’s too blinded to see the very
real possibilities of how this story we’re writing might play out.
I was too selfish to see it earlier. I wanted so much to be loved
by someone again that I let Milo put himself at risk. Never did I
imagine the depth of what he was putting on the line for me. A
terrible realization sinks into my heart. I can’t let him do it
anymore. A little over four months of happiness, it will have to be
enough to carry me through to the end. Whatever that end might
be.

Tears start
forming in my eyes before I even begin to speak. I press myself
against Milo as hard as I can, drink in his scent and memorize the
contours of his body. Four months, it’s probably more than I
deserve anyway.

“What if Celia
ends up getting hurt, or worse, because of me?” I say. “You can
make sure that doesn’t happen if you leave me alone. Milo, you
can’t be with me anymore. I won’t have yours or Celia’s blood on my
hands. I have too much on them already. Please don’t ask me to do
that, Milo. Please leave.”

“No. I won’t
leave. I’m not going to be one more person that abandons you.”

I turn away
from him, wincing at the wrenching pain that runs through my leg.
My voice is strained and weak when I speak. “I refuse to be the
reason you die, Milo. Go, please.”

“No.”

“Get out of
here!” I scream at him.

His hands grab
my shoulders and jerk me up to his face. The shock of his brute
force overrides the screaming my leg is doing. Defiance so intense
it presses me down with its force rolls off Milo in waves. “Stop
it,” he demands, shaking me again. “Stop it, Libby! I’m not going
anywhere. Nothing you say will change my mind. Just stop it!”

“It’s a choice
between me and Celia,” I finally say. It stops him cold. I’m asking
him to choose between me and his little sister, a choice he should
never have to make. But he has to understand. I have to make him
see the truth.

“Why does it
have to be one or the other?” he asks quietly.

“In what
ending could you ever have us both?”

His eyes blaze
with fire. “We stand a better chance of protecting her
together.”

“No! I’ll get
her killed, Milo. If I’m in your life she’ll never be safe. You
know it’s true!” I argue, punching against his chest to drive home
my point.

Milo shoves me
into the bed and straddles my hips. His face glowers a mere inch
away from my own. “You want to know what ending will let me have
both you and Celia?” He presses down on me, his intensity bordering
on frightening. “I get the woman I love and the sister I would die
to protect by helping you do what you were born to do. Destroy the
people hunting us, and I get my wish.”

My mind
stutters in shock. “You…you want me to go against the Guardians?
Are you serious?”

The cold glint
that was in his eyes when he talked about killing the Guardian in
Celia’s room returns. I’ve seen Milo get angry, several times. I
can handle his anger. This goes way beyond that. There isn’t a wild
fury in him driven by being in the moment, just a stone cold hatred
and desire to return the pain they caused him. It frightens me more
than the idea of attacking the Guardians.

“I’ve wanted
to kill them all since the night they tried to murder Celia. They
aren’t protectors, they’re mercenaries. I dream of finding that
second Guardian and ramming his own blade into his heart,” Milo
says. I can’t stop myself from pulling away from Milo a little.
He’s so focused on his dreams of vengeance he doesn’t notice. A
shiver ripples through my spine. Then a second, but for a
completely different reason.

“Is that why
you didn’t ignore me?” I ask. My bottom lip quivers like a
frightened child, but in this moment I feel like I am seven years
old again, teetering on the brink of having my world pulled out
from under me. “You saw me as a way to get revenge?”

Milo’s eyes
widen, and his grip softens and slips off my shoulders to the
pillow behind me. Any hint of the darkness that consumed him a
moment ago disappears completely. “No,” he says, “no, of course
not.”

“Then
why?”

“Because the
sullen pout on your lips was so adorable I couldn’t resist.” His
slow smile spreads and threatens to make me forget why I questioned
him in the first place.

His
irresistible charm won’t work this time. The memory of his cold
eyes haunts me. “Milo, I’m serious. You knew who I was when you
talked to me. Why?”

“Because I
knew who you were before Lance stood up in class,” he says. I start
to argue with the impossibility of that, but he doesn’t let me. “I
don’t mean you being the Destroyer. I mean you, Libby Sparks. Lance
was the only thing in your head before, but you were in mine. I
never understood before your Inquest why such a smart and beautiful
girl like you was so quiet and reserved. I guess I should have
known you had a secret, given my own experience with them, but I
wasn’t about to let a little thing like you being the Destroyer
stop me when I finally had a chance to get to know you.”

My heart begs
me to believe him. Is it really too much to ask for one
relationship not tainted by lies and betrayal? I just don’t know if
I can trust what he’s saying. He wants so badly to crush every last
Guardian into the ground. And he wants me to help him. My
Perception is hammering away, telling me he believes what he’s
saying, but does that make it true?

“Libby,” Milo
says, his voice alluringly soft, “I promise you that I had no other
thought in my mind other than kissing your pouting lips that day. I
hated that Lance hurt you, but I wanted to take his place. I wanted
you, not a weapon.”

He leans in
closer. The heat of his body is stealing my breath. Tingling
dizziness spreads from my chest to my fingertips and toes.

“I still want
you, Libby. More than anything, I want you.”

“But you want
me to go after the Guardians,” I manage to say in a breathy
whisper.

“I’ll go after
them regardless. I think it would be a step toward solving both of
our problems. Having you with me will help, yes, but the choice is
yours.”

“And if I say
no?”

“Then I won’t
ask again,” he says, “but I won’t leave you either. So stop
asking.”

His unguarded
emotions cover me in his love and his honest desire to share my
life no matter the risk. I don’t want to doubt him. Someone else
with the same ambition might see me as a tool to be used before a
woman who needed a soft touch, but I tell myself that Milo isn’t
that person. Passion and anger burns in him as fierce as any other
warrior wannabe, but it is tempered with concern for me.

The
deep-rooted desire to protect and care for others has to be
stronger than his darker desires. They have to be. He’s shown me so
many times how much he wants to do good. That stuff earlier, it was
only there for a few minutes. That isn’t the real Milo. The real
Milo is the one stroking my skin, radiating love. Although he is a
teenage boy kissing a pretty girl. That can cloud a guy’s mind
pretty quickly and make them forget just about anything else.

“You can’t
stay with me and go after the Guardians at the same time,” I
say.

His old casual
shrug makes a return. “I’ll figure something out.”

“You know I
won’t let you go alone. You know I’ll come with you whether I want
to or not.” It’s an accusation, but not one filled with malice.
It’s just the truth. I couldn’t let him face that alone.

“It’s a
possibility,” he admits, “but I have a feeling that if you really
want to stop me, you’ll have a pretty easy time of it.”

“You think
so?” I ask.

He nods before
touching my lips, lightly at first then more hungrily. My lips part
as his tongue glides over my bottom lip. Need so desperate it can
never be sated races through my veins. Milo lowers his body gently
to mine as his mouth wanders down my neck. My mind begs him
silently to keep going, to explore every inch of my skin. I reach
up to tangle my fingers in shaggy hair that is no longer there, and
find myself simply pulling him closer. He groans and pulls
back.

“No,” I
whisper. I don’t want him to stop. I want him to erase the past few
days, erase my doubt. I want his body to be the only thing in my
mind.

Milo offers me
one last kiss and rolls onto his back.

“Milo…”

His fingers
wrap around mine but he doesn’t come back. “Libby, you’re doped up
on some serious drugs. I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry.”

“But…”

“Libby, when
you’re thinking more clearly, if you still want to, I’ll be more
than willing. But not now, not when you might regret it later.”

That taste of
his passion is intoxicating. I can’t imagine ever not wanting to
bask in it, but as my thoughts grow more and more fuzzy I start to
realize that
later
might be a good idea.

Chapter 25

Boiling
Mercury

Anger can
overcome rational thought with barely any effort at all, but
curiosity can be just as powerful. The second I arrive on campus
with my casted foot and crutches people turn to stare. Concern
tempered by amazement makes their eyes linger. I hobble across the
blacktop under their wondering stares. I hear more than one person
whispering their questions about how
I
could have gotten
hurt.