I nodded, but I felt like there was still blood on my hands, and no matter how hard I scrubbed, they’d never come clean.

Tod’s gaze met mine again, and his irises swirled with a single tight burst of color, then went still as he got control over them. “Do you want me to…?” His focus shifted to my shirt again, and I realized that it would have to come off. “I can step outside if you want.”

“Stay,” I said, and his irises swirled again. “Stay with me, please. I don’t want to be alone.”

Tod’s gaze met mine. “You’ll never be alone again, Kaylee.”

My hands shook as I pushed the first button through the hole, and that burst of color was back in his eyes. The second button slid free and Tod’s gaze never left mine, but he was breathing harder. It took me a moment to realize I was breathing again, too. And that my inhalations had matched the rhythm of his.

His gaze burned into mine, like he could see past my eyes into parts of me no one had ever seen, and I knew I was seeing the same in him. No one else had ever seen him so vulnerable before, like if I pushed him away, he might crumble into pieces that could never be put together again. Yet there was strength, too. He was strong beneath that fragile need, and I knew that I could never fall with him next to me. If I tripped, he would catch me. If I lost my balance, he would find it.

I wanted to be those things for him, too. His strength. His balance.

I found the third button and flinched. It was sticky and cold with drying blood. I didn’t want to touch it.

“Do you want me to get it?” Tod asked, and that complicated mix of strength and vulnerability echoed in his voice, deeper than it should have been, like his question meant more than what his words actually asked.

I nodded. “Take it off. Get rid of it. Please.”

He reached for me, and his gaze held mine until the last possible moment before his focus shifted to his fingers on my shirt. To the button, as he slid it through the hole, then moved on to the next. His fingers brushed my skin as he worked his way lower, and I sucked in a deep breath. My eyes closed again, and I let my head fall back against the shelf above the tank.

I didn’t realize he was finished until he whispered, “Lean forward.” So I did, and his hands slid over my shoulders, pushing the material down slowly until I could pull my arms from the short sleeves.

Then my shirt was gone, and so were his hands. I opened my eyes just as he turned the hot water on again and rinsed the rag beneath it. He wrung the cloth out, then took my hand in his warm, damp one. “Stand up.”

I stood, and he knelt in front of me. The cloth was scratchy on my skin, and each stroke was torturously short and deliciously hot as he worked his way across my stomach. When he was finished, he laid the rag across the tub again and his hands found myhips. He kissed the dimple above my navel, and his hair brushed my stomach, so soft I had to touch it.

His grip on my hips tightened and he exhaled against my stomach. “Every time I see you, I want to touch you, and I’m still a little stunned every time you let me.”

“Why?” I whispered. If anything, I was the lucky one.

“Because this feels too good to be true, so I keep expecting something to ruin it. When I saw you covered in blood, I thought it was happening again, the way it was supposed to last time. I thought Thane got to you.”

“I’m fine.” Physically, anyway.

“Not much scares me anymore, but I’m terrified of losing you, Kaylee.” His lips skimmed my stomach again, and I closed my eyes as my hands curled in his hair. “I don’t want to let you go long enough for that to happen.”

“Then don’t. Nothing else feels right,” I confessed. I couldn’t tell anyone else what I was telling him, because no one else would understand. They were worried enough about me already. “Everything that isn’t us is pain, and blood, and death. Or nothing at all. Everything that doesn’t hurt is just…emptiness. It closes in on me when I’m alone, and I hate it, but I can’t fight it. Food doesn’t taste right. Music sounds flat and tinny. Colors look dull and faded. Why? What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing. It won’t be like this forever, Kaylee,” he promised, his lips brushing my skin with each word, his breath hot on my stomach. “Your body and your mind are still adjusting to the afterlife. You have to give your senses time to readjust.”

“You feel good.” I lifted his chin and his gaze met mine again. “Why are you the only thing in the world that feels good right now?”

“I don’t know.” He stood, and his hands trailed slowly up my sides. “But I’m not gonna question it.”

“I know why,” I said as his lips met mine and he reminded me that he tasted as good as he felt. My hands slid beneath his shirt and my mouth fed from his. When he kissed his way along my jaw, I let my head fall back. “It’s because I love you,” I whispered, and I could feel his heartbeat speed up. I’d never actually told him. I’d been scared to, because it was too fast, and too crazy, and…

“I love you, too,” he said, his lips brushing my ear. “Eternity isn’t long enough.”

My heartbeat raced to match his, and I pushed him back just enough that I could see his eyes. “I want to feel something good. Something real. Something that isn’t bitter, or cold, or ugly.” I stood on my toes to whisper the rest in his ear. “I want to feel alive again, Tod. Make me feel alive.”