And then, there had been another wave of instability—the beginning of the fix, I now knew. Kane had turned toward me, as if sensing what was going to happen to him. His hand brushed mine. I'd seen Lyra and Dorian hold hands plenty of times, during good times and bad, but it seemed too gentle a gesture for Kane, who was relentlessly sharp and prickly. I’d never been one for holding hands, either. I wasn’t even sure why I’d spent so much time thinking about it.
But at that moment, when the meld started to get even weirder, he’d pressed his hand against my palm. Soft, but sure. His lips had moved, but I hadn’t been able to catch it, as Mortal Plane buildings shifted into Immortal landscapes and back. A hot desert air surrounded us. The harvesters groaned in the distance, mourning in fear, grief and awe.
I didn't usually need a hand to hold, but in that moment, Kane's gentle touch was everything. The warmth of his palm grounded me in the otherworldly drift of the meld like an anchor, and instead of looking at the world as it got blurrier and dizzier around us, I’d stared into his eyes. I’d never noticed the gold flecks in his dark eyes before. They were like the souls that drifted through the Immortal Plane.
And then, just like that, he had been gone. His warmth had vanished. The harvester kids were also gone. The world snapped back into place, and I was left with most of the vampires and humans alongside me. They weren’t Kane, but they were alive and safe.
I’d found myself stumbling in the shallow part of a Mortal Plane pool, the hot air suddenly giving way to cold, icy water around me. The vampires were lucky enough to land on the lawn nearby. As I sloshed to the edge, trying not to startle the mortal family staring in horror from their kitchen window, I told myself not to worry. Kane could handle himself. The harvesters couldn’t survive in the Mortal Plane for long and had likely been transported back to their home plane. Surely, I told myself, Kane was with them, soothing myself with the idea that at least he was home, too.
Even if I would never get to see him again. The gates were closed and he had no reason to come back to this plane, which he’d always seemed to hate. I’d told myself that was fine.
After the Bureau picked us up from San Francisco, I’d eventually met up with Bryce and Lyra along with more vampires and human survivors. The vampire scouts managed to get in touch with our allies in the Immortal Plane. Nobody had seen Kane. He wasn't among the survivors that had come back from the river, although many harvesters had merely left of their own accord since the battle was over. Nobody knew what had happened to him, or the few others who vanished.
I’d held back tears with the firm belief that if anyone could survive something like that, it was Kane. He was like me—too stubborn for his own good, and certainly too stubborn to die that way.
Even before then, my relationship with Kane had been complicated. I cared for him deeply. The moment Lyra had stumbled across us during the party at the Hive... She still didn't know that had been our first and last kiss. The first and only time we’d given in to the attraction that sizzled between us every time our bodies pressed against each other in a sparring match.
And it wasn’t just the physical that drew me to him. I wouldn't call what I’d felt for him love, but for a while there, the feelings had been intense. Kane was scrappy, opinionated, bossy—a hustler and a fighter. Looking at him was like looking at the other side of my own coin. I’d never expected to find that in anyone, let alone a vampire.
The funny thing about grappling with someone is that it takes out any of the extra variables. I knew as soon as I started sparring with Kane that he got me. He knew where I was going to place my feet and my fists. He was quick and crafty. I was hard to impress, but he’d done it. And he could take all the trash I liked to talk and return it without getting huffy.
My mind drifted back to the kiss: one searing-hot moment where our bodies had run away with us. The way he’d thrown me effortlessly up against the wall, his hard muscles pressed against mine like we were sparring, until his lips met mine hungrily.
At the time, I’d been pissed with Lyra for barging in and interrupting us. But Kane… it seemed like he regretted kissing me at all.
Now, with a clearer head, I was sure that things would never have worked out between us. We were too alike in certain ways, and neither of us had the kind of conflict resolution skills that Lyra and Dorian liked to prance around with.
And even if we could get around that, there were other obstacles. Halla, for one—one more overprotective mother I didn’t need in my life. Not to mention that my own beloved family would lose their marbles if I brought home a vampire. Kane was a vampire, and I was human, and while the interspecies romance didn’t bother me, Kane’s life was in the Immortal Plane, and I’d never been keen on long-distance relationships.
Plus, I had to be honest with myself: Kane was ridiculously gorgeous and could have any girl he wanted. Wouldn’t he want some amazing, superpowered, model-lookalike vampire woman to rebuild his life with in the Immortal
