046— GOOD.

                 ~SLOANE~

My heart did one hard kick against my ribs.

Then I frowned.

"I don't understand what you're—"

"If you become my mate," he said, "the mark could go away. If the bond is strong enough." His hand closed around my forearm. Warm. He leaned closer. "I'd make sure it's stronger. You'd be okay. You'd be safe. You wouldn't have to—"

"Stop."

I pulled my arm back.

He blinked.

I looked at him. At his red eyes and his shaking hands and his wrecked face — and felt the anger arrive the way it always arrived when something hurt badly enough. 

"You don't get to decide that," I said. "You don't get to just walk in here and offer me a solution like I'm a problem on your desk."

"Sloane—"

"I heard you." My voice came out steadier than I felt. "On the rooftop. What you said to Niko."

He went still.

"You said you didn't want to do it," I said. "That you wouldn't. That there had to be another way." I held his gaze. "And now I'm in a hospital bed and suddenly you want to be my mate." Something burned in my throat that had nothing to do with the coughing. "You pity me."

"That's not—"

"Don't." My voice went up. 

The machines beside me beeped once, annoyed. "Don't you dare pity me Volkov. I don't need it. I don't want it. I would rather—"

"You have… weeks." His voice cracked on the last word. "Not months. Weeks Sloane."

The room went quiet.

I stared at him.

He pressed his lips together and looked at the floor for a second and then back at me. His jaw was moving like he was chewing through something he didn't want to say.

"I don't pity you," he said. Quieter now.

 "I just — I don't want you to—" He stopped. "I need you to be safe."

"I'll find a way myself."

"There is no other—"

"I'll find one."

"Sloane—"

"I said I'll find one." I looked at him. "I'm not doing this because you feel sorry for me. I'm not becoming your mate because you watched me cough blood. That's not—" My voice broke slightly and I hated it and kept going. "That's not what I want."

He looked at me for a long moment.

Then he exhaled.

"The doctor says he can reduce the pain," he said. "While you—" He stopped. "While you figure out your way."

He stood up and looked at me one more time with those red eyes.

"The team doesn't know about this," he said. "Just Anya."

He walked out.

I sat in the hospital bed and listened to his footsteps fade and his voice came back anyway.

‘Weeks, not months.’ 

I pressed both hands over my face and breathed.

He doesn't even — 

I stopped the thought before it finished.

Pulled the drip from my wrist.

The machine beside me started beeping immediately and I got up and found my shoes. The nurse appeared in the doorway looking panicked saying something about protocol and consent forms and I walked past her without slowing and went outside.

                    

                     …

The air hit my face and I kept walking.

Daniel appeared from somewhere near the entrance. "Sloane — hey, are you okay? I wanted to—"

"Not now Daniel."

I kept walking.

                      

                     …

I got into my room and locked the door. Body on the bed.

I lay there and looked at the ceiling and counted weeks I desperately didn't want to count and the numbers were small. Small enough to fit in one hand. 

‘Weeks. Not months.’

I pressed my hands over my face.

I wouldn't do it. Not like that. Not because he'd watched me collapse and felt responsible. Not out of obligation dressed up as caring. 

If he wanted — if he actually — he would have to say it. The real thing. Not ‘I need you to be safe.’ Not ‘I don't want you to.’

The real thing.

And he hadn't said it.

Which meant there was nothing to discuss.

A knock at the door.

I said nothing.

Another knock.

Then a voice.

"Sloane. Open the door. I know you're in there. I've been standing here for four minutes and my knees hurt."

I was off the bed before I finished recognizing her voice.

                    

                      …

Anya looked terrible.

Pale in the way of someone who hadn't slept. Her eyes were swollen and red like she had been crying for considerably longer than was comfortable to admit. 

She was standing in my doorway with her hair half-done and she looked at me for one second and then she grabbed me.

Both arms. Hard. Her face on my shoulder.

"I'm sorry," she said into my shirt. "I'm so sorry. I was so stupid and I'm sorry and I left and I was so— when they told me what happened I thought—" She was crying properly now, the graceless kind, her whole body shaking with it. "I thought you were going to die and the last thing I did was walk away from you and I'm so sorry—"

"Hey." I held her tighter. "Hey. Stop. It's okay."

"It's not okay—"

"Anya. Look at me."

She pulled back. Her face was a complete disaster and I loved her so much it physically hurt.

"I'm sorry too," I said. "For not telling you. For hiding everything. For making you feel like you didn't matter enough to know." I held her hands. "You're my best friend here. You're — you've been the only normal thing in my life for months and I was so scared of pulling you into it. I didn't want to make you a target."

"I would rather be a target," she said immediately, like it wasn't even a question.

I laughed.

She cried harder.

"You absolute…" She hit my arm gently. "I've been walking around thinking I did something wrong. Thinking you didn't trust me. Thinking…"

"I trust you completely."

"Then why?"

"Because I was trying to protect you." I squeezed her hands. "Which was stupid. And I'm sorry."

She looked at me for a moment. Then she dissolved again. "I'm such a douchebag," she said, into her own hands. "I had no idea you were going through all of that. Your family and the mark and living with — I didn't know any of it and I just walked away from you—"

"You didn't know."

"I should have pushed harder."

"Anya." I pulled her in again. "It's okay. We're okay."

She sobbed into my shoulder like a child and I patted her back. This was what I'd been protecting and the protection had almost cost me the thing itself.

After a while she pulled back and wiped her face with both hands and took a shaking breath and looked at me with teary eyes.

"What's happening today?" I said.

She blinked. "The Lantern Descent."

"What's that?"

"Night event. They team us up and we go into the forest with lanterns and find these carved tokens hidden in the trees. It's a whole thing. Very atmospheric. Very—"

"That sounds incredible." I was already looking at the wardrobe.

"No." Anya's voice went flat.

"I'm just saying…"

"You coughed blood two days ago."

"I feel much better—"

"Sloane!"

"I can't just sit here like a vegetable. I'm not weak. I'm not made of glass." I looked at her. "I need to do something. I need to feel like I'm still—" I stopped. "I just need to go."

Anya sighed. That long suffering sigh. 

She had been friends with me long enough to know she'd already lost this argument.

"Kai will go absolutely mad," she said.

I looked at her and felt the smirk arrive before I could stop it.

"Good," I said.