In my mind, I see Will. Think how he has become the mist, the sky, everything, to me. I do more than survive here. I love.
Sudden conviction races through me, almost terrifying in its total certainty. I can’t give him up. He’s the other part of me. He gets what it feels like to be separate from everything and everyone, to reject the path others lay out for you. We’re the same. Two sides to the same coin.
He couldn’t live without being a draki, and I couldn’t live without him.
The water is still and smooth. Polished glass. Not a ripple of wind disturbs the dark surface. Low-rising mist drifts off liquid mountains floating against a purple-bruised sky. An eager breath shudders past my lips. Soon the sun will break.
You can’t even see it. I’m the safest thing you’ll ever find.
The one voice I would hear even in death. A rotting corpse in the ground, I would sit up and take notice.
I wouldn’t have waited this long for you. I would have already showed up at your dorm the minute I decided I wanted you. I wouldn’t leave until I convinced you that you were mine.
I thought you were gone, Pepper. It was bad enough to lose you the first time, but to lose you like that? I couldn’t have dealt with that.
Leaning down, he whispers for my ears alone. “Prove them wrong.
Run from me, Grier Hadley, and I’ll follow. I’ll track you down and find you.
What happened to you, baby?
Never forget that we are more than the genetic code. We can be more than labels applied to us. We can be more than what others whisper behind our backs. Free will exists. We need to choose to be the best we can be and we need to help others do the same. Believe in yourself.
Exactly what he wanted me to do. Exactly what they all thought I would do. Everyone in here. Everyone out there in the world. A world so afraid of carriers, it makes killers out of the innocent.
The world was a merciless place. Hard and cruel. Except when you found someone to trust and love. Life, however fleeting, possessed meaning then.
Hope is all there is. All we have. And love. Or what’s the point of any of it?
We can’t stop loving and caring about others just because it hurts when we lose them.
Life is full of regrets. They’ll cripple you if you let them.
Things happen. Things that you think you’ll never get over. But you do. You move on. It gets better with time. You forget. Forgive. Whatever. Life goes on and you go on with it.
I want you,” he said starkly, the barest quiver in his hoarse voice. “Me and you. Together.” He drew in a deep breath, his broad chest lifting. “But I can’t chase you forever.
Just because we are carriers doesn’t mean that we have to live without conscience. The minute we forget that, the minute it’s every man for himself... then all is lost. We’ve become the monsters they say we are.