Midnight Star (Star Touched: Fae Bound #3)

35. Sapphire

Sapphire

I shove him, hard, wind whipping around us.

But he barely moves, instead managing to catch my wrist before I can put more distance between us. The way he holds me—gentle, controlled, with just enough pressure to keep me close—makes me ache with the need for him to say those three words to me.

“You’re shaking,” he says instead, his lips only inches from mine now. “Are you sure you don’t want this? Or is this just some fun, new foreplay? Because if it is, I’m into it.”

He waits for my reply, and I can feel how much he still wants me. The way his body reacts to mine, the way his breathing slows, the desire in his gaze.

But there’s nothing underneath it. No emotion. No love .

So, I wrench my wrist free, my breaths coming too fast. “No. I don’t want this,” I say fiercely. “I want you. The real you.”

His smirk falters—just for a second—but it’s enough to make my heart jump.

Then, it’s back, colder than before.

“The real me?” he repeats, his tone light, but his words cutting. “This is the real me. I want you, Sapphire. And given how familiar we already are with each other, I know you want me, too.”

“You want me,” I repeat, the words sounding hollow. “But you don’t love me.”

“No,” he says simply, and he doesn’t need to think about it, which makes it even worse. “But this is better. It’s simple. No complications. Just you, me, and…” He trails off, his eyes sweeping down my body in the way that makes my cheeks flush every time. “Opportunity.”

I stare him down, anger rushing through me, willing him to take it back.

Wind whips around us. Water droplets from the melted ice shards rise, suspended like tears in the air. My magic is a storm raging inside me, and I want him to know what that sort of turmoil feels like, too.

I want him to feel.

He just glances around and chuckles, as if I’m performing a magic trick. “Showing off now, are we?” he asks in amusement. “Trying to make me love you by reminding me how powerful you are?”

Remind him.

Yes.

That’s what he told me to do.

So, that’s what I’m going to do.

“The frozen lake. During the trial,” I say quickly, the words tearing from my chest as I claw for every detail he told me. “That was the moment you fell in love with me. You saw me disappear under the ice and realized you wouldn’t be able to live with yourself if I didn’t come back up. Then you used the whisper stone to teach me how to breathe underwater and help me get the key. And when I came back up and you saw me again—and you knew I was safe—that was when it all changed.”

He stills and sizes me up, taking in every inch of me, as if he’s considering each word I said.

I hold my breath, searching for a flicker of recognition in his eyes.

“If I recall the conversation correctly, I said that moment at the lake was when I started falling in love with you,” he finally says, and I lean forward, waiting for him to remember. Really, truly remember. “You see, I know I said all those things to you. The dryad didn’t take my memories. But it was just a game, Sapphire. All those words, all those nights together, all of it culminating with seeing you break right now… it’s be en a game since the beginning. And guess what? I won.”

“No.” I step back, shaking my head. “You don’t mean that.”

“I absolutely do.”

He doesn’t budge. Doesn’t care.

“Maybe you believe it right now,” I say, scrambling for an explanation. “But you told me you loved me. And we both know you can’t lie. Which means what you said was true.”

“I’ve been dancing around truths for my entire life, Sapphire. Long enough to know that while I can’t lie, I can omit. Which is what I did every time I said I loved you,” he says, and ice-cold dread rushes through my veins at the cruelty that passes over his once familiar eyes. “After all, I never specified which part of you I loved. I can love the power I have over you. I can love the challenge, the game, and the fire in your eyes when you think you can change me. I can love the way you bend for me, even when you fight. I can love the way you crave me—the way you throw yourself at me and shatter into pieces when I touch you. But loving you? That was your mistake—not mine.”

The water droplets floating around us splash to the ground.

The air stills.

Pain twists into anger .

Anger turns to shock.

Shock gives way to numbness. Cold, unyielding numbness. Worse than when the ice was about to kill me before Riven stripped me of my free will.

I knew he was guarded, devious, and calculating.

But I didn’t realize he was this cruel.

No. None of this is true. This isn’t him, I remind myself, but as much as I try to convince myself, it doesn’t make it any less painful.

Then, he does something worse than standing here saying these horrible things to me.

He shakes his head, turns away, and checks on the progress of the sap. As if he’s growing bored with me. As if he’s wasting his precious time by talking about this with me.

But after what he said to me, he’s not the one who just wasted his time.

I am.

After all, actions are what’s really important here. He’s not going to remember his love for me simply because of my words.

Which he stops me from saying, anyway, because he turns back around to face me—his eyes just as cold—to get in a few final blows.

“Now, if you’ve decided you aren’t ready to accept the truth of what this really is and have some fun together, might I suggest focusing on why we’re here in the first place?” he says, and with that, whatever hope I had inside me snaps.

I don’t care that my words aren’t going to trigger his memories.

I have to say them, anyway.

“When you made that deal, I knew you’d probably forget that you loved me,” I tell him, still praying that none of this is real, even though I know it is. “But I didn’t realize you’d hate me.”

“Hate?” He laughs, a hollow sound that chills me to the bone. “This isn’t hate. If I hated you, then you wouldn’t be able to stand right now, let alone speak. You should be thanking the queen herself that I don’t hate you. As it is, I’m tired of this conversation, and the sap is almost ready. So, let’s make like a tree, and get out of here. Where did you say the duskberry is?”

“I didn’t,” I tell him, so jarred by his sudden shift in attitude that I can’t gather my thoughts, let alone my feelings.

“Did your star goddess tell you?” he presses.

“She did.”

I can barely bring myself to say more than two words to him at a time. If I do, he’ll probably use it as an opportunity to say more cruel, horrible, heart wrenching things. He’ll use them to crush my soul.

And then, miraculously, his expression softens.

“Look, Sapphire,” he starts, running his fingers through his hair in the way he always does when he’s getting exasperated. “I’m sure this is hard for you. But we made that deal with the dryad because this potion is bigger than you or me. So, take a few seconds. Center yourself. Then we can focus on what’s actually important.”

When he says it like that, reality hits me like a ton of bricks.

He doesn’t love me.

He doesn’t hate me.

He just thinks my feelings… aren’t important.

And, as I watch him now, I know this isn’t the moment I’m going to get through to him. And I will get through to him. It’s just going to take longer than a few minutes. I can’t give up after a few minutes.

Our love deserves better than that. It deserves every minute until the end of my possibly immortal life.

Plus, he’s been a jerk to me many, many times. I got through it then, and I’ll get through it now.

But he’s right that our end goals are important. Saving Zoey, restoring his father’s sanity, and making sure the Night Court, the Blood Coven, and Ambrogio don’t turn into Revenants and destroy the world.

As we work together to make that all happen, he’s going to fall back in love with me. He’s going to see and feel everything that made him fall in love with me the first time around. All of those feelings will flood back to him, and he’ll be thanking me for not giving up on him. Which I really hope is how this will play out, because when this is done, he’s going to owe me a lot more than one single favor.

I have to believe it’ll happen.

If I don’t, I’m afraid my entire heart will shatter, and that I’ll lose the pieces forever.