She shakes her head, her lips pressed tight. It’s the expression she gets when her mind is spinning, and I find myself remembering snippets of other memories, of when we were escaping the Republic. “No,” she says. “But AIS is trying to track him based on the general area where you were.”

“They were underground,” I reply.

“Is that where Hann was stationed in a hideout?” June asks.

“A hideout is an understatement. It looked like an estate buried under the city. I don’t know how many other spaces he might have like that. But he has a construction site there. A machine.”

“Do you remember anything about the route they took you through?”

I shake my head. “They had me blindfolded the entire time. The area beneath the Undercity is a maze of old tunnels and abandoned elevator shafts. It’ll take weeks to get down there and do a proper sweep. We need to find a different way.”

Had Eden heard that I’d gotten out? Does he know that Hann had intentionally let me go? Did he have anything to do with that—had he made a bargain with the man?

Immediately, I start trying to get out of bed. That’s when all the soreness of my captivity hits me. I wince, looking down at my bandaged wrists.

June gets up in the darkness and pushes me down. “You’re not going anywhere,” she says sternly. “Strict orders from the doctor. Everything you need to do, you can do from the comfort of your bed, okay? Your director said she’d contact you in the morning, and we can go from there.”

“What about you?” I ask. “The Elector? He—”

“—is well aware of the situation,” she says. “Anden sends his regards and concerns.” June leans closer to me. In the night, her eyes shine like dark marbles. “This is big news in your inner circles, apparently. The President wants to be kept updated on what happens with Hann.”

I slump back on my pillows and clench my teeth in frustration. I made a promise to myself to keep Eden from harm, but I’ve failed to do it again. Nightmares from the Republic come rushing back now to haunt me—Eden, being taken away for experimentation; Eden, blinded and weak; Eden, left to die during the war with the Colonies.

Now he is in Hann’s grasp, and I have no goddy clue what the man wants with him.

June puts a hand on my shoulder. Her warmth is the only thing that breaks through my whirlwind of thoughts. “We’re going to find him,” she tells me. “He’s a smart boy, and he’s going to take care of himself. Your job is to be sure you’re strong enough by morning to tackle all this. There’s nothing you can do before that. Understand?”

I look back at her. “How long have I been out?”

“A day,” she admits.

“And you stayed here?” I ask softly. “The entire time I was out?”

A flash of fear glints in her eyes, then fades. She looks away and out my window. “I was afraid,” she murmurs, “to lose you.”

And again, I find myself thinking about what she’d said during her first night here, when we shared a kiss. When I realized how much her life had moved forward and settled into place.

She looks back at me. “What’s on your mind?” she asks me. “I can always tell by the weight in your eyes.”

“I’m thinking about how I’m the catalyst for chaos in your life,” I answer. “And how sorry I am for it.”

“Don’t be,” she replies. June sighs and looks down. “We’ve always been each other’s catalysts, haven’t we?” she says. “I don’t think we would have met if we weren’t. And sometimes I find myself pulling away because I want to end that cycle for you, as if that might somehow solve it all.”

I think of the way June pulls herself away from our intimate moments. It’s the exact same thing I do. I lean closer to her, letting my hand brush hers. For an instant, I think that she might pull away … but her hand lingers in place, and she stays where she is.

I know that fear she mentioned. That terror of not knowing what might happen to us next, of what could go wrong if we opened our hearts completely to each other. I’d bled the last time I allowed myself to love her, and she had bled the same.

But still, I find myself tightening my grip around her hand, then pulling her closer. She turns to face me in the night.

The fear still grips me, and the words I want to say still stutter to a halt in my throat. But this time, all I can think about is what it was like to live without her for a decade.

When I open my mouth this time, the words finally spill out.

“I don’t deserve having you in my life,” I tell her quietly. “There may always be pain and grief that follows me, even here, in all this Ross City luxury. Maybe that’s the way it goes in life. You don’t deserve to share that pain.” I take a deep breath, trying to quell my fear, the rising tide of all the darkness that still haunts me from the Republic. “But I think you do deserve to know the truth of how I feel. Because even if we can’t be together in the end, I would like you to know.”

June’s eyes are glossy against the blue-gray light filtering in from the windows. “And what is that?” she whispers.

“That I love you,” I whisper. “That I’ve been in love with you for years, even when we were separated. Especially then. I’ve lived with you in my life, and I’ve lived without you. No matter what kind of fear I feel in the possibility of us being together, the fear of being away from you is something I don’t think I can bear.” I look down, shy to meet her gaze now. “I have nightmares of losing you again. All the time.”

There. My heart is ripped open and exposed before her. All the uncertainty that had plagued me before now roars in my mind as I wait for her response.

Maybe this was all a mistake. I shouldn’t have told her this. It’s too soon.

Then June draws nearer. “I never had a chance to tell you, before you and Eden left for Antarctica, that I love you too. So fiercely that it frightens me.” Her voice trembles.

I love you. I love you. I have never heard these words from June before, and now they fill my heart to bursting, making me whole in a way I never knew I could be.

She smiles a little, and now I see that her eyes are moist. “Even if we don’t know where we’ll go in the future, perhaps our lives were always meant to collide again and again. Perhaps we are forever meant to be each other’s catalysts.”

Forever. It’s a word I’ve never dared to use with June. Maybe there is a chance for a forever in our lives.

“I’ve looked over my shoulder for a decade,” I whisper, “wondering what it was that was missing in my life. Turns out, all this time, it was you.”

Then I lean close, and this time, I kiss her.

She nearly collapses into my embrace. Her lips are so soft and familiar against mine, everything that I’ve missed in the years we’ve been apart. Our conversations together may be awkward and polite, and our presence around each other stilted and distant … but this, this feels right in every possible way.

She belongs here, in my arms, and I belong here, giving my whole heart to her.

A deep hunger rises in me. This time, I don’t waste a second. I wrap my arms tightly around her and push her back against the bed. My skin prickles in pleasure wherever she runs her fingers. She runs her hands through my hair and sighs contentedly against me. Her waist, her slender neck, the curve of her hips … I shiver at the warmth of her. Everything about her is like a fever dream. I want to preserve this in time for us. I want a million more of these moments.