Behind me the door buzzes, and already the little bit of freedom I have is being taken away. I know now that he allowed my retreat to simply relocate our conversation to a place with privacy. I face him, and while adrenaline radiates through me, the control I so want radiates from him. “I wasn’t looking for a way to run, if that’s what you think,” I declare, backing up as he stalks toward me, tall and broad, his longish hair framing his handsome features set in hard lines.

I hit the wall as he stops a breath away from touching me, and it terrifies me how much I want him to touch me, how much I want a hero, and anger surges in me at my weakness. “If you were afraid I was running again,” I lash out, “there was nowhere to go.”

“Were you thinking about it?”

“You didn’t give me time to think about anything.”

“You didn’t say you needed to think. You said you wanted to talk to me. So let’s go inside where it’s warm and talk.”

“I like the cold,” I declare, darting around him into the open space, and only when I have several safe steps between us do I turn to face him, as he does me.

“You didn’t like it last night.”

“I like it now,” I say. “I like it a lot. It’s real, when not much else is.”

His eyes glint. “Why do I know that’s about me?”

“It’s about everything, including you. It’s about you feeling familiar when you say you aren’t. And me believing I’m Ella, but I’m not in the passport system. Now I’m Rae Eleana. She’s not real, and yet she’s me.”

“A name doesn’t define you. We talked about this.”

“A name is a part of the identity I’ve lost. Someone just snapped their fingers and I was gone.” Laughter bubbles from my lips, bitter, almost hysterical. “It might have been me. How brutal is that, when I’d do anything to have me back right now? So you see, I need the cold. The rain. I need things that are definable. That are real.”

His eyes flash, and before I even know he’s moved, I’m crushed against his chest, the fingers of one hand tangled in my hair, the other molding me to him. “How’s this for real?” he murmurs, his mouth claiming mine, his tongue sweeping past my teeth in a deep stroke I feel in every part of me. A moan escapes my lips, and I both hate him and crave him in this moment. He knows it, too, deepening the kiss, his tongue doing a slow, seductive dance against mine. I want to fight. I want to push him away, and the more I can’t, the angrier I become. He just keeps making me angry. Keeps caressing me with his seductive tongue, keeps making me want more. And when he does tear his mouth from mine, he softly declares, “That was real. I’m real. And you are not alone.”

“Until I am again. Matteo just set you free.”

He leans me against a beam, one hand pressed above my head, his leg nestled between mine. “And you think that means what?”

“I . . . You’re out.”

“I was in from the minute you opened your eyes and looked at me in that alleyway; I just didn’t know it yet. So if you think I’m done with you, sweetheart, you’re wrong. I’ve barely gotten started.”

Suddenly he is my hero, and that means my instincts to trust him were right. It also means I have to trust my instincts about that box and that gun. “I need to go underground. If you can lend me money—”

“No. You stay with me. I’ll protect you.”

“And who’s going to protect you?”

“Sweetheart, I have nine lives and I’ve only used four.” He links our fingers. “Come with me.” He starts to move.

I dig in my heels. “No. No. Stop. Please.”

He turns back into me, his hands rubbing my arms. “You’re shivering. Let’s go inside.”

He’s right. I am. “Not because I’m cold. I can’t stay here. There are things—”

“You can and you are. End of subject.”

The command in his voice hits a nerve in some deep, dark part of me, and I do not like it. “Are you protecting me or keeping me prisoner?”

His eyes narrow, yellow flecks of heat in their depths. “I’m not the man who hurt you. I’m the one who’s fucking keeping you alive, and I can’t do that if you aren’t with me.”

“You don’t understand.”

“ ‘Please don’t be him,’ ” he says, quoting me again. “I understand fine. You can’t get past the fear that I’m him. I’m not him.”

I grab handfuls of his shirt. “I know you’re not him,” I hiss. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you and you wouldn’t listen.” I drop his shirt and try to scoot away again.

He’s still not having it, his hands bracing my hips, his legs shackling mine. “Who is he?” he says, his tone hard.

“I still don’t remember.”

“Yet you suddenly know he’s not me.”

“I never thought he was you.”

“Bullshit.”

Adrenaline is buzzing through me at this point, and I don’t even try to contain my anger. “Bullshit yourself, Kayden. You still aren’t listening. You’re attacking. So hear this. I have to leave. In case you still don’t get it: I have to leave.”

His fingers close around my wrists, grounding me in a way I don’t understand, his tone a soft caress that is still stronger than I feel, as he promises, “I’m listening now. Talk to me.”

His voice is silk, his eyes warm, and the contrast in this gentleness and the wolf that would kill for me undoes me. My eyes and chest start to burn and I lower my head to his shoulder. He releases my hands, his settling on my hair. “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”

“It’s bad,” I whisper.

His hands come down on my head and he lifts it, forcing my eyes to his. “I’m no angel, just like I’m no hero.”

“And yet you’re trying to save me.”

“No ‘trying’ about it. I am going to save you.” His thumb strokes my cheek. “Tell me.”

“I think I killed him. At the very least, I tried.”

To his credit, he doesn’t so much as blink. “The man in your flashback?”

“Yes. The man in my flashback. I had a gun, Kayden.”

He takes my hand, his bigger one swallowing mine, and starts for the door, and this time I don’t try to stop him. My head is spinning, and not from the pain. Because somehow speaking my fears makes them more real. I might have killed someone and I can’t breathe with the idea. I try and I just can’t get air into my lungs, let alone process where Kayden is leading me. I blink and we are inside a small, round room wrapped in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, and I don’t even remember how we got here.

Kayden sits me in one of two gray leather chairs, kneeling in front of me. “Easy, sweetheart,” he says, his hands settling on my legs. “We’ll deal with this. Tell me what you know.”

I finally draw in a deep breath and let it trickle from my lips. “I was in his room and I knew he was about to return. I was pacing and giving myself a pep talk that ended in me walking to a dresser and opening a drawer. Inside was a gun.”

“And then what?”

“I meant to hurt him.” My words are confident, strong—the way I wish I were about everything, not just murder.

“But you don’t know that you did?”

“Yes. No. Yes.”

He arches a brow. “Okay. Let’s move to something cut and dry. Do you remember what he looks like?”

“No.”

“What did you do with the gun?”

“I just remember looking at it and knowing I had to use it.”

“Nothing else? You’re sure?”

“That’s it.”

“We don’t know that you even tried to kill him.”

“I know what I feel.”

“You also keep saying I’m familiar beyond what is the truth.”

“No one else I’ve met feels like you do to me.”

“Case in point,” he says. “Your mind is sending you messages you aren’t always reading right. You can’t jump to conclusions until you fully recover your memory.”

“What if it was Niccolo?”

“He’s alive.”

“What if I tried to kill him?”

He reaches in his pocket and pulls out his phone, punches a couple of buttons, and then offers it to me. “Niccolo.”

I close my hand over his and take the phone, staring down at the image of a man in his thirties with curly dark hair and dark eyes, dressed in an expensive fitted suit. And I wait for the familiar feeling to follow, but it doesn’t.