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“Shh. Don’t speak,” he whispers.

My breath deepens, and he stops and puts me down. I don’t know how long he carried me, but my legs are still weak. I open my eyes and find him. His expression is tight, his eyebrows narrow as he keeps his arms around me.

His effect on me is debilitating. Just being in his presence takes away my ability to function properly, to think straight, to take a simple breath of air. I finally feel the courage to say something. “I’m not strong, Micah. I can’t deal with this.” I dart my eyes away from him, feeling like I might topple over. I hate him seeing me like this.

Weak. Pathetic.

I can’t handle anything without breaking down.

“You’re not weak, London,” he tells me, pulling my hair behind my ear. “I think you’re the strongest girl I’ve ever met. Maison and I are just really fucked up.”

I squeeze my eyes shut right before we cross the tree line to camp. Maison’s back from trapping and seeing him sitting there, looking at me, his eyes tight with concern as I probably look like a heaping mess once again. I don’t know how to face him right now, but it’s Nigel’s sunken face that sickens me over everything else. His ripped argyle shirt sticking out from under his hood, and his stupid fucking bow tie he still likes to wear for whatever reason.

This is all his fault.

“Micah,” I barely choke out a whisper as all eyes shift to us, “you can’t trust Nigel.”

“What did you do to her?” Maison asks as Micah carries me back to the group. I can barely walk, feeling so weak and utterly exhausted, my mind shattered.

Everyone’s sitting around the fire, their faces grim, hoods pulled up to their eyes. Sitting. Waiting. Surviving.

Micah looks at his brother, who bolts over to us. “I didn’t do anything to her. She just fainted.” Micah places me in Maison’s arms, who picks me up, acting as if I’m made of glass.

Maison refrains from asking why we’re together. The tension between them is thick, thicker than I’ve ever seen it, but at least I understand it better.

Maison thinks Micah killed Olivia, and Micah only ever protected Maison. Yet Micah’s DNA was all over her, inside her, when she died. Micah’s not telling me everything, but he told me enough…

He has feelings for me. Feelings that are wholly reciprocated.

“Come on, baby,” Maison whispers, “let’s get you to bed.”

I fall into him and walk away from Micah. I need rest. The overwhelming emotional and physical response I just had over both of them almost killed me.

Maison takes me to our little home—our shelter, the one I’ve spent countless hours with him in, getting to know him, falling in love with him, and now it feels like I’m in the arms of a stranger. I don’t know Maison Matei at all.

He crawls in next to me, his hands comfort me, his body warm as always. I lie on him and let him rub my shoulder, all the tension releasing, but the thought of him drugging Olivia makes me tense and bile rises into my throat.

He knows I’m not okay, he senses it. His fingers are tentative and his breath falters. I don’t want to talk about it, but I have to. I have questions. “Don’t be mad at him. It wasn’t his fault,” I finally say.

His finger’s pause and tighten around my collarbone. “Why were you with him, baby?”

I tense up. “I followed him to the creek… he didn’t know I was there.”

I’m not going to lie to him—too many lies are being told on this island. His lips graze my cheek, and he pushes himself around so he is over top of me, leaning both arms just over me. My heart’s pounding now, just like it did in the beginning, when I was unsure of him, unsure if he was capable of hurting someone. I stare up at the roof of the shelter, every branch and piece of moss he made for me—for us. He traces his finger along my collarbone. “You’re my girlfriend, baby, or have you forgotten that?”

My lips curl, and I push his fingers off me. “I haven’t forgotten, but have you? You just shared me with him, Maison. If you were so concerned about Micah, then why did you do that? Clearly, it bugs you.”

He tilts his head and his pupils flare as he hovers over me. “I shared you with him because I love him, and I knew he needed you that night. It was wrong… I know it was wrong, but I wanted him to experience you the way I have,” he slides his hand up my back, “and you didn’t seem to mind too much, baby.”

They share everything.

Heat flushes through my body. “Is that why you shared him with Olivia? Because he needed her?”

That has him at a loss for words.

I watch him carefully, so carefully. Every facial expression, every twitch, I watch him re-live every decision.

His face drops, and any anger I have simply drops with it. He looks broken, tired, like we all are. He rolls off me and places his arm around me. I dip my head into the crook of his arm and close my eyes as tiny sobs release from my throat.