He was coming for me, and I sprinted into the forest while holding my gun between my fingers. Tree branches brushed past me as I jumped over roots and scurried through bushes. I was panting as I raced away from Finn, knowing that he was back there behind me.

He was fast, so there was no way that I could outrun him. He'd already proven to me once before that he could overtake me on any trail. I'd lost my 'soul' betting on my speed, and I'd been heavily defeated.

Sliding down a muddy hill, I turned, a certain tree catching my eye. It seemed to glow a soft gold as I hurried towards it. Flowers in full bloom covered the branches, glimmering in the sunlight that flickered through the foliage over head. I couldn't help but pause, admiring all the flowers that looked magical to the eye. The leaves were long, stretching until they were nearly touching the ground like nature's sweeping curtain.

I could hide under the canopy until the game ended.

Supporting myself on a branch, I wiggled myself up high into the tree, bracing my body against the tree trunk with my gun in hand. Breathing deeply, I rested my head back against the wood, closing my eyes as I sucked in air. I couldn't hear him or his footsteps from where I sat, panting softly as I felt heat on my face. That was the fastest I'd run in my life.

"Stratton!" Finn's yell made my eyes fly open as I heard him pacing around the area. "Come out now! I know you're here! You can't hide from me."

I didn't answer as he continued to march about, hissing under his breath before he drew closer and closer to the tree. Clenching the gun in my hands, I turned it down towards the base of the tree, imagining with a smug smile hitting him straight in the chest with multiple paintballs. Multiple.

"You are being a coward! A coward! A little child!" He snapped, brushing back the long leaves of the tree below me.

At his words, a new type of anger took over my body after this entire week. So much anger. How had I been the coward? I was not a coward! He had been the one acting like the little boy throwing a temper tantrum, giving me the silent treatment and yelling at me all day long. He... He...! And I let that anger loose.

"I am not a coward!" I yelled.

He'd just walked through the trees and I open fired my paintball gun at his chest as though my life depended on it. Holding down the trigger, I sprayed him with paint, leaping down from the tree to only get closer.

"I am no coward, Finnigan Shay!" I screamed at him. "You are a coward! You are a child! You are!"

"Kate, stop it!" He was yelling back at me as he used his wings to shield himself from the paintballs. I paused, leaning down slowly to grab the gun he'd dropped on the forest floor. He peeled his wings back with caution, and just when he'd opened them wide enough, a paintball hit him square in the stomach.

He doubled over with a curse, and I hit him one last time in the shoulder, feeling now very satisfied as he shot me a vicious glare. I narrowed my eyes at him, "you deserved it, you ass."

In the same second with my vengeful anger boiling to a peak, something else was laced with my fury: my own acute pain. My eyes were watering before I could help myself. I hadn't realized until now that my sadness was much stronger than my rage. And looking down at Finn, gripping where I'd shot him, all I could feel was the most sour dose of shame.

I dropped the gun, blinking my eyes. Finn stood up straight again, his entire chest covered in splattered paint. That had to have hurt, and I felt my fingers begin to quiver. What the hell had I just done?

The tears started to spill from my eyes as I brushed them away with my fingers before daring to look up at Finn, the air between us now frozen. "I'm... I'm sorry." I managed to stutter, a shudder running through my spine. I'd ruined everything, any chance of being with him at all.

His eyes were dark as he clenched his jaw, studying me before he spoke. "Please don't cry, Kate. Please don't."

"Why? Am I not allowed to be upset?" I felt more tears begin to run down my cheeks and I let them be. "After what I just did to you? Oh my Fates, what did I just do? I'm such an idiot!"

Resting a hand on my forehead, I closed my eyes while trying to take a deep breath, but it was painful as fire burned my lungs with each inhale. I was close to having a meltdown right here, each breath coming out more strangled than the next.

I heard Finn's footsteps as they stopped in front of me, his voice now directly in front of me. Opening my eyes, I looked up to him. "Hey, of course you can be upset. I just hate the fact that it's because of me. I never want to make you cry, Kate."

I started to pace as my worry swelled, jabbing a finger in his direction, "Really? You just want me to be as happy as I can be? Well you've been doing a shitty job this entire week! You've made me miserable! On purpose! I've been crying all fucking week long because of you, and now you want to act all sweet by saying you hate to see me sad. I call bullshit! Bullshit!"

Finn's kind eyes darkened instantly. "Let's take a few more steps back to our latest fight where you explained how much you hated me. You think I didn't deserve to be upset because of that either? You said you despised me the most out of every person in Gabrian and that you were wrong to believe I was ever a decent person!" Finn's face was hard, his anger reviving with each second. "You got rid of me, Kate. So I just returned the favor because you set the terms. If you think so lowly of me..."

"I don't!" I coughed. My lungs and skin were on fire as I tried to concentrate on anything except his lips. "I don't think of you like that at all! I was just so angry and hurt. The first fight set this rolling, and I was upset that you wouldn't... let me help you when you were obviously hurt, Finn. Don't even try to deny it! You pushed me away and it stung terribly. I was angry at you so I said things that I really wish I hadn't, and then we fought more, only making me more upset. You blamed me for the Mimic and said I was untrustworthy. I snapped because I was just so hurt. I didn't mean any of it."

"Please, you don't just say things like that if you don't believe them." He retorted. "If you don't want to be my... anything, then just don't. It's that simple. I won't speak to you and you don't have to speak to me. I can get someone else to be your guardian permanently if you don't ever want to see me."

I narrowed my eyes, taking a step closer. "Is that what you want then? Just to never speak to me again? Just to see me shut the hell up? To get away from me because I'm too difficult to deal with?"

"No, it isn't." Finn breathed. I paused, looking up into his eyes. His expression looked open, cracked apart now so that I could get a glimpse of a true pain inside him that made my heart constrict. "I just don't know if you feel the same, Kate, so I won't force you. Hell, I'm never going to persuade someone to tolerate me, even if it is you."

I took a deep breath as I stepped even closer, looking up into his eyes. His nostrils flared, his fingers twitching forward as though he were about to take my hand in his.

"I don't think all those bad things about you, Finn. You just really hurt me, so I guess I was just so upset that I said as many things as I could to hurt you back. It worked too it looks like or else we wouldn't be... like this." I wiped the fallen tears from my cheeks, "I don't want to be friends with you."

His face fell as he stared at me, blinking as his eyes only became more glossy. "You... don't?" It was the first time I'd ever heard him stutter.

It is time.

"I care about you too much to just be friends, Finn." I confessed, feeling my heart beat so fast inside my chest as a wave of nausea raked my body. The closeness between us only made color rise on my cheeks, but it was a closeness that felt too wide as well. "That's why when you wouldn't open up to me, it was brutal because you didn't let me in, and I also realized that you had no reason to. I'm sorry that I was vicious and mean but you have to know it's because I really, deeply care about you. I like you, a lot. But I don't like the Commander because he isn't the Finn the I know and the one that I care about the most."

Finn stood still like a statue, staring at me with wide eyes without a word. My stomach dropped like a broken elevator; he didn't feel the same way.

He finally spoke, "you like me? Even after all of this and how much of an ass I've been?"

"I didn't like that, but I like the Finn I know. I really like the slippers Finn, the Finn who makes me laugh, the Finn who liked my sister and my thief family despite their occupation. The blanket and earmuffs Finn too." I looked away from his blue eyes, "if you don't feel the same way, I can just forget it..."

Finn's warm fingers reached up to touch my cheeks, holding my face in his hands as we stood so close that I could practically feel his body heat. The electricity made goosebumps rise on my skin and his blue eyes bore into mine as he shook his head, "don't forget it."

I swallowed, searching the expression on his face as a new happiness filled up in my chest. A smile rose on my lips as I whispered, "really? You feel the same way?"

"Definitely. From the very beginning." His thumb traced my cheekbone down towards my jawline, making a shiver run up my spine as I was mesmerized by his handsome features. This man liked me?

"But, you were just so angry..."

"I hurt you, so you retaliated, and I guess I got caught up with the same idea. I'm so sorry. I'm so unbelievably sorry because this right now is what I really wanted."

"I'm sorry too. You have no idea how sorry I am." My fingers wrapped around his wrists, heat running through my body as his fingers took a more possessive hold of my face.

Finn stepped even closer to me as I lost my train of thought.  Everything was bright and blurry, except for Finn whose features were sharp and in focus. I could pick out every freckle on his nose, the dimples in his cheeks when he smiled, every speckle of blue in his eyes, and the pale pink tint of his lips. I wondered if they are soft.

"I forgive you, Kate, and I hope you can forgive me for being a complete asshole." He breathed, my name rolling off his tongue deep and husky. "You're what I always needed."

My stomach filled with butterflies as I looked up into the light of his eyes, his closeness blessing me with his signature smell of fresh rain and chocolate that mixed together in an intoxicating effluvium. I felt the need to close my eyes just to enjoy the way his voice sounded.

"Kiss me." I said, my voice soft. "Kiss me please."

His eyes darkened, gazing at me now with hunger. It must have always been there, first as a predator's craving and now a glow of need. It didn't matter to me which after his lips came down on me with such power that I gasped in surprise, wrapping my arms tight around his neck to keep myself from falling backwards.

His strong arms snaked around my waist, dropping both our guns as he kissed me with such raw intensity that I forgot what my name was. I'd never been kissed this way before, not even by Leighton. It was powerful, vulnerable, and driven by desire. My craving for his lips pooled in my abdomen as I matched his fervor with my own kisses, digging my fingers roughly into his hair.

We broke apart only to stare, equally surprised as we held each other. His eyes were wild as he gripped me tight against his body. I gazed up at him, our eyes watching one another as Finn gave me a cheeky smile.

Wrapping my arms tighter around his neck, I sealed my lips against his, Finn pushing me backwards against the tree trunk until there was no space between our bodies.

He teased my bottom lip in a way that made me push my hips forward, causing animalistic sounds to rise from his throat. He'd begged for entrance by gliding his tongue against my lips before I opened for him, now both of our tongues dancing together. His dominated mine as I matched his rhythm, my entire brain nonexistent as all I could do was kiss him.

I let my hands glide along his back, around his wings and down the sides of his stomach. I traced the edges of his abdomen and explored the pack of muscle I had been dying to feel yet never touched. His own hands ran along the curves of my hips to trace fire along my skin before his soft fingertips moved upward to my cheeks. We pulled apart, my lips tingling.

"You did... good." I stuttered, feeling my cheeks burn with embarrassment at my loss for words. It only made him smile even wider as he looked particularly pleased with himself.

"So did you." His kind grin made my cheeks only turn a deep shade of pink. "The game ended. They'll be looking for us if we don't hurry."

"It's over?" I asked and he nodded.

"The whistle blew."

"Oh... I didn't hear it." I looked down at my feet before back to Finn as he picked up both our paintball guns with a chuckle.

"Let's go, Kate. Or I'll have to shoot you with one of these."

"You wouldn't. I've hit you enough already for it to be obvious who won." I smirked at him, "beaten by the Prodigy, Sir. You never stood a chance."

"I'm not too unhappy about it." His fingers laced in mine as he kissed the back of my hand. "I got what I wanted."