Calder frowned at me, but then he shrugged and settled himself more comfortably against the pile of pillows at the head of the bed, as if he didn't give a fuck one way or the other what I did, or whether I stayed near him.
"The bond tied us together and wouldn't let you die," he said finally. "I pulled everything through it. Everything you had to give. I drained you. Until I had enough to get out of that fucking collar."
His hand moved, an aborted gesture perhaps indicating how much of everything he'd taken. "But you didn't die."
Cold sickness gripped my stomach, tightening my chest too. Apparently, it would've killed him to sound even marginally happy about that. "Sorry to disappoint you," I managed through clenched teeth.
He stared at me levelly, but his body went tense. "If I'd left you there, the bond wouldn't have been strong enough, with the distance between us. I felt it fading whenever we weren't touching. I could've abandoned you to die on the floor alone."
