Author's Note: Sorry guys, I've been slacking. Finals week has been getting the best of me. Hopefully this maybe makes up for it a little bit? Also, side note: thank you all so much for the reviews. They make my day. :)

Julian ran for the door, frantically shaking the knob. When that failed, he tried to kick down the door the way he had the front entrance, but the door stood solid. He continued to throw himself into the door in a desperate attempt to escape.

"It's no use, Jules. We're trapped. With no weapons I might add." Emma motioned to her belt, which had previously been stocked with various seraph blades and chakrams, but now was completely empty. Say what you wanted about Mara, but he was certainly thorough.

"Well if you're so smart, what do you suggest we do now?"

"Mara is the demon of temptation, not war or destruction. He's tricky; not murderous. Chances are, he wants something." Emma plopped herself down on the bed, resigning herself to the fact that they would simply have to wait for whatever Mara had planned for them. Julian sat down beside her, close enough that the outside of their legs touched and his arm brushed hers when he moved. Emma felt like the room had suddenly gotten very, very small and very stuffy. The fact that she was locked in a bedroom, alone with Julian indefinitely, had finally begun to sink in. Emma scooted herself towards the head of the bed so that there was space of about a foot separating them.

"Really, Em? You can't even stand to touch me?" She could see the sadness in his blue-green eyes, but she could also feel it in the weird way that she'd become accustomed to over the last 24 hours.

"It's not like that, Jules. I just... can't. I'm with Mark now. You know that..."

"Right. You're with Mark." His expression suddenly turned bitter and cold. She knew Mark was his trigger point. "And how is that working out for you? Does he make you happy, Emma?" He practically spit the words at her.

She didn't like where this was going. "I don't want to talk about this right now Julian."

"Well that's too bad. We're stuck here and you can't run away from me this time, so you're going to talk. Now tell me that my brother makes you happy."

Emma didn't know how else to avoid the situation. She figured short answers would be the easiest and most effective. "Yes! He does!" she shouted back at him, hoping to get her point across.

"Oh really? Really, Emma? Is that why you wanted to kiss me last night? Is that why you spent all night in his room last night crying? Because you're blissfully happy?" He got up off the bed, too worked up to remain seated. "When are you going to realize that you can't lie to me anymore?"

He'd been practically shouting at her the entire time, but one sentence seemed louder than the others to Emma. When she spoke, she was quiet. "How did you know I was crying?" though she already had an idea.

He sighed before answering, and brought his volume back down to a conversational level. "I could feel it... I can feel everything you feel." He swallowed hard. "I don't know how, or why, but I can. I could feel how sad you were. This whole time, I thought this thing with you and Mark was real. I thought you wanted him, but last night I felt what you felt. You don't love him, Em. You don't even like him."

Now Emma was the one shouting. "You have no idea what you're talking about Julian! I do love him!" She stood up, no longer wanting to feel talked down to; though she could never really be eye level with him considering their height difference. Even still, standing gave her the illusion of a level playing field, which was good enough for now.

"Not in the way you want to." He knew he was getting under her skin, but he kept pushing; put the last nail in the coffin. "Not the way you love me."

"You're wrong, " the words barely came out; he wouldn't have been able to hear her if he wasn't standing within an arms length of her. She faced him straight on, making sure he could hear every word. "None of it matters anyway. You think that if I'm not in love with Mark that things will be different; that we can be together and pretend that nothing ever happened, that we aren't parabatai and we'll live happily every after but we can't!" She could feel tears welling in her eyes. "You just don't get it, Jules. You don't get it." The tears continued to build, but she refused to cry again. "We don't work, Jules. We never will."

He moved so fast, she didn't have time to react. At first, she thought he was going to hit her, but no matter how angry was, he was still Julian and she knew that he would never, ever hurt her. He never touched her, but he'd come at her in a fury and pinned her against the wall behind them. He breathed heavily with rage. His arms were on either side of her head, and he was leaning down over her, like he was using the wall to restrain himself.

"Say that again, but mean it this time." He leaned in closer to her, making her head feel fuzzy. She hated that he knew exactly how to get to her. "Tell me you don't love me." His blue green eyes sparkled in the dim light. He moved another step in, close enough for her to feel his breath on her lips. She felt freezing could and burning hot at the same time. "Tell me you don't love me, and I'll let you go. Forever." It was like all the air had been sucked out of her lungs.

She knew she should lie; knew she should tell him she never wanted to see him again. It would be best for everyone. But he was too close. She breathed the air that he breathed and she couldn't think straight. She could feel her heart pounding in her chest, feel the blood racing through her veins. Every part of her cried out to close the gap between them. She couldn't take it anymore. She was an addict and he was her drug. The worst part was that he knew it. She grabbed him by the back of his neck, feeling his soft curls between her fingers, and pulled him into her.

His lips crashed against hers, pressing her harder into the wall. She felt like a volcano erupting; like hot lava spilling down and destroying everything in its path. She no longer cared about the consequences; nothing existed in the world but the two of them. She needed him in a visceral kind of way. He alone had the power both to fix her and to break her, and in that moment, she'd hoped to be broken.

His hands moved over her, pulling her even closer into him, and lifted her off the ground. She wrapped her legs around his waist. He ran his hands through her hair and trailed a line of kisses across her jaw line and down her neck, making her gasp for air. He carried her over to the bed, and laid her down, never daring to break the kiss for fear that if they stopped, they'd realize it was all a dream. She ran her hands over his chest feeling the muscles under his shirt, and pushed off the jacket of his gear. The black tee shirt he wore underneath was thin and soft with wear. Julian unzipped the front her jacket, placing kisses across her collarbones as he moved.

The layers between them continued to disappear and Emma knew she couldn't stop it even if she'd wanted to. They were two halves of a whole; magnets being pulled together. She tried to memorize every touch, every movement, and every whispered word. No one had ever, could ever, make her feel the way Julian did when he touched her. She knew nothing but him. They moved together perfectly, matching intensity and building heat every second. She came undone has he lost himself, pulling her body into his, melding them into one.

They clung to each other, both breathing heavily. Julian held her face in his hands kissed her forehead tenderly and whispered, "I love you, Emma. I've loved you my entire life, and I will never stop loving you. Not ever." His voice was low and thick.

She'd already decided she was done lying to him. There was no use now anyway. "You know I love you; more than I've ever loved anything," she whispered, knowing what she had to say next was going to ruin everything. "But it still doesn't change anything. We still can't do this, Julian."

"How can you say that? It changes everything!" He got up, searching the floor for his discarded clothing and throwing Emma's on the bed beside her. When he'd gotten fully dressed, he sat back down on the bed beside her. "We can make it work, Emma. We can do anything together; that's how you make me feel." His optimism broke her heart.

"Jules, I have to tell you something." There was no other way. She'd tried everything else she could think of and she couldn't make him stop loving her. Telling him the truth was the only option left. So she told him everything. She told him about Malcolm's taunting, she told him the horrible truth that Jem and Tessa had revealed to her and she told him what it would mean for them and the kids.

Julian sat in silence beside Emma on the bed, both now fully dressed. He stared out in front of him; looking without really seeing.

"Please say something," she begged. She couldn't take his silence any longer.

"Why didn't you just tell me, Emma?" She had no answer for him. Not one that seemed good enough anyway. She thought he was going to stop there and wait for her to come up with and answer but he went on. "The last week of my life has been absolute hell. I know you think you were doing what's best for me and my family, but it wasn't your decision to make."

"I'm so sorry Jules-"

"Please don't call me that. Not now."

"I'm sorry. I should have told you."

He took a long breath before he looked down and finally spoke. "No. You shouldn't have," he gave a sad sort of laugh. "The worst part is, you were absolutely right not to tell me. Knowing doesn't change how I feel about you. I would gladly give up being a shadow hunter if I could if it meant I got to be with you for the rest of my life." He met her eyes for the first time since she'd told him the truth of the parabatai bond. He leaned down and kissed her lips softly one last time. "I get it now, Em. You did what you had to do. And now we'll spend the rest of our lives regretting a decision we made when we were 12 years old."

Emma laced her fingers through his and rested her head on his shoulder. What could it hurt after what they'd done? Innocent handholding was the least of their worries.

The familiar black mist appeared in the center of the room, swirling then converging to form the demon who called himself Mara. They shot up from the bed, separating and trying not to look as guilty as they felt.

"That took considerably less time than I'd thought," Mara mused, though no one else was in the least bit humored.

"What is this? Some twisted demonic set up? You were just waiting for us to have sex before you tell us what's going on?" Emma was furious. She hated feeling used and manipulated, especially in such an intimate way.

"As the demon of temptation, I do love fornication. But I assure you, that was not goal of this set up; just a happy accident. No, what I was waiting for was for you to reveal the deepest desire of your heart; your greatest temptation, if you will. I find this information usually comes in handy when offering bribes."

Emma and Julian looked at each other, both afraid of what they would hear next.

"So here's the deal," Mara continued. "I want the Black Volume, and you're going to bring it to me."

"Like hell we will," Julian spat.

"Wait, now. You haven't even heard my proposal. You see, you bring me the book, and I will sever your parabatai bond."