Author's Note: Alright if you are Will and Tessa fan, this chapter is definitely for your guys. Sorry for Jem and Tessa fans out there! I hope you enjoy it! And thank you all for comments - please keep them coming I love to hear what you guys have to say! Also thanks to BlondeHairBlueEyes14 for betaing once again!

Disclaimer: I do not own the Infernal Devices - I only own Rachel and the new characters that come to play!

The London fog rolled in, a maze for those who entering the city. Tessa was pacing in her room after her conversation with Charlotte, she was fuming mad that Mr. Lightwood was pressing Consol Wayland into pushing Charlotte and Henry from their positions in the Institute. She felt the skirt of her dress brushing up against her legs as she continued to pace. Her head whipped at the sound of a knocking on her door.

"Come in." She said, trying to keep her voice steady. Her gray eyes widened slightly when Will entered the room. "I have taken that Charlotte told you the news?"

His blue eyes were furious with rage, his hands tightened into fists by his side. His lips tighten. "Yes," He moved his fingers like he was trying to relax. "But, I came to your room to make sure how you were doing?"

Her breathing hitched inside of her, she didn't want to let her feelings for Will to suddenly show. Turning around she faced the window, her fingers fiddle with her skirt.

"I'm fine."

"Tessa, I'm sorry." She heard him whisper and the floor board creaked.

Shifting her body, she saw that Will had taken a step closer. His gaze locked on the floor. She opened her mouth to speak, and then quickly shut it when Will began to mumble under his breath. She never had since side of him before. Furious one minute, and now lost the next.

"For everything, you deserve so much Tessa, that you have no idea." He still wasn't facing her. "I can see it in his eyes, I'm surprise I haven't seen it earlier." His voice so low and hallow.

She was so confused. Taking a hesitant step she moved close to him. "Will, what are you talking about? Who's him? Will?"

When she called his name the second time, he looked up, his dark blue eyes stared at her. Her breathing caught inside her, emotions, so many flashed in them. After what felt like eternally, he broke the contact and glanced at her bed cover.

"I love you….." He whispered. "Tessa, I have loved since the moment I've meet you."

Tessa's fingers laced with the fabric of her dress skirt. Her eyes flared. "Back on the roof top, I thought that you couldn't have been crueller, but I was wrong, this crueller."

Will stood motionless like a statue, his head turned back to her with disbelief in his eyes. "You… don't believe me?"

"Of course I don't, after they way you have treated and said to me why I –''

"I had to," He cut her off. "I had to push you away or would have died!"

Her eyes widened, she shook her head from side to side. "William I had enough this, please leave."

"Tessa, please listen to me, please."

She frowned, they way he said "please" was so desperate. After a moment of silence between them, she closed her eyes and nodded her head. She was going to hear him out.

"Tessa, what I going to tell you I have never told a living soul, except for Magnus but I need his help that's why. I have never even told Jem." He took in a deep breath. "When I was twelve, living with my parents in Wales, I found a Pyxis in my father's office. I don't why he had it, a memento from his Shadowhunting days? I don't know. But, do you recall the Codex discussing curses and how they can be casts?" When she nodded, he continued. "Well, when I opened the box, I released a demon, who cursed me. He swore that anyone who loved me was doomed to die. I might not have believed it – I was not well schooled in magic-but my elder sister died that night horribly. I thought it was the beginning of the curse. I fled from my family and came here. It seemed to me the only way to keep them safe, not to bring them death on death. I did not realize I was walking into a second family. Henry, Charlotte, and even bloody Jessamine – I had to make sure that no one here could ever love me. To do so, I thought, would be put them into deadly danger. For years now I have held everyone at arm's length-everyone that I could not push away entirely."

Tessa felt her head spinning as words echoed in her mind. Held everyone at arm's length – pushed everyone away…. All those years trying to put on act, but there was one, who he let in. "Jem," she whispered.

He looked at her miserably, "Jem is different. He's dying. I thought the curse wouldn't have effect on him and with every passing year, and he survived, that seemed more likely. I thought I could learn to live like this. I thought after Jem was gone, after I turned eighteen, I'd go live by myself, not inflict myself or my curse on anyone… and then everything changed. Because of you."

Tessa blinked, "Me?" she said in quiet, stunned voice.

A ghost of smile touched his lips, "When I first met you, I thought you were unlike anyone else I had known. You made me laugh. No one but Jem has made me laugh in, good five years, And you did it like it was nothing, like breathing."

"Will-''

"Ask Magnus. He'll tell you. After that night on the roof, I went to him. I had pushed you away because I thought you had begun to realize how I felt about you. In the Sanctuary that day, when I thought you were dead, I realized you must have been able to read it on my face. I was terrified. I had to make you hate me, Tessa. So I tried. And when I wanted to die. I had thought I could bear it if you hated me, but I could not. I realized you would be staying in the Institute, and that every time I saw you it would be like standing on that roof all over again, making you despise me and feeling as if I were choking down poison. I went to Magnus and demanded that he help me find the demon who had cursed me in the first place, that curse might be lifted. If it was, I thought, I could try again. It might be slow and painful and nearly impossible, but I thought I could make you care for me again, if I told you the truth. That I could gain your trust back - build something with you, slowly."

"Are – are you saying that the curse is lifted? That's gone?"

"There is no curse on me, Tessa. The demon tricked me. There never was a curse. All these years, I've been a fool. But not so much a fool that I didn't know the first thing I needed to do once I had learned the truth was to tell you how I really felt." He took a step towards, closing the space between them.

She did not move back, but only stared at him. Staring at him in the way she might stare at the beloved that might never return to her with, memorizing every detail - the dark hair curling at his temples, the nape of his neck, at the blue of his eyes and the curve of his mouth.

"Why me Will? Why me?" Her voice sounded far off, distance.

He hesitated. "After we brought you back here, after Charlotte found your letters to your brother, I – I read them."

Her blood rise, her anger was about to lash out, but like a silent breeze washed out her as she gazed at young man who stood before. A man that looked almost completely broken, even maybe scared, scared not at life, but what her response was going be. She bit back her tongue and waited for Will to continue on.

Tenderly, he placed his hands on her shoulders. Holding her delicately close to him. His dark orbs stared into her grey ones. "You and I, Tess, we're alike. We live and breathe words. It was books that kept me from taking my own life after I thought I could never love anyone, never be loved anyone again. It was books that made feel that perhaps I was not completely alone. They could be honest with me and I with them. Reading your words, what you wrote, how you were lonely sometimes and afraid, but always brave; the way you saw the world, it's colors and textures and sounds, I felt - I felt the way you thought, hoped, felt, dreamed. I felt I was dreaming and thinking and feeling with you. I dreamed what you dreamed, wanted what you wanted – then I realized that truly I just wanted you. The girl behind the scrawled letters. I loved you from the moment I read them. I love you still."

Tessa had begun to tremble. Her voice caught her in throat, speechless to what Will had just confessed to her. Opening his heart to her, letting her in, telling her that all this time he loved her and still does. His name rolled off her tongue, nothing but silence replaced it. Then, she gasped as she felt a hungry, yet, desperate warm lips took hers. Closing her eyes, she melted and pressed her body with his as hands drifted off her shoulders, down her arms and around her waist. His hands gripping her tightly. Moaning inside as she felt his mouth leaves hers and travel down her the nape her neck. She felt breathless and dizzy. Then just quickly as this moment between them came, it ended quickly with a bloody scream.

"Sophie!" Her eyes snapped opened and pulled away.

She rushed out her room, with Will following her. They halted to a stop at the top of the staircase where Sophie stood. Tessa followed her gaze down to the floor level. Her heart begun to beat like a fast beat drum, she blinked once, then twice. Rachel stood at the bottom like a female warrior wounded in battle. Her black trousers ripped and torn, her black blouse torn at the sides, strands of her red locks wrapped around her neck and her green eyes blazing with fierceness.

"Rachel….." She whispered.

Movement tore her attention away and she saw Charlotte, Henry and Jem to the other side of Rachel looking in shock. Their skin white and pale like they had seen a ghost.

"Ra…Rac..Rachel! You're alive!" Charlotte exclaimed.

"I'm sorry to come back like this Charlotte, but I need to know where Jessamine is?"

Henry blinked, "Jessamine?"

"She betrayed you all. She's been working with Nathanial." Her voice with filled certainly.

"No that can't be… she would never…." Charlotte began.

Rachel eyes filled with sadness, then glanced up to where they were standing. "Sophie, show me Jessamine's room."

Sophie's eyes widened, but quickly nodded. Rachel up the stairs before anyone could blink and was following Sophie down the corridor. Charlotte, Henry, Jem, Will and her all followed behind. Rachel hadn't even been in the room then five minutes before she came back out and hand her a stiff cream-colored card.

"Tessa please verify this hand writing." Rachel commanded softly.

She took the card and glanced down. Her eyes fixed on the card. Turning it over in her hand, realizing it was an invitation to a ball.

July 20, 1878

Mr. Benedict Lightwood

presents his compliments

to Miss Jessamine Lovelace,

and requests the honor of her company

at a masquerade ball given on Tuesday next,

the 27th of July. RSVP.

Tessa's blood froze when she flipped the invitation on the back and saw all too familiar hand writing. My Jessie. My very heart is bursting at the thought of seeing you tomorrow night at the "great affair." However great it may be, I shall have eyes for nothing and no one but you. Do wear the white dress, darling, as you know how I like it – "in gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls," as the poet said. Yours always, N.G.

"Nate," Tessa said numbly, staring down at the letter. "Nate wrote this. And quoted Tennyson."

She heard Sophie and Charlotte drew in sharp breaths. Henry, Jem and Will were speechless. There was only one voice that spoke and she felt sympatric like she knew what was going to happen next.

"I'm sorry to all of you. I'll call the Silent Brothers and tell them to bring it." Rachel's voice soft as the wind. Her footstep retreated down the hall and at the very moment it felt as if the world had gone very still.