No...he could not trust her. Could not. Would not. Not with who he knew her to work with now. She was here, no longer seeking his death, but she was a key to it. A key the other could use to gain just that. What would she feel then? What would then be left behind. Was it worse to feel that...or worse to feel as though he could not trust? If she looked deeper, felt deeper, she'd know that he wanted to. That it wounded him to hold her at such distance. But no matter the past, no matter that love, he could not trust her.
She was used by another...another that sought to break him and others. If he believed he could save her from him he would have tried. But he knew he could save no one. A harsh reality but a reality all the same. Did she even wish to be? Did he? questions that felt to have ever changing answers...
But it was not just she that gained such distance. Selene had as well. Cassius kept himself distant from all now. She too could push him. She too had nearly pushed too far already. If he was so safe with her, at the school, then why was he here? Why was he shut away alone to a house warded to keep all others out.
I always will... Always. No matter the distance. No matter the pain. No matter betrayal or truly what came to pass. She could kill him now, aid in killing him later...harm him, harm others...and he would eternally love her. Just as he always would love Selene. It was not something he could escape....not something he could change. Always.
They were a part of him.
Closed off....and yet if she paused to feel she would know he was completely so. Cut away from all, locked away in his own mind. It was not trust....it was a means to spare them. A means to keep it all from overflowing to the point that he could not stop it. Waves of emotions, memories, thoughts, that he kept contained. Lock and key that he allowed no one access to. It was a struggle...a strain....and the thudding to his skull increased ten fold by it. But he did not stop...did not let that guard down.
At some point his eyes had fallen close as the hearts beat grew further and further apart. He had fought to keep them open but too much now had been taken. His arm around her was loose, his touch ice cold. He scarcely felt the shift of her body but the taste of her blood drew his senses. His body screamed for it, hungry to devour but he did not. Though his tongue teased against her lips to lick away that taste he did not feed. He tasted but did not devour.
He craved…but he did not give in.
Weakly his free hand moved, smoothing up the front of her form, ice cold fingers brushing her throat as he forced his eyes to open. To look at her. Believe me in that....or take what is left... Believe that he loved her, that that had not changed, that it never would. Or cease the life now beneath her teetering upon the edge of death. Finish him and know then, with that feeling gone from her mind, the painful truth.