WARNING: SUPER SPOILERY!
So if you didn't know, Shadow Me (Shatter Me 4.5, a novella) was just released and of course I had to read it as soon as possible. It was waay too short for me, I need to know more!! Still I loved the extra scenes and Kenji's POV, which we'll be getting in the 5th book: Defy Me.
Here's a list of my favorite scenes/quotes:
CHAPTER 1
"Warner peers past me, into my room, and for a moment, says nothing. Then, quietly: “Kishimoto, if I considered other people’s mediocre standards a sufficient metric by which to measure my own accomplishments, I’d never have amounted to anything.” He looks up, meets my eyes. “You should demand more of yourself. You’re entirely capable.”
“Are you—?” I blink, stunned. “I’m sorry, was that your idea of a compliment?"
You had a hard day yesterday,” I say. “It’s all right to have a rough morning, too.”
After a long pause, he says, “I’ve been up for a while.”
I blow out a breath. It’s nothing I wasn’t expecting. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I get it.”
He looks up. Meets my eyes. “Do you?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“I don’t think you do, actually. In fact, I hope you don’t. I wouldn’t want you to know how I feel right now. I wouldn’t wish that for you.”
That hits me harder than I expect. For a moment I don’t know what to say.
I decide to stare at the floor.
CHAPTER 2
"Instead, I’m a big, raw, bleeding heart, and I spend my days pretending not to notice that I want more. That I need more.
Maybe it sounds weird to say, but I know I could love the shit out of someone. I feel it, in my heart. This capacity to love. To be romantic and passionate. Like it’s a superpower I have. A gift, even.
And I’ve got no one to share it with.
Everyone thinks I’m a joke."
"She’s squinting at something behind me. “Do you—um, do you always walk around without a shirt on?”
I raise my eyebrows. “Up here? Yeah. Pretty much all the time.”
CHAPTER 3
“So no J, then, huh?”
Warner looks up. He seems stunned, and for a second I see something like pain in his eyes. I blink and he’s a statue again. “No,” he says.
Warner walks to the door and then hesitates. Slowly, he turns to face me. “You’re having trouble again.”
I look up, surprised. “What?”
“In love. You’re having trouble in your love life. Is that why you were late?”
I feel the blood drain from my face. “How the hell would you know something like that?”
“You reek of it.” He nods at me, my body. “You’re practically emanating lovelorn agony.”
...
Warner smiles. It’s the first real emotion he’s shown all morning. “I suspected she might eviscerate you,” he says. “But I admit I thought she would use a knife.”
I force out a humorless: “Ha.”
“Be careful, Kishimoto. I find it necessary to remind you that she was raised to be lethal. I wouldn’t cross her.”
...
“Wait a second.” I frown. “Did you just give me dating advice?”
Warner tilts his head. A flicker of a smile again. “I’m merely returning the favor.
I laugh, surprised. “Thanks, man. I appreciate that.”
“No,” I say. “I don’t eat like an animal. I just happen to be hungry. And maybe you should spend a few years starving to death before you think about making fun of the way I eat, okay asshole?”
It’s startling, how quickly it happens, but something changes in Warner’s face. Not the tightness in his jaw or the furrow in his brow. But for a moment, the light goes out of his eyes.
Warner might murder me if he knew I felt this way, but the truth is, I know Juliette better than anyone. Better than he does.
I look up directly into Warner’s eyes, and, I’m not going to lie—it’s a disorienting experience. That dude has some wild eyes. Pale, ice green.
It’s a little unnerving.
CHAPTER 4
Castle smiles. “Indeed.” He wraps his arm around my shoulder. Squeezes. “My greatest wish for you,” he says, “is for you to see yourself the way that I do: as a brilliant, handsome, compassionate young man who would do anything for the people he loves.”
Warner and Juliette are having a moment.
A pretty passionate moment, right here, in the hall. I realize, as I watch them, that I’ve never seen them kiss before. I’m frozen. A little stunned. And I know I should, like, look away—I mean, I know in my head that I should? That it’s the decent thing to do? But I’m kind of fascinated.
They clearly have crazy chemistry.
CHAPTER 5
“Tell him—” She hesitates again, and then seems to make a decision. “Tell him it’s about Sector 241. Tell him we think it’s a message. From Nouria.”
I don’t know how Castle will react to hearing her name. He hasn’t heard a word from Nouria in years. Not since—well, not since the boys were murdered.
THANK YOU FOR READING!
