I peer at him. “Do you really think any of the shadowkind at the school see you as that kind of sorcerer? You’re nothing at all like the one who captured me.”
You might as well compare a golden retriever to a rabid wolf. Absurd as a cauliflower pie.
“I’ve still had to force a lot of them to act against their will.” Jonah shakes his head. “But we’re not supposed to be talking about my hang-ups. You need to decide how you want to handle your part of the containment mission.”
“I can already decide. If Rollick brings another sorcerer on board, I know you’ll make sure anyone helping you sticks to the rules. They’ll just be backingyouup, and you’ll be trying to stop more harm from being done, like you always do.”
It’s Jonah’s turn to stare at me. Disbelief courses out of him, but it’s tinged with a relieved sort of contentment. “You trust me that much.”
I shrug, a smile crossing my lips. “Even when we’d only spent a little time together, I could tell you were trying to make things better for all the beings around you. Having this bond with you has meant I’ve seen even more how much you care. What’s there to distrust?”
He opens his mouth and closes it again while he gathers his answer. “I’m not a shadowkind. I’ll never really understand what it’s like to be one. I’ll always have this power that can steal your free will.”
“So? I’ll always have powers that you don’t, that’ve hurt you in the past. You might not be like us, but none of us are all like each other either. I bet I’ve got more in common with you than I do with Hail.”
Jonah can’t restrain a chuckle. “All right, I’ll give you that.”
As he holds my gaze again, the familiar butterscotch sweetness of desire passes between us—both ways, mine flaring at the first taste of his. But Jonah stays where he is, a couple of feet away from me, his shoulders tensing.
I don’t want to push him. I don’t want to bring back the surge of guilt that’s jolted out of him before.
There is one thing I feel needs to be said. “You know, I was never afraid that you’d use your authority against me, even when you were part of the teaching staff. I can’t see you giving me a better report because I kissed you or taking away marks because I didn’t.”
A flush creeps up Jonah’s neck, but for once, he doesn’t pull even farther away. “I don’t think it’s that simple. If your head gets clouded with emotions, it’s hard to judge anything objectively.”
“But you’re not judging me officially anymore, right? We’re equal teammates now. I’m not trying to convince you that you should act on how you feel. I only want to understand why it still makes you worried.”
Jonah hesitates again before he answers. “I guess… I can’t help thinking that if I act on it now, it means I always would have, no matter what happened. That I must have encouraged you in that direction when I shouldn’t have, set the groundwork when you should have been able to count on me not to.”
Oh. How can he have himself so mixed up?
I blink and then laugh. “ButIknow that’s not true. I always picked up on your emotions when we were together. There’s no way you’d have encouraged any kind of closeness like that when you were my teacher. As soon as you recognized what you were feeling, you backed off. I might not have marked you on purpose, but it wouldn’t have happened at all if I hadn’t been sure you were a person who’d always look out for me.”
A deeper surge of happiness tingles through my senses. Jonah relaxes enough for his tone to turn dry. “You marked Hail too. It doesn’t seem to be that exclusive a club.”
I wrinkle my nose at him in mock-offense. “Hail means well underneath. He just has too many prickly pieces overtop that I haven’t figured out yet. He would never really hurt me either.”
“I guess you might know us better than we know ourselves.”
“It’s easier to understand emotions when you’re not the one stuck in them,” I say brightly. “At least one good thing came out of these connections, even if you all didn’t really want them.”
Something softens in Jonah’s expression. “You know, if I had to be tied to anyone, I’m happy it’s you. There’s something about you…”
He looks down at his hands and then back at me. “I always think of the first time I called you in to bring you to the academy. Seeing your true form, all glowing. Maybe sometimes your light gets too harsh, and sometimes it’s overwhelmed with darkness, but mostly a perfect glow shines through. And it lights up everything you touch.”
There’s so much fondness in his voice that my heart skips a beat. “Maybe that’s why I lit the four of you up. You’re the ones who’ve made me glow the most.”
Jonah’s throat works. He eases over on the sofa and trails his fingers across my cheek.
The gentle caress wakes up every nerve in my body with the giddiest of shivers. I want to touch him in return so badly, but he’s been so unsure. Doubt drizzles across his desire.
This decision needs to be his. He needs to be sure it was a conscious decision, not a mindless giving in to temptation.
So I hold still and simply let the bond between us shine with all the admiration and longing he stirs up in me. It feels so much more right pouring myself into the connection than trying to shut it off and resist it. Like a matching shine is reverberating back into me.
“Fuck,” Jonah mutters, and then he’s lowering his mouth to mine.
The kiss sends sparks through my veins. I slide my arm around his shoulders and kiss him back with a tenderness to match his own. His breath stutters against my lips.
