“Aren’t you even going to try to defend yourself?” Layla asked, astounded.
“I want to.” Adrian’s gaze was dark but honest as he watched her. “But if I tell you the truth, I can’t protect you. You’ll be too far in – you’ll know too much. It will put you directly in the line of fire with my enemies.”
“Aren’t I already?” Layla answered, knowing they were approaching something deep that was integral to the whole of Adrian’s secrets. “Adam says the people you’re close to tend to die. He said more than five women who were close to you have wound up dead.”
“It’s true.” Adrian’s voice was a hard rasp, his eyes terrible as his hands wrung each other again, tight. “It’s one of the reasons I don’t let myself—”
“Let yourself what?”
“Fall in love.” Adrian finished softly. His gaze held hers, deep. Sincere. Scared. The haunted honesty in that gaze was terrible: so open and raw. Layla had never seen Adrian like this, and it struck her suddenly, exactly what he was trying to say.
“You love me?” Layla blinked, not having expected the conversation to go this way.
Adrian didn’t answer. But as he held her gaze with that deep, haunted honesty, his energy swirled, caressing Layla like a warm, protective cocoon. Holding her close inside his gentle power, she felt as if he was cradling her in his arms, even though his hands were still laced tight together. She could feel him, as if they weren’t sitting apart but he’d stood and pulled her close. Smoothing his warm hands over her back; nuzzling his lips into her neck and hair. Breathing her in as he held her close to his strong, lean chest. Layla could feel Adrian’s deep heat as he brought her into the circle of his arms and his power, protecting her.
As if she were the most precious thing in the world.
“I would do anything for you,” he spoke at last, his eyes luminous and dark all at once. “And if my enemies find that out, if they find out how much I… they’ll kill you, Layla. They’ll move against me, by striking at my heart – again. I can’t let that happen. I just can’t.”
Adrian wrung his hands. As he took a deep breath, his gaze moving to the windows and watching the autumn leaves whirl, Layla’s heart broke for him. This was the truth; this was what tortured Adrian night and day and made him cagey with secrets. Layla could still feel his energy around her, protecting her as if cocooning her away from the rest of the world. And watching him, she knew that he’d tried to stay distant from her for a reason. Because she was safer that way. Because she’d be protected if the forces that hunted him thought he didn’t love her, that he was only using her for her power, and for the power it gave him.
But love didn’t work that way.
Suddenly, Layla understood that Adrian was in an impossible situation. With a smooth movement, she rose, stepping to him. Adrian looked up as she neared but didn’t rise, his hands still clenched as if he was trying to hold the entire world from breaking. Layla watched his eyes flare gold; desperation in them as she stepped close.
Gazing down at him, feeling her own love and her desire to help, Layla felt a warm, soothing energy ease out from her body. Caressing over his clenched hands, her energy held his fingers – pressed them in the unseen way that his power normally did with her. But it was Layla reaching out this time with her Dragon’s power – touching him, stroking him, soothing him rather than the opposite.
Adrian’s eyes widened; his breath caught. His face opened in shock at her etheric touch as he gazed up at her, his eyes luminous even as much as they were bleak. “Layla…”
“Shh…” Layla knelt before his chair. Clasping his hands, she smoothed her real hands over his, warming his tension with her Dragon’s energy. Reaching out, she ran her fingers through his brush-cut black hair, feeling its silky texture.
Watching Adrian’s eyes become astonished as she touched him.
“Layla, please… don’t.”
“No.” She firmed her resolve, understanding that this was the piece she had been missing about Adrian. It wasn’t that he was an asshole, or that he was clueless about relationships, or that he was purposefully trying to be unkind. It wasn’t that he was a tycoon and didn’t tell her about his dealings because they were shady. It was that he was afraid – for his life and for hers.
And he couldn’t tell her why because it might get her killed.
“Do you trust me, Adrian?” Layla spoke, stroking her hand down his cheek, caressing her thumb over his cheekbone. He didn’t say anything for a moment, staring at her with obliterated longing in his eyes as she touched him.
“Yes.” He breathed at last, and Layla saw his raw honesty.
“Can you trust that I’m stronger than your fears?”
“I want to. But you don’t know our world, Layla.”
“And if you shut me out, I’ll never know.” Layla answered. “You trusted me in the forest to feel your real power, your real feelings. How is this any different?”
“It’s not different.” He spoke quietly. “It’s just that I have so much I’m afraid of. Both with my power and how little of it I still have to protect you with.”
They were hitting the sweet, painful spot of radical honesty now – for perhaps the very first time. Just like they had found abandon in the forest before, it was real and it was deep. It was the stuff true relationships were built on. And even as painful as it was, it made Layla’s heart sing. Deep inside, her Dragon took a tremendous breath. Coils loosened, barbs were set down. Layla put away her fangs, feeling her way into that tender place, wanting to be there with him. For the first time, she felt her energy and Adrian’s swirl together, not in passion but in depth and kindness; achingly tender and raw.
And for the first time, Layla felt truly close to Adrian, as they stared deep into each other’s eyes.
“Last night,” she spoke quietly, moving into that space, “Adam took me to the Gypsun bar in the City of Julis – Marnet’s.”
“He took you to Marnet’s?” Something brightened in Adrian, as if he remembered the exquisite emotion of that place. And then darkened. “I wish I had been the first to take you there.”
