“There’s nothing wrong with this,” I repeat, fisting his shirt in my hands and pushing him into the wall, but softer this time. “We’re here. We’re together. You’ll get used to it.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t like it.”
“I don’t either,” I admit, sliding my hand between us and cupping his balls in my hand. “But I like this.”
“That’s all it is now,” he says sadly.
“What?” I step back and furrow my brows together. Declan is my mate, my soul mate, and we’re forever tied together. By fate and by blood.
“I mean.” He runs a hand through his hair and blinks up at me with those blazing eyes of his. “I don’t feel the same. I think I feel the same way about you as I did before, but it doesn’t feel the same inside of me. It doesn’t feel as important.”
Declan looks at our feet like he’s ashamed of the words he’s saying, and it’s like getting shot all over again, but this time it’s his hand on the trigger and not Franklin’s.
“I don’t feel any different about you. I love you,” I tell him.
“I love you. But the way I love you doesn’t feel as urgent, Ezra. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“I know what you mean.”
He steps out from between me and the wall and walks across the room. He pulls the curtain back and stares out the window. It’s just shy of one in the morning. It’s a new moon, and the sky is dark, peppered with connecting constellations that reach beyond the distance we can see.
We’ve always had a special connection, like there’s a thousand years of history between us, but it’s not the same anymore. The string is frayed and pulling apart, and there’s an unease because we can both feel it ready to snap. I’ve never regretted anything the way I regret trying to save Declan the pain of my death, because this life is terrible now.
“Please reconsider,” he whispers.
I join him at the window and press my chest against his back and he leans against me. If only thiscouldfix everything. Find us new ways to be close to each other.
“Come for a walk with me.” I take his hand and pull him out of my room. The house is quiet. William and Birdie are traveling with Henry, and Elijah and Jedidiah are floating around in their own little world.
There’s supposed to be a council meeting tomorrow, and it’s my first. My father asked if I wanted him to come home for it, but I told him no. It’s my responsibility now, so I might as well step up.
I grab a blanket out of the backseat of my car and we walk to the park. I fan the blanket out on the grass and we lie back, staring up at the stars. I still want to take him to see the Milky Way, to see the northern lights. He’s still my world, and I’ll still give him this one.
“Do you still want to travel with me?” I ask.
“Of course.”
“You know I’ll give you anything.”
“Except the one thing I want.” Declan rolls onto his side and tucks his legs up. He reaches out and draws on my cheeks with his hand. I nip at the tips of his fingers and he smiles.
“Even if you don’t have the memories, we still have this life.”
“I’m trying to be thankful,” he says, but his lips turn down at the corners and he pulls his hand away and rolls onto his back. He threads his fingers together over his chest and stares up at the sky, so I turn onto my side to watch him.
He’s so fucking beautiful, even when he’s unhappy with me.
“I’d have burned the world down,” I whisper. “If he’d taken you from me.”
“Ezra.”
“Yes?”
He turns his head to me. “Please fuck me.”
Declan grabs me and pulls me on top of him. He fumbles between us and gets my dick out of my pants. He spits on his hand and works me with his fist until I’m hard for him, then he scrabbles out of his own pants, pushing them down to his ankles and kicking free.
I don’t even have time to realize what he’s doing before he’s lined my cock up with his hole and relaxed the rim of his ass. The head of my dick pops into him and he bites me to stifle his cry. He doesn’t puncture the skin; he just sucks at the side of my neck like he’s trying to give me a hickey.
