I trusted Nyomi. I trusted the way her eyes caught what others were trying to hide. If she went out to that part of the island with the Claws, she would notice the wrong blink, the fake ease in a shoulder, the way guilt sat crooked on a man’s face.
I trusted that.
But trust didn’t change what the Fox would do to a woman like her if he ever got a clean angle.
Fast, Nura smiling at Hiro hit my mind and then my father’s bullet slamming into her head a second later.
I can’t let that happen to my Tiger.
I swallowed.
But. . .Hiro wouldn’t be tied up like with Nura. The Claws and him would be free to protect her. . .
I trusted Hiro with damn near everything. My brother came wrapped in jokes and sugar, but he was nothing sweet when the knife came out. I trusted the way he read a space—pulse by pulse, lie by lie—how he could peel a man to the truth with a glance and a hum.
I trusted him to stand between Nyomi and anything stupid enough to reach for her.
I trusted him to come back bloody and grinning, to make death look boring.
But my fear didn’t care who Hiro was. Fear knew that even gods tripped on wet stone. It knew bullets didn’t read names.
Fuck. What should I do?
Reo spoke, “You can ask her if she wants to do it.”
“Fuck you. We both know she will say yes. She loves danger and she’s too goddamn curious.”
Reo smirked. “That’s one of my favorite parts about her.”
I took in my Roar.
I trusted Reo too. I trusted his math—the way he lined a map with invisible thread and tugged until enemies fell into predictable ruin.
This conversation was unlike most we had ever had. He was never so blatantly determined to win.
Typically, if I said go, he went.
If I said stop, he held the line until his bones shook.
I trusted him with my corners, with my blind spots, with the orders I didn’t want anyone else hearing.
But fear was bigger than Reo’s perfect lines. Fear remembered the day the Fox snapped a plan in half with one ugly surprise and smiled while the table bled.
“I don’t know. My father is a monster. You can’t out-calculate a monster who enjoys the cost.”
“But you’re a monster too, Kenji.”
I swallowed.
I trusted myself. I trusted the Dragon I had built out of rage and oath, the man who could pull a city into focus like a rifle sight.
I trusted my hands to do what needed doing and my name to carry the weight.
But, then I met my Tiger and learned that there was a world worth living in after the war.
That was the problem.
Love handed me a future and fear took it hostage.
