“That was the summer…”
I didn’t have to finish the sentence. He knew as well as I did that summer was when Malakai and I first confessed our feelings for each other.
“That was when I decided I would never tell you.” He finished his drink, setting the glass aside. “If the feelings never subsided, I decided then that I would keep them to myself as long as I lived.”
“Tol…”
“I don’t want pity, Ophelia.” He looked at me, eyes hard.
“I’m not pitying you.” Maybe I was pitying myself for never knowing, for never seeing. “The feelings never subsided.”
“What do you want me to say?” He turned toward me, hand pressing to his chest. “Do you want me to say that I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember? That I woke every day aware you were his and accepted it because you loved him and that was enough for me. Being your friend, walking through life with you, even if in a different sense than I hoped…it was enough. Is that what you want me to admit? That I was allowed to make you laugh, share in those brightest moments, and feel the light you spread to the world. And when that light needed rekindling, I would do that, too. Because if that’s what you want to hear, then I’ll say it. I’ll tell you every hidden truth darkening my heart if it’s what you want—it belongs to you anyway.”
He clutched the railing, knuckles turning white, and that grip tightened around my heart. It had been him holding it together all these years.
His love was the glue between my broken glass. The fire forging me anew. And I’d never stopped to realize.
“I want the truth, Tol. I want to know why you never told me. When Malakai was gone, you still didn’t tell me.”
“How could I?” His brows pulled together, but he ran a hand over his face, collecting his thoughts. “You were so hurt, so broken. I watched you fall into that dark space, and I swore I would help you climb back out of it however you’d allow me to. But I also swore I would do nothing to hurt you any more than you’d already suffered.”
It was instinct to step toward him, but I stopped myself from unlatching his fingers on the railing. Spirits, I wanted to. I wanted to unburden all of these heavy truths from his heart.
“How could you have hurt me?” I asked instead.
His face nearly crumpled. “If I had told you, it only would have ended one way.” When he saw the confused tilt of my head, he continued, “You were so in love with him still, carrying that spark ofhope that he would come back to you. If I had told you what was in my heart, you would have rejected me. And I know you—it would have hurt you to do that to me.”
A selfless decision, caring only about the pain that rejection would inflict on me. I didn’t deny that I would have done it. I’d been so desperate for Malakai, I likely wouldn’t have looked at anyone else.
Still, I wished Tol hadn’t been so selfless.
“You were never going to tell me?”
“If I could have gotten you over what happened, as nothing more than a friend, I never would have told you.” He read the secret-burned scars that made me flinch. “I know that takes away your decision in the matter, and for that I apologize, but I wasn’t willing to be the cause of any more damage to your heart.”
“And what about your heart?” He’d always been pushed to the side, so much so that he now chose it for himself, sacrificing to putmefirst.
“What about it?” He shrugged.
My blood heated at the casual dismissal. “Tolek Vincienzo, your heart matters as much as anyone else’s.”
To me, it mattered more than most. It always had—and I was only starting to consider what that might mean.
“But you needed a friend when Malakai was gone. You didn’t need…whatever I might be. And once he was back…”
Understanding tapped at the confusion in my mind. “You tried to keep your distance?”
It was why I hardly saw him in those first weeks after the Undertaking. Why he’d seemed to disappear until I needed him most, always attune to those moments like an instinct forced him back to me.
He’d tried to give me the space to heal with Malakai.
“I thought it would help you two if I didn’t complicate things further—I tried, I did. But, Spirits damn me, you’re hard to stay away from, Alabath.” He shook his head, and with each confession, tension melted from his shoulders. The hollows I’d formed at his distance filled.
Tol finally unlatched his fingers from the banister. “I never needed you to love me, Ophelia. Not in the way I love you.” One step toward me. “Did I want you to? Of course. More than I wanted tolive.” Another slow step. “But I never needed it.” A third, and he stopped, inches away.
My heart pounded, the Bind inked on my arm pulsing with each beat.
“What I needed was for youto love. To allow yourselfto be loved. To save the girl I fell in love with from succumbing to that brutal darkness so she could grow into the woman—the warrior—she was meant to be. And if you never loved me, but the rest was true, I would’ve been okay. I would’ve been happy to be by your side in whatever capacity you needed.”
