But now, the moment their eyes met, restraint became a lie he could no longer afford. He started to speak, stopped, and then tried again. Nothing would come out.
And now the niceties of civil conversation were over and they just stared at each other. He could see the longing and fearin her eyes, along with the pain he had caused her by pushing her away, and he could barely breathe.
His control was no longer steady. Rather, it was brittle and quickly cracking under pressure. He also knew that it was highly possible that she was no longer safe out in the open. If the Ruecrags knew she was back, there would be trouble.
He caught her arm gently but firmly and steered her into the hallway that led out to the lobby. He positioned his body as a shield. Heat radiated through him from his hand on her body.
“Jakob,” she breathed.
“Six months,” he said in a low voice as they walked. “Six months of hell.”
Even now, he didn’t touch her more than necessary. He didn’t allow himself the comfort of her warmth. Every inch of space between them was deliberate and painful when all he wanted to do was sweep her into his arms.
“I tried to forget you,” he said. His words were stripped of softness. “I tried to make our time together insignificant. Just something temporary.”
She reached up and her hand on his chest shattered that illusion.
The contact rocked him, but he didn’t move closer. She looked as trusting as she ever had. He stared at her lips but he didn’t kiss her. He didn’t even let himself breathe her in properly.
When he stepped back, it was abrupt. Almost harsh.
“I can’t,” he said. “I won’t do this to you.”
And then he spun around to leave. Not because he wanted to, but because if he stayed another second, he would lose everything. Her cry at his sudden withdrawal almost killed him.
He made it three steps. Three.
That was all the distance his restraint could manage.
The bond surged again, raw and panicked this time, and Jakob understood with brutal clarity that control was no longer protection. It was a liability.
She wasn’t safe. And neither was he.
“Come with me,” he said when he returned to her side. His voice was no longer steady. “Now.”
The corridors were hushed with night pressing close through the tall windows. His grip on her hand was firm and urgent and completely stripped of pretense. This wasn’t restraint anymore.
This was a retreat.
She pulled out her key when they reached her room. “How did you know I was in the same room as before?”
“Lucky guess on my part.” He didn’t tell her how many times he had walked by the room over the last several months. Truthfully, he hadn’t considered that she would have a different room.
The door closed behind them and the sound echoed.
For a single, suspended heartbeat, Jakob stood utterly still with his hands at his sides, his jaw clenched, and breathing hard. The silence was deafening after the discipline he’d enforced on himself all night.
She reached up and touched his face. “Jakob…” she whispered.
That broke him.
Before he could think, he pulled her to him and kissed her like restraint had never existed. He drowned in the sensations as she kissed him back with the same lips he had spent so long dreaming about.
Like six months hadn’t passed. Like he’d been holding his breath the entire time and only now remembered how to inhale.
The kiss was desperate and unguarded. His hands framed her face as if she were the only solid thing left in the world. Every ounce of control he’d wielded in the café and in the corridors collapsed all at once.
Mallory’s fingers curled into his coat and grounded him while she was completely undoing him at the same time.
