I can feel the fear and the anxiety coursing through me. I’m terrified I’m about to lose something precious to me.
“Back when we first started seeing each other, you made it clear that you wanted a submissive boyfriend. You wanted me to be yourangel, just as Benjamin was: sweet, docile, and obedient.”
I give him a chance to speak, to agree, or maybe even to object so that I can let go of this ache and go to sleep. But Rowan just stares at me, so I continue.
“And I know it makes me a dick, but I saw that, and I wanted you badly enough that I was willing to play that role. To let you defend me where I’d be more than happy to defend myself; I even kept most of my bitchy comments inside of my head so you wouldn’t know that I’m kind of a prick.”
“Kind of?” Rowan jokes, and when I glare at him, he promptly shuts his mouth.
“But in reality, I don’t need a protector. Sure, sometimes it’s nice to have someone speak for me, but most of the time it feels good to stand up for myself. I’m capable and not at all dependent. This image of me that you have in your head? That’s all just Benjamin. That’s the old me. I’ve… somewhere between death and rebirth, I’ve changed,” I conclude.
Rowan is still quiet. He’s watching me with those ever-calculating, cold eyes, and I’m sweating from under my own anxiety.
I’m waiting for him to stand up and leave, to yell at me, to declare that he no longer wants to be in my presence. That he will go and find another man to take the role of his little angel boy.
“Elijah,” Rowan finally says, and his voice sounds so void of emotion that I just know it’s over. My whole world is about to crumble around me. “You’re the smartest guy I know, yet sometimes, you can be such an idiot.”
“Sorry?”
He laughs. “I know you, angel. I can see it on your face when a random pedestrian pisses you off; I can hear it in your tone when you bitch at the TV show we’re watching. You’re an asshole, and you always have been.”
“So… then why…?” I'm trying to find the words to question him.
“Just because I’m aware that you’re capable, doesn’t mean I’m not going to try to care for you anyway. It’s in my blood. Unlike you, I didnotchange—I will always have the urge to protect you,” he says.
Rowan is staring at me so softly, as if he can pour all of his affection into my heart with a single glance. But I’m confused; I’m not understanding him.
“Then shouldn’t you be with someone who is more dependent? Who needs that kind of man in his life?”I ask him.
At this, Rowan’s face grows cold.“No, I should not. I should be withyoubecause I love you. Whether you are exactly like your past self or not doesn’t matter to me. It isyouwho matters. And I quite like that you’re bossy. I like it when you put me on my knees, and when I’m worshiping you.”
Tears have begun to well up, and my face feels hot and flushed.
“But what if I’m not worthy of being worshipped? What if I’m not an angel, what if I’m something much, much worse?” I whisper.
Rowan’s warm palm glides gently over my cheek just as the tears begin to fall, and he coos at me softly.
“I don’t carewhatyou are. I have loved, andwilllove, every version of you that I meet.” He lays a warm, wet kiss over my lips. “My sweet angel, my little villain.”
A choked sob escapes my throat, and I’m straddling his hips a moment later. His arm snakes around my waist and pulls meflush against him, our naked bodies aligned so perfectly in the moonlight.
“Rowan, my flower, listen to me,” I force out, my chest tight.
“I’m listening, Eli,” he says, and it sounds like a melody composed just for me.
“Keep me. Love me. Until we die again, promise you’ll love me. I… please know I’m not a very good person. Please keep me anyway.”
Something dark and primal passes over Rowan’s features and settles there, and I feel him harden beneath me. I’m not sure what it is that I’ve said to make him react this way, but I’ve gotten under his skin.
“You will not escape me—not even in death,” Rowan promises me.
And then his lips are devouring mine, and I’m overwhelmed once again with the amount in which I need him and the affection I feel for him.
Love.The love I feel for him.
As Rowan’s mouth travels down my throat and to my chest to tongue over one of the scars he has left me, I groan.
“I love you, Rowan," I tell him, and his breath hitches. “I love you now, as Rowan, and I loved you before, as Aaron. I will love you forever.”
