“Because I already chose. I choose both of you. You once asked me to say I was yours, now I’m saying?—”
“You’re ours,” Julius ended, opening his eyes.
I firmly nodded. “No more standing on opposite sides of me anymore. No more acting as if one of you matters more than the other… You don’t.”
“Mouse—”
“No.” I stood my ground, letting them know what I needed, what I truly needed from them. “If you want me…” I continued, “then you take me like this, or you don’t take me at all.”
Julius dragged a hand down his face, pacing once before stopping in front of me again.
Julius remarked, “You’re asking a lot.”
“I know.”
“You’re asking me to just accept this?”
“I’m asking you not to walk away from it.”
His eyes searched mine, trying to find something to hold on to.
“And what happens if this doesn’t work?”
I sat down in front of him, staring deep into his eyes. “Then we deal with it”—I grabbed his hands—“together.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one there is.”
I gripped his hands. “You really think this can work?”
“I think it already is.” I grabbed Kraven’s hand next, bringing it over to me. I held both of them near my heart. “I think we can make anything work. This is what I want.”
Julius’s gaze dropped to where I held him before lifting slowly to look at me again. There it was, clear across his face.
“I love you, Isla,” Julius expressed. “I’d do anything for you.”
And there it was…
The start of something new.
JULIUS
I needed space to think, but every time I left, I ended up right back where I was.
It was where I belonged.
I glanced at Kraven, not like he was something I had to beat the shit out of, or I had to argue with or take from. He was just there and part of this.
“That doesn’t mean I like this,” I admitted.
Kraven didn’t miss a beat. “You don’t have to like it. You just have to decide whether you’re staying.”
“I’m not sharing her,” I adamantly denied. “I’m not,” I repeated, shaking my head. “I’m keeping her. There’s a difference.”
Kraven mocked, “Whatever you have to tell yourself.”
I leaned back into the couch, studying both of them now. Not separately, but for the first time, together.
