“Yes.” His grasp on me loosened. “I’m not as strong as you. Not knowing whether Gedeon lived or not killed me. That’s why I envied you. You tried to move on while I remained stuck.”
Before, I’d considered yelling at Zion. He’d made me feel betrayed by hiding Gedeon’s situation from me. Particularly when Zion was the one who’d brought me to Damia’s compound to get my second tattoo, the blackbird under my collarbone.
But he was also as broken as me. And despite his pain, he’d found the strength to support me through my breakdowns.
So I didn’t shout.
I chose the path of making peace with it.
“I understand your reasoning, Zion, I do, but it still hurts,” I said. “I’m not okay with you keeping secrets.”
“I’ll do whatever you want. Just…” He searched my face, desperation sculpted into his features. “Let me hold you for a little longer.”
Seeing him panic at the prospect of losing me thawed my heart. Locked in Zion’s arms, I twisted to face Gedeon. “So what’s going to happen now?”
Sitting on the bed, he rested his elbows on his thighs. “Now we play the martyr game.”
23
ZION
Gedeon’s study drowned in a hush as suffocating as the heavy air before a storm.
Lounging on the light gray couch, Sadira and Ryder kept exchanging displeased looks between bouts of staring at Gedeon. The broody bastard was leaning against a windowsill, a statue of intensity.
Behind him, ominous clouds had usurped the sky. The atmosphere fizzled with charged particles, the early dusk as bleak as the mood of our group.
For the last five minutes, no one had uttered a word. Recounting theactualevents that had led us to today had stunned everyone.
Bored, I strode past Kali sitting behind the desk, Eli and Eislyn on the sleek ebony chairs before it, Ezra sipping his tea on the couch’s armrest, and Jayla nestled in Ava’s lap on the suede armchair.
Gedeon ducked as I yanked open a window. A blast of the evening’s cold assaulted us, but I turned my back to nature’s elements and took my position beside Gedeon, clutching the windowsill close enough for my pinkie to collide with his. If I could, I would’ve climbed him right here, in front of everyone.
Standing close to him wasn’t enough. Even the howling wind lashing at my back and the chill burrowing underneath my knitted sweater couldn’t mollify the itch.
Last night, the precision with which Gedeon had wielded those two leather floggers, raining sparks of fire on my back and ass… It’d been the most cathartic experience of my life.
I’d awakened feelingcleansedthis morning.
For gods knew how long, night after night, I’d slunk into his room and observed him sleep. The steady rise and fall of his chest was one of the two things soothing enough to lull me to sleep. Day after day, I’d followed him, doing his bidding, coordinating our operations and expanding our network in Ilasall.
The endless string of sunsets and sunrises had scarred me deeper than the burns on my forearm. But then we’d taken Kali for ourselves. Her threats had become my addiction, her whispers my obsession.
And watching her and Gedeon together had brought me to my knees. His absence had proved what I’d suspected: his commands had become my lifeline, his laughter a necessity to my survival.
He sought to protect us by denying himself what he wanted, but I was ready to give him anything and everything to prove him otherwise.
Including holding him, starting with his pinkie.
Next in line was his cock.
Jayla burst the bubble of bewilderment first. “So, ahm, to get this right—you were never taken by Ilasall?”
“Does helookdead to you?” Sadira snapped. She threw her head back on the couch’s backrest, the multitude of her black braids swaying with the movement.
The leader of our tech team, able to stay balanced in the most demanding situations, yet Gedeon had achieved theunachievable—rattling the woman—by simply marching into his study.
Fun.
