He traces the lines on it with his thumb, one side then the other, following them from my wrist out to my fingertips.
He kisses each one, taking his time, and he’s so intent on it that it feels…
More than happy.
More than calm.
“Stay,” I whisper.
Chapter23
Iknow he hears my request, even with as quiet as my voice is.
He drops a kiss against my palm, his touch light. Another kiss closer to my wrist and now my breathing is rapid.
I’ve moved forward out of the middle of the spray, but it cascades down my back and across my shoulders, droplets running between my breasts and legs.
“You don’t have power over my life anymore,” I say. “I’m free to choose.”
His lips linger on my hand, a caress that makes my thighs clench.
He doesn’t come any closer and I’m not sure if he’s waiting for me to explicitly ask him to.
My lips part, the invitation on my tongue, when he speaks.
“I’ve walked a line with you from the day I first met you,” he says. “A line between keeping you alive and ensuring you stayed at arm’s length from me. At first, I didn’t want to build that wall between us, but then I realized that neither of us would survive without it. So I did everything I could to inspire enough hatred of me that you would construct a wall for me. And it would never come down.”
He’s speaking softly, without a hint of fury.
I can’t stop my smile. “It came down.”
The corner of his mouth tugs up. “Youdraggedit down.”
I challenge him. “You let me.”
“I wanted to let you.”
But his shoulders suddenly hunch, shadows building in his expression, and the abrupt change makes my smile fade and brings an emptiness into my heart.
“This connection between us has only ever brought pain,” he says. “Right from the start, Asha. Loss and pain. For you. And for me.”
The ache in my heart only deepens, a heavy sadness settling in.
My people killed his family.
He killed my people.
We met in a moment of blood and fury and terror.
My eyes suddenly fill with tears and I’m not ashamed of them. “I want to go back,” I say, my pain and hope bleeding into my voice. “If I could go back, I would find you before Malak changed you. I would ask you to run away with me.”
His eyes widen and for all the world, I can’t imagine a look of greater regret on his face than the one he wears now.
An instant later, he’s shaking his head and pulling away from me, but I close my hand over his and hold on tightly with the strength the medallions give me.
“I would fight,” I say, meeting his deep-gray eyes. “I would fight as hard as I did to bring you here. I would pull all of us through the mud and slime and jagged rocks. I would carry Tamra and you would carry Gallium. Together, we would keep them safe, and your family would come with us too—your father and brother—and we would help each other, and we would never…”
My voice breaks. “We would never be lost.”
