“It’s not,” Raithe said, his tone leaving no room for debate.
Inclining my head, I asked, “When we first met, you said you didn’t have someone to say goodbye to. I now understand the solitary lives of Chosens, but… have you never had anyone? Before Hector. A friend, a lover, anyone you’ve ever been intimate with?”
A book caught on Raithe’s surprised fingers and tumbled to the ground. He shoved it back between the other spines. “No. My focus has always been my training.”
“That’s too bad.”
“Is it?”
“Yes,” I insisted. “It’s beautiful. Especially if you have a connection with someone.”
“Connection?”
“You know, a bond.”
He tilted his head up at the books. “Did you have that? With… Kole?”
My own answer surprised me. “I thought we did. I wanted too much from him. Time and distance have shown me that I…” I didn’t miss him that way anymore. The sex was fun, but it never satiated my yearning for the kind of connection I dreamt of. “He was an escape from my grandmother’s marital pressures and a release from the weight of her disappointment. What we had was rooted in the need for validation clouded by lust, tainted by deceit.”
“What do you mean?”
Shame tightened its grip around my throat. “I told you the story about how I almost died when I was twelve, right?”
He nodded, recalling the story I'd nervously shared with him when we traveled from Gemini to Scorpio.
“After I fell over the edge of that skyland and landed in the netting, Basil pulled me up with trembling hands. He looked me in the eyes and swore he would always protect me. From then on, we shook on promises made only between us, binding the other to our word.”
“What does any of that have to do with Kole?”
I sighed, fearing what he’d think of me. “Basil warned me to stay away from him the day we all first met. We shook hands on it. When Kole pursued me… I let him. I never told Basil, even as the guilt gnawed at me.”
“Why was Basil friends with him if he wasn’t someone he thought you should be around?”
I shrugged. “He didn’t have any problems when I befriended his sister, Mel. Maybe he didn’t want me to ruin his friendship? I don’t know. He didn’t care if I entertained other men, only Kole.”
“Othermen?” A thick undercurrent of tension coated his words.
“Women too. Only with Kole, though.”
Raithe remained utterly still as he stared into the bookshelf.
I tucked my hair behind my ears that burned from his scrutinous silence. “I used to think sharing him with others would make him want me more. But I hate sharing, especially when it comes to sex, because to me it’s sacred. I may have flirted and taunted my body with others, but giving yourself to someone else like that is…”
“Is… what?”
My heart fluttered as his honed attention shifted from the books onto me. I couldn’t breathe properly with him looking at me like that. Not as the wordsexrang in my ears and I imagined him unrestrained in the throes of passion. Desire curled in my abdomen as the images shifted to him and me: my tan skin beneath his pale flesh, our bodies slick and sated?—
“Is good!” I yelped.
“Good?” Raithe questioned, the faintest hint of teasing in his voice. “All that fuss for good?”
“Great,” I amended sharply. “Amazing. Mind-altering. Sky-shattering. Star-bursting.”
“Hmm.”
I rubbed at my arms to ward off the goose bumps peppering my skin. “You really were never intimate with anyone before becoming Chosen?”
His attention shifted back to the books. “I was never attracted to anyone the way people said I was supposed to be.”
