Chapter 25
twenty-five
Eryn
Kaiden and I had the place to ourselves when we returned.
Ezra volunteered—demanded really—to be left behind to keep watch over Rani.
With me not there, she was in no danger, but he couldn’t be swayed.
As long as he kept out of sight, it wouldn’t hurt.
The last thing we needed was for him to freak her out more than she already was.
She hid it well, and I didn’t think she lied about still being best friends, but anyone would need time to process all she’d seen and learned tonight. Space. I promised myself I’d give her space, even when she hadn’t explicitly asked for it.
“Okay, take off your pants. I’ll be right back with the supplies.”
“What?”
Kaiden’s demand pulled me away from everything. I wasn’t sure I heard him correctly.
“Did you just tell me to take off my pants?”
He huffed a laugh. “Don’t act so affronted, princess. You love what I do to you when you’re”—His gaze branded me as he scanned down to my toes— “half naked. You should see what I can do with absolutely nothing in my way.”
My mind blanked. I literally forgot how to speak for a moment because he was, in fact, extremely talented with his hands—and mouth—as I’d already learned.
Mouth dry, I swallowed and tried to reply, “W-why am I taking my pants off?”
“You really weren’t listening on the ride over, were you?” His eyes glimmered with amusement.
I tried to think about what he said, but I was too wrapped in my own thoughts. I definitely would have remembered if he told me to take off my clothes. I think.
“Your stitches,” he prompted. “Ezra’s comment reminded me they need to be removed.”
“Right,” I ducked my head embarrassed, and he chuckled again, moving closer.
His hand lightly pushed on my shoulder until I backed away. The high mattress behind me pressed against my legs, and he gestured to it.
“Take off your pants and lie on your back.”
Not waiting to see if I obeyed, he disappeared into the bathroom.
A few moments later, I heard him rummaging around under the sink.
I changed directions multiple times, second-guessing myself.
Glancing at the slightly closed bathroom door, I hooked my hands in the waistband of my shorts and slid them down my legs.
Before Kaiden came out and caught me in my underwear—a sight he’d already seen multiple times by now—I jumped onto the bed and covered my lower half with a blanket. Hands clasped over my stomach, I stared up at the ceiling like it could open up and swallow my nerves if I begged it to.
“I can feel your panic.” Kaiden’s voice was suddenly beside me. “You know I’m not going to hurt you.”
I cleared my throat. “I was more remembering how it felt to get them put in.” A quick peek at the bedside table showed gauze, a jar of sterile water, and a small pair of very sharp scissors. “Shouldn’t we wait for Ezra to numb it again?”
Kaiden’s large hands settled over mine, his fingers gently wrapping around my wrists to move them higher up. My shirt followed as he folded the material just above my belly button.
“Eryn.” His tone demanded my attention, and I turned my head to look at him, lower lip locked in a death grip between my teeth.
“This isn’t going to hurt, so I don’t need Ezra, okay?
” I nodded, and he kept moving, as if he knew I’d freak out the second he stopped. “I’m going to lower the blanket now.”
The fabric slid halfway down my thighs, and I felt cool air on my hips. The wound had stopped itching long ago. The skin around the small stitches felt tight and pulled often. They definitely needed to come out. But if they didn’t hurt when I moved, this shouldn’t either, right?
I relaxed my tense muscles and nodded at Kaiden to proceed. I felt his smile through the bond, as impossible as that sounded, and relaxed even more at his approving purr.
“So brave,” he whispered and ran a soaked piece of gauze over my hip.
Once my skin was clean and more pliant, he picked up the scissors and a pair of tweezers.
My pulse spiked, but I took a breath and told it to calm down.
I trusted Kaiden, and he knew what he was doing.
His hands didn’t shake once as he clipped the little knots loose and pulled them free.
There was slight discomfort as the thread got caught in a couple places, but it felt more annoying than painful.
“There,” Kaiden said, putting the instruments down. “You can hardly see where they were.”
He stared down at me, at my exposed midriff and upper thighs, and swallowed, clearly at war with himself over something else he wanted to say.
“What is it?” I asked. “I can feel your uncertainty. Just ask.”
His half-smile set free a horde of butterflies in my stomach.
“Look who’s getting better at reading me.
” After another moment of hesitation, he sat on the side of the bed, close enough that I felt the warmth from his leg.
“I was just thinking about how much you deserve a reward, but wasn’t sure if you would welcome me touching you. ”
Oh. Oh.
“Why wouldn’t I welcome your touch?”
His eyes snapped to mine and held. I watched his tongue dip out to wet his bottom lip while a slow burn of arousal uncurled down the bond.
“Do you want me to touch you?” The calluses on his palm tickled the skin of my thigh.
“Why are you asking like it's a bad thing?”
If I couldn’t feel his attraction, as strongly as I felt my own, and if I was less confident in how I knew seeing me like this tested his control, I might be insecure. But he was holding back.
“I just want you to be sure. Now that the truth is out, and we know where this is headed.”
Where this was headed? Why did it always have to come back to the damn bond? I’d acknowledged it, admitted to the fledgling pulse in my chest, and his presence at the other end of it. Was that not enough?
“Isn’t there an end game?” he pushed. “Not right away, but eventually?”
I felt myself shutting down, a self-preservation trigger I wasn’t even aware of. Kaiden frowned like he could see right through me to the gooey dark center where I attempted to hide.
“Don’t do this,” he begged, leaning forward to get a better look at me. “Don’t go backward.”
I shook my head. I wasn’t, but talking about bonding wasn’t something I was ready to delve into yet.
“You’re scared.” My heart pounded, and there was a very real chance he could hear it. “You’ve spent so much time and energy, so much of yourself, fighting it and what you think being bonded means for your future.”
His thumb ran soothing circles over my hip bone, right under where the stitches used to be.
The easy touches grounded me, and for the first time, I didn’t think about running far and fast from this topic.
With each pass over my skin, I sank into the mattress, more relaxed. Did he even realize what he was doing?
“I know it will take time for those feelings to change, but part of working through things is talking about them.” Kaiden leaned even closer, hovering over me in a way that was both comforting and had my heart beating against its cage for a completely different reason. “What scares you about it?” he asked.
It took a moment for me to find the words, but he didn’t rush me. Just kept that thumb moving in slow, tight circles.
“Mainly, that…” I closed my eyes so I could focus.
Kaiden wasn’t having it. His thumb pressed in, sending a shock down my leg.
“Once it's done, it can’t be changed,” I rushed out.
That pressure paused and then resumed a breath later.
I dared a look. The blue in his gaze was darker in this light, but they urged me to continue.
“What if things are different on the other side? What if you are? What if, down the road, we don’t see eye to eye when there’s no longer a common enemy? ”
“Things will be different,” he admitted.
Well, that was helpful. Not.
“No, don’t frown at me. It will be different because it’s a choice.
When we bond, it will be because we choose one another, not because it’s safer or because my family pressured us to do it.
I will choose to let you see all of me and all that I am with the knowledge that only you can make me better.
Only you can look past the controlling, overthinking, selfish parts of me to the even more greedy man inside that covets you for all the right reasons.
Your utter loyalty. Your inner fire and conviction when you’re angry.
Your huge heart. To the man that wants you exactly as you are.
” Somewhere in his speech, he got closer.
That hand left my hip to snake around the back of my neck, anchoring me to him in yet another way.
His eyes flicked side to side as he watched my face.
“On my life, our bonding is the only thing I can swear you will never regret.”
I think I stopped breathing entirely. It was possible my lungs had melted and could no longer function. They were now a goopy mess of flesh that couldn’t do their job. Their one job.
“Then show me,” I wheezed, catching him by surprise. As his brows rose, I blushed and backpedaled a bit. “Not…bond, but show me how it could be between us.”
Kaiden
How did I ever get so lucky? I wasn’t sure I’d done anything in my life to deserve this brave, absolutely captivating woman beneath me, but I was going to make sure I earned every second of her trust. Her fear was palpable, a physical intruder on this moment, but she faced it and offered herself to me despite it.
She wasn’t ready to bond, that was fine. I’d wait forever if she asked me to. Right now was my chance to show her what the rest of her life would look like. A lifetime in my bed and forever burrowed in my heart.