Chapter 19 Felix #4
My heart skipped a thousand beats as Kit reached towards my hair. He plucked a leaf from it, then another. Then his hand froze mid-motion, eyes catching mine, and suddenly everything narrowed to the inches between us, the forest around us holding its breath.
This close, his eyes held new depths of grey—storm clouds and steel, the soft charcoal of his favourite cardigan. I could count the speckles of grey in his hair. Could trace the sharp line of his jaw, the way his trimmed beard couldn’t quite hide the vulnerability in his expression.
My brain stuttered to a complete halt. All those careful algorithms that usually ran in the background—cataloguing threats, processing data, maintaining social protocols—crashed entirely.
There was only Kit’s face inches from mine, the intensity in his grey eyes, the way his lips had parted slightly. What was going on?
Some distant part of my mind tried to analyse what this meant, to calculate probabilities and outcomes.
But for once, the rational side of me couldn’t get a foothold.
Kit was looking at me like… like I was something he’d been searching for his entire life.
Something he couldn’t bear to lose. And that look was doing things to my chest, making it tight and warm and terrifying.
I wanted to lean into his touch, wanted to close that impossible gap between us, and it had nothing to do with fate or bonds. It was just him. Just this.
My gaze dropped to his mouth—those perfectly shaped lips that I’d been trying very hard not to notice these past weeks. The way they parted slightly as his breathing quickened. The cleft in his chin, just below them, and my fingers curled involuntarily, wanting to feel the dip beneath my thumb.
“D-do you want to k-kiss me?” I stammered, the words tumbling out before I could stop them.
Holy shit. My brain short-circuited. Fried. Exploded. Did I really just say that?! Had I fully lost my mind? What an incredibly ridiculous thing to ask.
Abort programme. Abort programme.
Kit’s hand fell to his side. His eyes went wide, searching my face as if he couldn’t quite believe what he’d heard. The moment suspended, loaded with possibility and terror in equal measure.
Say something, I urged him silently. Anything. Put me out of my misery.
At last, he spoke.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, Felix.” His hand reached over to brush the hair from my forehead with heartbreaking gentleness, but his expression was pure anguish. The kind of sadness that seeped into your soul.
My heart dropped like a stone. What was I thinking? But then why did Kit look so… torn? Like he was fighting himself?
“Why not?” I squeaked, probably sounding about thirteen years old.
Kit blinked twice, slowly, as if gathering courage. “Because I think a single taste of you will be my undoing.”
I couldn’t help but gasp, a strange heat flooding my entire body. What does that even mean? But the way he said it, low and rough… my pulse hammered against my throat.
“But… but you said we’re soulmates,” I said.
A flickering of various emotions seemed to fracture across Kit’s face, before he became almost stern. “Is that the only reason you want to kiss me?”
The question took me by surprise. I opened my mouth, to shout, “No!” at him, then snapped it shut again.
Wait. Is it? The thought made my chest tight with panic. Am I only interested because of some supernatural bond? Because the universe decided for me? The idea made me feel sick, like my feelings weren’t even my own.
I thought about it. Really thought about it.
“I was really enjoying spending time with you, before… before the SEVENTEEN gig,” I said slowly. “Our training sessions. And… the times we spent together outside of them.”
I tried to imagine an alternate universe where none of this craziness had ever happened, where Kit had never stalked me, never confessed that I was his soulmate in that broken voice on a London street. Would I have developed feelings for him anyway?
It was hard to picture. Not because he wasn’t attractive—God, he was incredibly handsome in a way that made my brain stutter—but because I never would have imagined someone like Kit being interested in someone like me.
I would have been too intimidated to even consider the possibility. Too convinced he was out of my league.
Yet, as I stared at Kit’s face, things clicked into place.
Solidified. This was the man who’d been quietly taking care of me since my first day at Killigrew Street.
Who’d stumbled through tea deliveries and raincoat offers with endearing awkwardness, who’d launched to my defence in meetings until I’d found the confidence to speak up myself.
Who’d made me feel safe in a way I’d never experienced before.
Kit had said that I was brilliant and kind and funny and anyone would be lucky to have me. But I was nothing compared to him.
Oh. The realisation hit me like a system crash.
I’ve been attracted to him for ages. All those times I’d caught myself staring when he rolled his sleeves up, admiring the corded muscles in his forearms. How my pulse quickened whenever he leaned over my shoulder to look at my screens, his presence solid and reassuring behind me.
“And now?” Kit asked quietly. “Are you enjoying spending time with me now?”
I nodded, suddenly unable to speak around the tightness in my throat. More than enjoying it. Being here with him felt right in a way that had nothing to do with supernatural bonds and everything to do with how he looked at me like I was something very precious.
Kit didn’t look convinced.
“I am!” I protested, and he smiled—a small, sad thing that didn’t reach his eyes.
He doesn’t believe me.
A tragic realisation struck me. There was no way Kit was going to kiss me. Not after everything that had happened. He wouldn’t let himself, wouldn’t cross that line. Too much guilt, too much fear of taking advantage, of being the monster he’d convinced himself he was.
But suddenly, desperately, I wanted to know what those lips would feel like against mine. What his beard would feel like scraping against my cheek. The thought sent the butterflies inside me frantic. Sent that heat through me again—unfamiliar and startling, but something I wanted to hold onto.
This is mad. I’d never felt anything like this before. This wanting that seemed to originate somewhere impossibly deep. Like every part of me was reaching towards him.
“So, just to check,” I said, picking at the moss beside me to give my hands something to do. “With the mate stuff, do wolves always feel attracted to their mate? Like… um… sexually?” My face may as well have been on fire. “Or can it be, like, platonic or something?”
Smooth, Felix. Really smooth.
Kit’s laughter rang through the trees, rich and warm. “Felix, are you trying to ask if I find you attractive?”
“Maybe?” I grimaced, praying that the roots of the trees would reach out and drag me into the earth.
Kit’s hand cupped my face, thumb stroking across my cheekbone with devastating tenderness. His gaze grew serious, almost reverent.
“You’re absolutely bloody gorgeous,” he said, his voice low, and deeply sincere.
What. My brain flatlined. Kit thought I was gorgeous? Me? That can’t be right.
“So beautiful it actually hurts to look at you sometimes. And I find it hard to stop looking at you. Even the little things, like the way the light catches in your eyes when you’re concentrating on your screens at work.
That tiny smile when you solve a tricky problem.
How you bite your bottom lip when you’re thinking or worried.
” His thumb traced the line of my jaw. “It’s the way of the world, isn’t it?
That the most lovely people never know how lovely they are. ”
I swallowed, hard. The forest spun dizzying circles around us, Kit’s words making everything else fade to static. If it wasn’t for his hand on my face, I’d surely float away.
He’s been watching me. The thought should have been alarming, but instead it sent a warm glow flooding through me. He notices things about me. Not just the obvious stuff, but small details I didn’t even know I did.
“Since the day I met you, everyone else has been just… this colourless blur to me. Whereas you—” He stopped abruptly, his hand freezing against my skin. “You’re everything bright and real. You’re everything I never thought I deserved to want.”
Everything he never thought he deserved.
There it was—that same self-doubt that plagued me, reflected back.
How can he think he doesn’t deserve good things?
Kit, who was brave and strong and had probably saved more lives than I could count.
Who’d quietly looked after me from the moment I’d stumbled into Killigrew Street. Who made me feel safe.
I wanted to prove him wrong. Wanted to show him that he deserved everything good in the world.
And maybe I deserve something good too.
And then, because words felt inadequate for what I was feeling.
Because I needed him to know he deserved to be wanted just as desperately as he wanted me.
And because I couldn’t live another moment without knowing what his lips felt like against mine.
I kissed him.