Chapter 21 #2
At his bare chest. At the dragon coiling across his ribs like a living thing.
At the muscle in his shoulders that had carried so much for so long.
At the brown of his eyes that had gone almost black when he asked me if I wanted him to kill a pregnant woman, and had gone soft again the moment I said no.
At the mouth that called me Tora the way nobody had ever called me anything in my whole life.
He was about to leave this island and walk into a war with Hiro beside him. With Reo coordinating on the other side. With the Fangs and Claws at his back and front.
And I loved them all, every single one of them.
I wanted every last one of them to come home.
But Kenji most of all because. . .he now lived in a place within my heart, my soul that no man had ever even touched. He had moved into it without asking permission, set down his bags, hung his coat, and absolutely claimed it.
I cannot live without him. I just. . .can’t. . .
The thought arrived, and I waited to see if it scared me.
It didn't.
It was the truest thing I had ever known about myself.
I had spent my whole life as a woman who could survive anything.
I had survived loss. I had survived loneliness.
I had survived being underestimated by every room I had ever walked into.
I had survived being the strong friend, the calm one, the one who held everybody else together with hands that nobody ever thought to hold back.
I had been a Black woman in a world that had not been built with my softness in mind, and I had still somehow made softness anyway.
I could survive a lot of things in this fucked up life, but I could not survive Kenji not coming back.
And. . .I was slowly realizing that this feeling was not weakness. It was not a woman losing herself in a man.
It was a grown woman who had loved enough wrong men in her life to recognize when she had finally found the right one.
If he didn't make it home, I would not be living anyway.
Sure, I would be a body still walking, a voice still answering, a woman still pretending. Going through motions. Smiling at people. Putting one foot in front of the other through a life that had lost its actual reason.
No. . .I can’t. . .
If the rite tied me to him, then the rite was just naming what was already true.
My soul had already chosen.
The earth was just being asked to witness.
I shivered. “I’ve got to do it.”
“You don’t have to do it.”
“I want to give you every single thing in my body, my blood, my soul, my magic, my prayers, any and everything so that you can come back to me.”
“That could happen without you tying your soul to me.”
“You already have my soul.”
He gave me a sad smile. “I want you to spend the rest of this day thinking about this—”
“I don’t need to spend any more time thinking about it. If your dragon-shadow can fight beside you, then let’s do it. He’s huge now too.”
Kenji pursed his lips.
“So huge that he could probably weaken tons of men.” I bobbed my head. “And if you can see people’s deaths coming, then fuck. . .you can stop them.”
“I would try my best.”
“My Roar, Fangs, and Claws would come home.”
“Your Roar, Fangs, and Claws?”
“You heard me. Let’s do it. That’s worth my life.”
His smile left him. “It’s not.”
“Kenji. . .”
“I want the advantage, but I don’t want you harmed.”
“I don’t want to live without you.” My eyes watered. “I don’t. . .”
He looked away from me.
“I don’t Kenji. I really don’t. I want to wake up to your arms. . .every fucking day for the rest of my life. And if I couldn’t. . .” A tear left my eyes. “Then, I don’t want to wake up. . .”
He closed his eyes.
I wiped the tear from my face. “I’m just telling you the truth.”
“Tora. . .” He opened his eyes and put his gaze on me. “You’re still young. Beautiful. Intelligent. You’re fucking. . .amazing. If I. . .if I was killed. . .there are things that I have already had Reo put in place to take care of you while I’m gone. . .”
“I would just be a zombie without you. There is no man on this planet that could ever replace you. And even if there was. . .I don’t want him. . .”
Kenji went still.
Another tear left my eye.
He reached up and wiped it away.
I sniffled. “You don’t want me to do it?”
“Of course I want you to do it, but that is the selfish part of me—”
“Or it’s the part of you that knows how powerful our love is. How strong we could get if we come together.”
“Tora. . .this next battle. . .it will be deadly. In the last one, we left Yoshiwara Depths because things got murky. This one. . .we don’t leave until my father is dead.”
I shivered.
“That means no matter who dies or how many die, we move forward. We search and kill. We don't fucking turn around as we drip blood and exhaustion fills us.”
Horror rose within me. “We’re going to do this. You said the full moon is tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Then, we do it tonight.”
“We have tomorrow night too—”
"You all are close to getting your father's location.
For all we know, you all may leave tomorrow.
I want you protected. I want all the magic that we can figure out and muster.
I want to do the Burial Ritual and any other ritual that's out there.
" I took a breath. "I'll fucking bleed on your guns.
I'll bleed on your knives. I just want you coming back to me. "
He sat up too and ran his fingers through his hair. “What if there are other consequences?”
“What if there are other gifts?”
He blinked.
“Shoot. Maybe a tiger-shadow comes out of me and now I come to the battle too and fuck everybody up along with you all.”
A sad smile spread across his face. “Tiger-shadow or not, I would never let you come.”
“That wouldn’t be your decision.”
“Actually, it would. You may not know this, but. . .I’m considered a pretty important person on this island.”
“Well. . .” I shrugged. “I’ve never heard of you.”
“Tora. . .” He stared at me and fear rose in his eyes. “Doing this. . .scares me.”
I blinked.
“I could cut myself, jump into danger. I can risk my life, but your life. . .it’s too important. And we have to think about the fact that our child can be growing within your womb right now—”
“Kenji, I’m not pregnant. So, let’s just calm down with that—”
“You might be—”
“I’m not. It’s called birth control.”
He frowned. “We should talk about you stopping whatever birth control you’re on too.”
“How about we talk about that after the Burial Ritual, the DNA test, and you know what else?”
He quirked his brows. “What?”
“The war, Kenji. Perhaps, let’s put all your focus on winning the war before bringing in kids.”
His frown deepened.
On the night stand, his phone rang.
Sighing, he leaned that way, picked it up, and answered. “Yes?”
He listened intently for a few minutes and then he nodded. “Get everyone into the War Room.”
I raised my eyebrows as he set the phone down. “What’s going on?”
“We finally have my father’s location.”