18. Say It
Say It
The next day at the market, Hazel shows up as the day is winding down to drop off some merchandise.
“Why do you keep looking at me?” I finally demand after thirty minutes of her flicking her eyes over to me like I’m some sort of fancy museum exhibit.
Her smile is conspiratorial, as if we were just gabbing about a secret. “I . . . Well, I got home early last night, and I may have accidentally overheard part of your conversation with Grandma.”
Fucking shit.
“Leave it alone,” I demand.
Drop it, Hazel. Please drop it.
“Is he really? Is Ash really . . .” She trails off.
She’s not going to drop it.
I huff a frustrated breath. “What? Is he what?”
All the good feelings from my conversation with Grandma fall away, leaving the twisted anger and fear that burn like flame in my gut. I’m not ready to share this with her. I purposely didn’t share this with her, and crossing my boundaries like this is bullshit.
“Is he your soulmate?”
I cringe at the word. I’m not a liar, but I know what she’ll say.
She’ll tell me that I deserve love, that I deserve what she and Noah have.
It’ll be meant as a compliment, but it isn’t one.
Do I deserve to lose the one I love? To turn into a monster because I got the person I love kidnapped or killed?
I like to think I don’t deserve that.
The scent of warm fire, evergreen trees, and musk overwhelms me. Fuck.
“Answer her.”
I turn to find Ash standing there, radiating palpable frustration. His normally evergreen eyes are a forest in the middle of a storm.
I can’t force air from my lungs—no words or breath. I’m consumed by the myriad of emotions pouring off him. The cautious optimism that flutters around him like fireflies at dusk. The frustration of being held at arm’s length. The longing that clenches his fists.
“Answer her, Goldilocks,” he repeats, his voice trembling just a tad.
Shit.
I open and close my mouth a few times. My silence is more powerful than anything I could’ve said.
Hazel’s mouth falls open as she watches the exchange, as she watches Ash take one single step forward.
“Hazel, I need a moment with her.” Ash turns to my sister. “Please.”
“Are you okay with that?” she asks me quietly.
Now she’s considerate of my feelings. Now, when she’s already done a world of damage.
I nod.
Despite not wanting to face this conversation, despite being forced before I was ready, I know I’m safe with Ash.
She leaves, closing the flap of the tent behind her to give us some semblance of privacy. But I know those old biddies now. We’ll be the topic of gossip for days.
“I knew there was something different between us.” His body trembles. “I knew what we have is more than anything I’ve ever felt in my life. The way I’m drawn to you, the way I’ve memorized the cadence of your voice. My entire being is yours and I’ve barely touched you.”
I take a small step backward. I’m not ready for this.
I can’t.
“Do you know how often I think about touching you? Goldilocks, I swear to fuck I am a man possessed by the idea of simply holding your hand. And here you are, knowing exactly what we are to each other. I suspected, sure, but with how hard you pushed me away I was half-convinced I was insane. Were you ever going to tell me?”
I take another small step back.
“Say something!” he begs, hope and desperation dripping from every word. “Anything!”
“You’re my soulmate,” I whisper into the tent. I admit the one thing I’ve been trying to avoid since the moment he first touched me. Because it doesn’t change anything.
It doesn’t matter.
His hand covers his heart, rubbing at his thick flannel as if he could soothe the ache on his own. “I knew it.”
We stare at each other. Absorb the heaviness, the weight of us.
“How long have you known?” he asks.
I’m not surprised he has questions. I just really don’t want to fucking answer them. I don’t want to keep hurting him. I just wanted to stay away.
But no! Grandma had to force me to open this stupid booth, and he had to keep coming around after I kept trying to set boundaries.
“Since the first time you touched me. Since fall.”
“For months?” Betrayal flashes in his eyes. He takes a cautious step forward. Just one, but it feels like so much more. “You’ve known for months, and you . . . You really were never going to tell me. You were going to keep going on with your life and never say a goddamn word. Why?”
Anger swoops up into my throat. “Because it’s what I decided to do. I’m an adult and I made a decision about my life. I don’t answer to you!”
“No.” He advances again as if he needs to be close to me.
Needs the reassurance of my presence and warmth just as much as I need his.
But he’s still a few feet away. “You sure as hell don’t answer to me, Goldilocks, but you made a decision about our lives.
You don’t get to make decisions that include me without even the courtesy of a discussion. ”
“Do you feel so much better now?” I step forward, closing the distance one extra foot, scrabbling for control over this conversation.
“Do you feel better knowing that you’re my soulmate and I didn’t tell you?
That I didn’t want to tell you? Is it better than me suffering in fucking silence?
Is both of us suffering with the weight of this really that much better? ”
His chuckle is low and full of pain. “As if I wasn’t already suffering. At least now I know why.”
I blink back the stinging in my eyes. The pain in my chest begs me to run to him. To let him hold me and take care of me. To soothe away this awfulness.
He’s there, wiping away the first tear before it can even fall. Electricity pulses from his skin through mine, wrenching a gasp from both of us.
“You don’t get to make decisions for me anymore. Going forward, we make decisions together,” he says.
I shake my head. I know I’m right. Aren’t I?
I won’t turn into my mom. And what if it was the opposite? What would it do to him if I were the one he lost?
“I am so fucking pissed at you,” he growls, leaning his forehead against mine. “For trying to take this from us. For doing it without thinking I deserved to know. I’ve never been angrier.”
Everything I’ve been trying to avoid—all the pain I tried to keep from him—is right there on his face. All my plans and hopes are dissolved in the blink of an eye.
“I’m not sorry for trying to protect you from this,” I whisper.
“And I’m not sorry either.”
Before I can ask for what, his hand comes up to cradle my cheek. The soft action contrasts with the rough calluses on his hand from all the woodwork. With one last breath, his lips press to mine.
And the world melts away.
His full lips are gentle, but the anger is there simmering under the surface. A grunt is my only warning before my back is pressed against the wood beam holding the tent up.
I dig my fingers into his shoulders, needing him closer. The hand on my cheek slips down to my neck, thumb rubbing against my pulse point.
My mind is liquid. All I know is his body, his touch, the electric current running between our bodies, making everything that much more sensitive. I think I’d come apart if he touched me anywhere else.
My mouth opens at his nip to my lower lip, and he delves inside.
Why did I ever not want this?
“See, Goldilocks?” His mouth moves down my neck, nibbling and sucking. “You feel that? You fucking belong to me, and I never want to hear you say anything otherwise.”
I am a woman possessed. I hike my leg up to his waist and he grabs it, grinding me into the harsh wooden pole at my back.
“Say it, Goldilocks. Say you belong to me and I’ll show you exactly what you’ve been missing.” He bites my neck.
Words? My body rolls against his, feeling every inch of his hard, muscular body. What I wouldn’t give to feel the power he must have.
“Say it, and I’ll kneel before you. I’ll worship you in the middle of this tent for the entire fucking market to hear. I’ll let you ride my tongue until you cum so hard it tears this world in half.”
I moan at the way my nipples harden, brushing against his chest. Too much. It’s too much.
He pulls away just a fraction, keeping my leg up in his hand. His smile is triumphant. “Say it.”
“I’m yours.”
I’m yours.
The words fly out of my mouth at his demand and there’s no way to take them back.
Ash’s hand caresses my thigh, mapping out every part of me he can. “Let me taste you. Please.”
I take his face in my hands, forcing his lips back to mine. I want to enjoy the blissful emptiness of my mind before the doubts come back.
His beard scratches against my skin in the most delightful burn, his touch like a brand. I’ll never be the same.
“You’ve driven me mad,” he whispers in my ear, sucking on the lobe. “You’ve driven me half-mad.”
You have no idea what madness is.
Madness is touching the one person in this world you want more than anything and still fearing every second of it. Of having your soulmate in your arms and trembling with terror.
“Shut up,” I snap, digging my fingers into his hair. “No more words, for fuck’s sake.”
His mouth is harsh as he nips and sucks at my neck, bruising my skin. I’ll have marks for days and I can’t bring myself to regret the possessiveness in each one.
Fingers play with the button of my jeans, digging in just a bit to tease the sensitive skin there. His eyes meet mine, not needing to voice the question behind them.
My breaths come in heavy pants, but my mind has cleared enough that panic has seeped in. I don’t break our connection, liquid-emerald pools watching me as if I’m both the bane of his existence and his redemption.
“I have . . .” I swallow, my mouth suddenly dry as desert sand. “I have dinner with my family. I have to go.”
Annoyance flickers across his eyes before he takes a deep breath. “We have to talk about this.”
“We will. We will, I just have to go. I have to.”
My heart speeds up as anxiety threatens to swallow me. I can’t be here.
“There’s no air in here!” I exclaim, breaking out of his hold. I run to the tent flap and throw it open, taking in deep breaths of the outside world.
He stands there, his arms still up in the same position, as if my reaction has surprised him so much he can’t move. It probably has.
I’m fully aware I’m acting absolutely illogically. I’m erratic and panic-ridden and I have to get out of here.
I can’t stand the way he’s staring at me, the way I’ve done exactly what I promised myself I wouldn’t.
And the way most of me doesn’t regret it. Most of me wants to run back to his arms.
“Laura,” he says, all the pain and misery in the world in one single word. In the name he never uses.
My knees wobble as I stare out at the market, not truly seeing anything. I can’t imagine what I must look like to everyone.
“Please,” I say, turning to him. “Please, Ash.”
“After dinner? After dinner with your family can we talk?”
I should say no. But I crossed the line today, and he deserves some sort of explanation as to why this can’t continue. Why I have to be stronger now, despite knowing it’ll be that much harder.
I nod. “I’ll text you.”
“Will you really?”
The doubt is fair, but it hurts nonetheless.
“Yes, I promise. I don’t go back on promises.”
My skin aches in each spot he touched me as we simply watch each other from opposite sides of the tent. I wish his soulmate could’ve been someone safer for him.
“I’ll find you even if you do.”
Despite everything, the corner of my mouth lifts in a half smile. “I know you will.”
From the way that man looks at me, I know he would follow me into the depths of Hell and back. And that’s what terrifies me.