Prologue Navy Achebe
As moonlight spilled through Honor's bedroom window, I found myself lost in thought about what the future held for us.
Come sunrise, everything was going to change for the two of us, and that scared me more than I wanted to admit.
In the five years I'd known Honor, he'd become my best friend.
We shared secrets, snuck glances, and became whatever the other needed when they needed it.
He'd somehow entered my world and became the center of it.
Five years of knowing him wasn't enough. I needed more. I craved more.
More of his daunting silence, more of his storm-brewing orbs crashing into my calm ones, and more of his presence, throwing my pulse out of whack.
I yearned for Honor, not in the way a girl did for her crush, but I ached to know him in all the ways no one else cared to.
Knowing Honor wasn't easy. It came with accepting that he ran with demons he no longer felt the need to outrun.
It happened the day we met, the day he jammed the gun against his head, finger itching to press down and…
boom, blow himself away. Few were willing to deal with that kind of trauma because it wasn't a one-off.
Something like wanting to take your own life, lived with you for years to come.
At the time, I was ten and had no business running out of the house screaming for him not to do it.
If Lucian were a better father, he might've yanked me back the moment I wrapped my arms around Honor.
He didn't, and the burden of that haunted me.
I didn't have a clue what any of it meant, but I did it because my young heart wouldn't allow me to stand by while a boy robbed himself of his future.
"I'm Navy by the way."
"Honor."
Staring at my reflection in the window, I still heard the childlike version of his voice.
Even back then, it carried a pain I couldn't relate to but felt each time he spoke.
Through the glass, I watched my cheeks flush at the thought of him.
That's the effect he had on me, even in his absence.
Honor made me feel things that words couldn't fully explain.
Feelings that lived in the space between a breath and a heartbeat, because with him, it was never about what was said, but solely about how everything felt.
I always felt him… all of him.
That man… he was surely too young to be labeled a man, but that's what the game of life deemed him.
He moved across the board, carrying a secret too heavy to tell.
Every move was intentional, even the ones my father forced on him.
Each step, a stroke against the canvas of a bigger picture, meant only for him to interpret.
His solace… detachment. He wore it like armor, keeping himself unattached, unloved, and untethered to anyone or anything that might've made him feel.
I hated that for him because all he ever did was make me feel, at the same time, I understood.
Only a year older, Honor already lived a life that mirrored that of a man twice his age.
Lucian was to blame, but so were the pieces of his past that haunted him at night.
Pieces that brought him to my room whenever I spent weekends at Lucian's.
Beyond the secrets he shared, I listened to everything he didn't say.
I studied the language of his silence. The way his body tensed in moments where love should've bloomed, but chaos had already planted its roots.
I wanted to change that for him and dig up those roots, planting new ones that would pull him from the depths and push him to the surface.
That's why I am here now. I had fifteen minutes to find my voice.
Once the day flipped and it became Honor's birthday, things would never be the same.
I overheard my father speaking to Chance a few weeks ago about Honor moving into a group home in Gravehart Grove. I started to rush in, ready to beg my father to let Honor stay, but something in me wouldn't allow my feet to move.
I stood outside his office, listening as he told Chance that Honor was going to run drugs through the group home and build a team.
Chance snorted at the plan, believing it should've been him taking over Gravehart Grove instead of Honor.
Chance was underestimating Honor. My father saw that and corrected him.
"Why would I send my right hand into a graveyard to dig for bones?" Lucian quizzed. The callousness of his tone, even though it wasn't directed toward me, made me flinch.
"Why not?" Chance challenged. "You need someone there who can handle those savages. Honor isn't ready."
"You are watching my mouth move yet refuse to listen to anything coming out of it.
This is why you will never enter rooms as my equal but as a man who trails three paces behind.
Honor is from Gravehart Grove. His roots are embedded there, whether he knows it or not.
He understands the hustle of that grim city.
Beyond that, he has a story. Tragedy punished him, as it has many of the boys in that group home.
Do you understand the kind of power that holds?
" Lucian paused, giving Chance the opportunity to display more of his stupidity.
"Yes, but he's not—"
"No!" Lucian barked, followed by a loud slam. His hands, I guess, were hitting the oak of his desk. "All I am hearing is envy when you speak, and still, you fail to listen. Do yourself a favor and rid yourself of it, or marrying my son will be the least of Chosyn's worries."
"You promised that as long as I got her to marry Talon, she wouldn't be harmed." Each word rattled with anger that Chance knew better than to release.
"I did. I also told you to train her, so she'll be a killer. Her being a wife is helpful, but I'd hate for her talents to go to waste. Maybe I can link her with Honor and turn her into—"
I slammed my eyes shut before he could finish.
My throat ached with a scream I couldn't let out.
Honor couldn't be tied to anyone when he was barely holding himself together.
My hands trembled, my chest tightened, and for a moment I felt like I couldn't breathe.
My body went numb until I heard Honor's soothing ghostlike rasp invade my mental space.
"Calm down, Navy. You're too good to get caught up in the horrors of this mansion. Breathe for me. Breathe."
I hummed, as Honor taught me, whenever I had one of my attacks.
My father liked to think I was being dramatic, but Honor understood and coached me through my attacks whenever he could.
I slowly unclenched my jaw, and a shuddering breath pulled back the panic.
Taking one last deep breath, I forced myself to continue listening.
"Shared pain is a strange kind of glue. It seals cracks between people, binding them with the memory of surviving together."
"So, you want him to go there to trauma bond?" Chance foolishly asked. He didn't understand what my father was saying, but I did.
"Trauma forges loyalty in the same way fire tempers steel. Honor will create his team through the pain that brought them to Gravehart Homes, and their desperate need to not shatter alone."
"Navy, what are you doing in my room?" My name falling from Honor's lips lugged me from the spiral of my own mind.
"I'm bringing in your birthday with you," I softly answered. "This is the first one we get to spend together since it's on a weekend."
"Come on, Navy. I already told you birthdays aren't deep for me. It's just another year spent surviving in a world I'm not even sure I wanna be a part of."
"I hate that you feel that way."
Moving away from the window, I walked around his bed to meet him where he felt most comfortable… the shadows. Literally and figuratively, Honor found comfort in the places he didn't belong, almost like he couldn't see his own light or believed it didn't exist.
"What you doing, Navy?"
My hand slipped into his, our fingers meeting at the tips. His touch felt cold, rough, unloved. I hated that for him. What Honor couldn't see in himself, I saw at ten.
"I want to celebrate you, Honor," I whispered.
"I don't deserve a celebration. Ain't shit good about me," he groaned, stepping back and taking his touch with him.
"Honor," I called out.
"Nah, Navy. You gotta go." Honor grabbed the bedroom door, yanking it open wider than it already was. "Lucian and Chance are probably on their way back here anyway. You shouldn't be in here."
"They're not coming back tonight. I overheard Chance say they have business in Crimson Falls and won't be back until tomorrow afternoon."
"Cool, but you still gotta go."
"Why?"
My eyes frantically searched for his under the glow of the moon. It spilled through the window, bathing his face in its glimmer but never touching his eyes. Dark, detached, and lifeless, they tore into me, begging me to admit just how worthless he was.
"Navy," he groaned, rubbing his hand down his face.
"Don't do that! Don't call my name like I'm doing something wrong."
"You are Navy! You fucking are!"
"How? What am I doing wrong?" I yelled, refusing to back down.
"Every-fucking-thing! I shouldn't even be here. I didn't want to be here. I was straight with—"
I rushed Honor, throwing my arms around him, disrupting his haunting thoughts.
"Don't say it," I mumbled into his chest. Honor had height, but so did I.
"Navy." His hands gripped my arms, tearing them from around him.
"Honor, don't do this!" I cried. "Please don't do this!"
"Nah, you don't fucking do this, Navy!" he barked back.
"Honor!"
My hands grabbed the pocket of his hoodie.
"Navy, chill!"
He tore me away from him.
"Honor!"
I grabbed him.
"Navy."
He pulled me off.
"Honor, please!"
I grabbed him.
"Navy, don't."
He pulled me off.
"Honor!"
This time, I wasn't fast enough to grab him. He scooped me up, tossing me onto his bed.
"Don't get up, Navy," he warned.
"Why? Why don't you want me to fight for you?"