THIRTY-SIX #2
“Seoul,” I tell her honestly, giving her another piece. “My family left South Korea when I was young enough that I could adjust.”
Her expression shifts slightly, but not with pity. More like curiosity, maybe. It’s careful and really badly hidden, proven when she asks, “You miss it?”
I peer through the cracked glass, at the long-dead vines that climb the frame, and the ruined compound lights past them. Then I tell her softly, “I miss what I remember. Not really sure that’s the same thing, though.”
Dakota grows quiet for a heavy moment. Not the kind of quiet that means she has nothing to say, but more like the kind that means she’s choosing whether to touch that particular bruise or leave it alone. Then her gaze drops to my hand and she says, “You said that like remembering hurts.”
“It does.”
Her throat moves with a harsh swallow. “Yeah. I get that.”
I know. I know because it’s written in the way she holds herself. In the way she flinches from softness and still decides to reach for it anyway. But the words settle between us with something like honesty, just a little rough around the edges.
She looks away first, but she doesn’t step back.
Instead, she steps closer. One step, and then another.
“I don’t want to be handled carefully,” she says quietly.
“I know.”
“I’m not a crystal glass,” she adds.
“No, you’re not.”
“I won’t shatter just because someone touches me.”
“No, you won’t,” I promise her.
“Then touch me.”
The words are quiet, but not unsure. They’re just raw enough that I force myself to breathe once before answering. “Where?”
Her pupils widen and I see the exact moment the question reaches her. Not if, not why, not are you sure in that fake way people ask when they’ve already decided what answer they want.
Where.
Her choice. Her body. Her rules.
Dakota swallows before answering. “My face.”
I lift my hand slowly. Slow enough that she can move away at any second, bite me, mock me, or even pretend this was all a biological blunder she’ll pretend never even happened later. But she doesn’t do any of those things, and so my fingers touch her cheek.
Her skin is warm under the pale patches, softer than the violence she wears so well. She closes her eyes at once, angry about it. I only know because her mouth tightens like she’s deeply and personally offended by her own nervous system.
I keep my touch light and without an ounce of pity. I don’t worship, I simply provide attention, and she releases a shaky breath before whispering, “Again.”
So I give her my other hand too, cupping her face between my palms. And this time, she leans into it. It’s only a fraction, but it’s enough.
Her hands reach out and fist in my shirt, and I work very hard not to react in any way other than to tell her, “You can say no.”
Her eyes open. “If you ruin this by being weird and noble, I’ll actually scream.”
“I’m not noble.”
“You absolutely have the bone structure of someone annoyingly noble.”
“I’ll do my best to get past it,” I assure her, and a small sound scrapes out of her. It’s almost a laugh, but I can’t fully appreciate it because the next moment her mouth is on mine.
It’s not gentle, because Dakota doesn’t kiss like she’s asking permission from the world to want something. She kisses like she’s finally taking back the territory she thought was taken from her.
I let her set the pace for roughly three heartbeats. Then four. And then five. Her fingers twist in my shirt and her mouth opens under mine, hot and demanding. The first taste of her sends a wave of hunger through me, bringing her scent with it.
Wild honey.
Rain.
Grief and daggers.
Softness with a knife hidden in one boot.
I want her. The wanting is so immediate and deep that it’s dangerous, so I slow down. I don't stop, and I don’t pull away, I simply slow down. I kiss her like time still exists. Like there isn’t an emergency in wanting her, no cliff edge daring us to fall over, and no debt that is owed to pain.
One of my hands remains at her jaw, cupping gently, and the other slides to her waist before stopping there. Dakota makes an impatient sound before pulling away enough to mutter against my mouth, “I said touch me.”
“I am touching you,” I point out.
“More.”
“Where?”
She exhales against my mouth, slightly furious and very shaken.
Then she takes my hand and drags it under the hem of her shirt.
Her skin pulses under my palm, and so does mine, because there’s no armor here.
There’s no bandana, no smoke, and no dirt.
It’s just Dakota, warm and breathing, letting me touch her in places where survival hasn’t turned her to steel.
I kiss her again, slower this time, and her fingers crawl into my hair. Mine spread over her ribs, cautious of bruises, old injuries, and fresh pain. When my thumbs brush the underside of her breast, she bites my lower lip hard enough to make the message clear.
Don’t treat me like porcelain.
I completely understand it and I don’t waste another second. I lift her onto the edge of the closest workbench, and she makes a surprised sound into my mouth before wrapping one leg around my hip like she’s decided to pay me back for being useful.
The hat sits on the planter bed behind her and I notice it instantly. She notices me noticing and, for a second, Maine is in the room with us. Not his body, obviously, but his absence. His return. The painfully fresh bruise of him that makes Dakota’s expression change.
I stop and she glares. “Don’t.”
“I’m not stopping because you’re sad,” I assure her softly.
“Then why?”
“Because I won’t be that person who uses your sadness to get closer to you,” I explain with enough honesty that her eyes search mine for a long moment.
I see the anger in them. The terror. The want.
Then she says, “You’re already close.”
“I am.”
“Closer, then.”
I drop my forehead to hers gently, then breathe, “Say it in a way that you own.”
Her breathing comes fast between us and her hands tremble once in my hair.
Then they still and she confesses, “I want you, Xeon. Not because I’m broken.
Not because he came back. And not because I need to forget it all.
It’s because I want something soft that doesn’t look at me like I’m teasing the edge of death. ”
And that has my control breaking apart quietly. Not enough to hurt her, but enough to show on my face.
Her eyes darken when she sees it, and with a dangerous little whisper, she says, “There you are.”
I kiss her again and this time I’m not careful about it.
This time, when her hands tug at my shirt, I let her take it off.
Her palms skim my chest, my shoulders, and my back.
There’s nothing timid or tentative about it.
She’s all curiosity and hunger as she maps scars without asking about them, and I think I love her a little for the silence.
I remove her jacket after that. Her shirt quickly follows when she raises her arms, leaving her bare under the grow lights with her pale hair loose, vitiligo bright over her pretty olive skin, and bruises and old scars etched into her skin like messages the world has never been invited to read before.
She lifts her chin with a dare, and I look.
Not pitying.
Not flinching.
Not turning her body into some kind of tragedy.
Want lashes through me, low and consuming, and I tell her, “You’re beautiful.”
Her eyes narrow. “That’s a dangerous thing to say to a woman with a knife close by.”
“You’re also armed,” I amend.
“That’s more like it.”
I smile against her throat, and that undoes her way more than the compliment. Her breath stutters when my mouth brushes her skin. Neck. Shoulder. Collarbone. I kiss every single place she lets me touch, and when I find the edge of a pale patch over her ribs, I feel her go still.
I pause but her fingers tighten in my hair with a whispered, “Don’t stop.”
So I don’t. I kiss that pale patch, but not differently. It’s the same pressure, the same heat, and the same burning want that scalds under my skin.
Dakota’s head tips back and the sound she makes is quiet enough that someone else might have missed it. I don’t. I’m going to remember that sound until the day I die.
When I stand next, her hands reach for my belt, and mine cover hers. “Dakota.”
She huffs a little breath before she says, “If you ask me if I’m sure one more time, I’m going to lose my mind.”
“I was just going to say there’s no bite tonight unless you ask for one,” I tell her, and the words make her still.
She looks at me then. Really looks at me.
There are rules in our bodies that are far older than any language.
Alpha. Omega. Want. Claim. Need dressed up as destiny by people who enjoy cages so long as they appear ceremonial.
I want my mouth on her throat. I want my teeth in her skin.
I want to knot her so badly that my control is rapidly growing thin around the edges. But wanting is not permission.
Her gaze drops between us, then lifts again, bright with understanding.
“No bite,” she says.
“No bite,” I agree easily.
Her fingers tighten around my belt. “And your knot?”
The words are quiet, but they don’t shake even once. My breath leaves me very carefully as I tell her, “Only if you want it.”
Her mouth twists. “That’s not always how bodies work.”
“No,” I agree. “It’s not.”
Because an Omega lock can happen without permission from pride, logic, or fear. Biology is an ancient language with really bad manners. Her body can pull mine deeper, hold me there, and make leaving impossible until the knot goes down.
That thought burns through me but I keep my hands still.
“I won’t force it,” I swear. “And if your body locks around mine, I’ll stay with you. I won’t turn it into some claim, or turn it into ownership. I’ll stay because you chose me before your instincts got too loud.”
Dakota grows quiet. Then, softer, she says, “No bite.”
“No bite,” I assure her.
“And if I lock?”
“Then I stay.”
“If you knot?”
“I stay.”
Her eyes flicker then. Trust, just as sharp as shattered glass.