Chapter 17 Enough is （Not） Enough
Jaxon
Our time in the Shadow Realm is a total and complete misery. Not just because of all the bullshit we have to go through with the Shadow Queen, though that’s certainly a part of it.
And not because of the damn concert Hudson and I had to put on just to get the woman’s attention, though that was definitely miserable.
And it’s absolutely not because they renamed the town Vegaville after my obnoxious older brother and built statues in his fucking honor, though that certainly felt like overkill.
No, the real reason our time in the Shadow Realm was fucking miserable is because of Flint “Let Me Torture You Until You Want to Peel Your Skin From Your Bones” Montgomery.
Flint, who right now is sleeping in the bed next to me, his body curled up against mine—his breath hot against my cheek—even though he refuses to look at me when the lights are on.
Flint, who hovers at the edge of every conversation I’m a part of, talking and joking and laughing with everyone else but refusing to say a word to me unless he absolutely has to.
Flint, who sucks up all the oxygen in the room so that every breath I take feels like I’m suffocating—or being strangled.
I’m right to move into position to take the vampire throne so Hudson doesn’t have to. I know I am—he’s sacrificed enough, too much, more than anyone should have to. It’s my turn to sacrifice, especially when doing so will pave the way for Flint to take control of the Dragon Court.
But knowing that doesn’t make it any easier to walk away from Flint—especially when he’s so angry with me. Because right now, when we’re sharing a room instead of telling everyone that he dumped me, it doesn’t feel like I’m right.
In fact, when he’s right in front of me and my fingers itch to touch him and my mouth aches with the need to be kissing him, it sure as hell feels like I’m wrong. There might not be a mating bond between us, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel like there is.
We’re at the Curator’s house now, taking turns watching her ridiculous TV sets and recording incidents happening around the world all in an effort to get the location of the Bittersweet Tree.
Everyone else is dying for this whole fucked-up nightmare to be over—dying to get to that damn tree so we can free Mekhi from the shadow poison once and for all.
I want that, too—of course I do—but I’m also dreading it.
Because once it’s over, once we save Mekhi and go back to our daily lives, there will be no more reason to pretend to be anything but what we are: ex-boyfriends.
The Vampire Court needs someone to take the throne, and Hudson has flat-out refused to do it. Which means I’ve got to step up. But that’s not the only reason I refuse to abdicate.
The truth is, if I give up the throne, then there’s nothing to keep Flint and me from being together.
Nothing, that is, except his own responsibilities.
His own throne. The dragon clans are so determined that I not sit on that throne with him that they’re willing to kill him to make sure I don’t get close to it.
I couldn’t live with myself if Flint loses his throne because of me. But if he loses his life, too? The havoc my father and brother have brought to the dragons will be nothing compared to what I do to them.
There is no easy answer here. Keep the vampire throne and lose Flint. Or abdicate and risk losing him anyway—either to death at the hands of the other dragon clans or to guilt because he let his people down.
I can’t do that to him. I won’t do it. Because he is just idealistic enough, just romantic enough, to choose me. And then regret it for the rest of his life.
Flint belongs at the head of the Dragon Court, and the only way that will happen is if I love him enough to let him go.
And I do. No matter how hard it is not to reach for him in the dark. Or how much I long to press my mouth to his neck just to feel the warm, steady beat of his heart.
The alarm goes off—our turn to take over in TV hell—and Flint jolts awake. I can all but hear his brain roar to life, can feel the moment he realizes that he’s wrapped around me. He stiffens and flings himself away from me so fast he almost falls off the bed.
It’d be insulting if it didn’t hurt so damn much.
“Your virtue is safe with me,” I snarl as I reach a hand out to grab his wrist and keep him from falling ass over teakettle onto the ground.
Okay, so maybe there is some insult mixed in with the hurt.
“It’s not my virtue I’m worried about,” he growls, throwing my hand off and crawling out of bed.
He pauses to flip on the lamp beside the bed before grabbing his crutches and starting his shower routine. He was too busy pretending to be asleep last night to take a shower after me.
I pull on a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt while I wait for the chance to brush my teeth. Fifteen minutes later, the bathroom door finally opens.
“It’s about time—” I start, then break off when I realize he’s wearing nothing but a white towel wrapped around his waist.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.
Tiny rivulets of water run down his heavily muscled chest, making his skin gleam in the dim lamplight. My mouth waters, my fangs exploding in my mouth as I imagine crossing the room and taking a bite—just one long, slow, delicious bite—out of him.
In those moments, I don’t try to hide the need pulsing through me. I don’t think I could even if I wanted to. And Flint—Flint doesn’t try to hide, either. His gorgeous amber eyes meet mine and hold for second after long, lingering second.
I take a step toward him—several steps—before I can stop myself. He smells so good, looks so good, that all I can think about is how he feels. How he tastes. How he sounds when his hands grip my shoulders and his body arches against mine.
A red haze clouds my brain, making me want, need, have to have. Desire floods me, has me aching to touch him, to hold him as I pierce his jugular with my fangs.
Somehow, I don’t know how, I manage to stop myself before I reach him—and reach for him.
But judging by the way his eyes narrow and his mouth tightens, my control only manages to piss Flint off.
Which makes no sense, considering he jumped out of bed this morning like he was terrified to be anywhere near me.
It also makes no sense that even though there’s plenty of room for him to cross between me and the bed, he still manages to brush against me as he passes.
I grit my teeth, try to ignore the way the simple press of his arm against mine sets my entire nervous system to jangling. But then he does a full-body stretch complete with gleaming muscles and rippling skin while the warm, clean scent of soap and dragon emanates from him with every breath.
He doesn’t look at me as he stretches. And he doesn’t glance my way when he walks to the dresser where he keeps his clothes.
But he damn sure looks straight at me when he drops the fucking towel around his waist before reaching for his clothes.
And that’s when I snap.
“For someone who claims not to want anything to do with me,” I tell him in a voice that’s all barbed wire and bandages, “you sure find a lot of reasons to make sure you have my attention.”
Of course, that’s when he turns away. The coward. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He grabs a pair of boxers from the drawer and yanks them on.
“Bullshit.”
He glares at me over his shoulder. “Excuse me?”
“I said that was bullshit.” I stalk toward him. “You wrap yourself around me every night like a fucking koala. You rub against me whenever you cross a room, even if you don’t have to. And then you pull that shit…” I wave my hand up and down in a way that encompasses his whole body.
Which makes him smirk, because he’s a total asshole. “Getting dressed?”
“More like getting naked in front of me.”
“No one said you had to look.” He slides on his prosthetic before pulling on his jeans.
“But you want me to look,” I retort as all the days of pent up feelings roll through me like a wave. “And you want me to touch you. You just don’t want me—”
“I never said I didn’t want you,” he snaps as he drags a green T-shirt over his head. “I said I was tired of begging you to want me.”
“You’ve never had to beg for a thing in your whole fucking life,” I snarl. “You sure as hell have never had to beg for my attention. You’ve had it from the second we first met.”
“You mated someone else,” he fires back. “That sure as shit doesn’t sound like I had your attention.”
“That’s getting old fast,” I advise him. “If you want to bludgeon me with something that actually hurts, you should pick something else.”
“So the truth doesn’t hurt?” he asks, brows raised.
“Not your bullshit, convoluted version of it,” I shoot back. “First of all, you weren’t even talking to me when Grace and I met. You wanted nothing to do with me. And secondly—”
“Your brother killed mine. Of course I didn’t want to talk to you—”
“And, at that time, we all thought I’d killed Hudson in retaliation, so that doesn’t fly. And secondly,” I stress, “I didn’t have a choice in that mating, and neither did she. It was a spell.”
“Yeah, well, you didn’t exactly try to resist it, did you?”
Frustration wells up inside me, and I have to take a step back—several steps back—before I do something like grab him and kiss him until he can no longer spew nonsense at me. “What the fuck do you want from me?”
“For you to put me first!” he roars back. “You choose everyone—everything—over me. Your duty. Your guilt. Your family. Grace. The fucking Vampire Court. You name it, you’ve chosen it. And I choose you over everything. Every. Single. Time. I choose you.”
And just like that, my anger deserts me, leaving me with nothing but emptiness. Nothing but the feel of my chest caving in, like his words—his pain—reached right in and cracked open something I’ve barely been holding together.
“That’s not fair,” I whisper, because it’s the only thing I can say. Because I have put him first. I am putting him first. The Dragon Court needs Flint. But more, Flint needs the Dragon Court. More, certainly, than he’ll ever need me.
“Oh really?” he spits out. “You think I didn’t see the way you looked at Hudson when he stepped aside? Like it was your turn to sacrifice something, too. Only that something was me. He gave up everything for Grace, and you…you just tossed me aside like I’m nothing.”
“Tossed you aside?” I roar, and this time it takes every ounce of self-control I have not to grab him and show him just how much I want him. Just how much I need him. Just how much not being with him is destroying me. “You’re the one who broke up with me, if you remember correctly.”
“Only because you were dragging it out. You think I didn’t see the writing on the wall—”
“I think you saw only what you wanted to see,” I tell him through clenched teeth. “I chose you. Every time I kept my hands to myself. Every time I walked away from the bond because I didn’t want to steal your future. Every time I said no when all I wanted to do was say yes.”
One leap and he’s in front of me, eyes blazing. “You didn’t choose me. You chose to sacrifice yourself. That’s not the same thing.”
“It’s exactly the same thing—”
“No!” he yells. “It isn’t. Because I wanted to build something with you.
A future that no one could take away from us—not the dragon clans, not the Vampire Council, not the Circle.
No one. But you were too busy trying to protect me, trying to give me what you thought I should have, to ask me what I actually want.
Because if you’d done that, if you’d actually treated me like a partner, you would know that I want a lot of things. But all I need is you.”
Silence falls like ash around us, the embers of everything we’ve lost pouring down all around us.
With a few sentences, a few well chosen words, Flint has eviscerated me. I can’t see the blood pouring from my body, but I sure as hell can feel it. I don’t know what to do—what to say—to stop the hemorrhaging.
Flint takes a step back, like he’s finally finished—with the conversation, with the situation, with me. And it breaks what’s left of my heart all over again.
I reach for him, catching his wrist before he can walk away. His skin is hot and smooth, and it takes everything I have not to tug him closer. Not to wrap myself around him and beg for his forgiveness.
I can’t do that to him, though, so I settle for whispering another truth. “I miss you.”
“I’m right here,” he whispers back, his throat working. “But I won’t be for much longer.”
I slide my hand up his arm, cup his jaw in my palm. “Flint…”
His eyes go blurry, out of focus, and he leans toward me until his mouth is only a few centimeters from my own. “Tell me you’re mine,” he whispers.
They’re the easiest words I’ve ever spoken. “I’m yours.”
“Tell me I’m yours,” he breathes.
“You’re—” My voice breaks. Because he’s not. Because he’s so much more than just mine—he belongs to the Dragon Court. He belongs to his people, and that’s the way it should be.
And just like that, his gaze turns sharp again. “You can’t say it, can you?”
“I need you.”
“Not good enough,” he tells me. “And it won’t be, until you decide I’m enough.”
“You are enough—”
“But we’re not enough together,” he answers sadly. “And somehow that’s even worse.”
He pulls away, and my hand feels empty without the press of his cheek against it. I feel empty without it—without him. “Flint—”
But he just shakes his head and walks out, leaving me standing in the silence with nothing but the ghosts of what could have been to keep me company.