Chapter Eight #2
Her eyes shine under the city lights, and I keep going because if I stop now, I might never start again. “If you reject it, I will survive.”
That’s a fucking lie.
Her eyes narrow. “Try again,” she says.
My mouth closes, and she gives me a look sharp enough to cut. “No more hiding, remember?”
I look away toward the city. “If you reject it, something in me will break. My beast may never forgive me for letting you go. I may spend the rest of my life wanting what I can’t have.” Her breath catches, and I force my gaze back to hers. “But I will let you go.”
Briana stares at me for a long time. “You should have told me.”
“I know.”
“I’m angry.”
“You have every right to be.”
“I hate that everyone else knew something about me before I did.”
“It was not about you.”
“Bullshit.”
I almost smile, but her eyes flash, so I don’t smile.
“It was about you,” I say. “And me. And fear. Mostly mine.”
That seems to affect her in a way she doesn’t expect. She turns from the railing and walks toward me, and my body locks. She stops just outside arm’s reach. Close enough that her scent fills my lungs. Soap, night air, woman, fear, and anger all mixed. And beneath, want, faint, but there.
My beast goes utterly still.
“Do I feel it?” she asks.
“The bond?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe. Not the way I do. Not yet.”
“Why?”
“Because you are human.” Her mouth twists at my reply, and I move fast with my words. “Not weak. Not less. But you have human nerves and human instincts. Your body has been fighting for survival. It may not know what to do with a bond yet.”
“My body knows too much already.”
“I’m sure.”
She looks up at me. “When you touch me, it feels different.” My heart stops, and her cheeks flush, but she doesn’t look away. “Not always easy. Not always simple. But different.”
My voice drops. “Different how?”
“Mine.” She frowns, frustrated. “Not owned. Not taken. Mine to choose.”
The world tilts, and I can’t speak. If I speak, I may beg.
Her gaze drops to my hands. “You always ask.”
“Always.”
“Even when you’re losing control.”
“I try.”
“You stop when I say stop.”
“That’s how it should always be.”
“You came back when I called.”
The beast bows his head inside me. “Yes.”
Briana lifts her hand, then stops. Asking without asking. I don’t move. She touches my wrist, and my whole body goes quiet. Not calm but reverent.
Her fingers circle my wrist lightly, thumb brushing over my pulse. Such a small touch. Such a human touch, yet it feels more intimate than anything I have done in my life.
“Does this hurt?” she asks.
“No.”
“What does it feel like?”
My laugh is broken. “Like trying not to fall to my knees.”
Her eyes widen, and I expect her to pull away, but she doesn’t. Instead, her thumb moves again, deliberately this time, and my breath leaves me.
“Don’t say things like that unless you mean them,” she whispers.
“I mean everything with you.” The words come out too honest. Too much.
She releases my wrist and steps back. Cold rushes where her hand was, and I let her go, even though I want to grab her and pull her back. She looks at me like I am a locked door and she is deciding whether she wants what waits inside badly enough to find the key.
“I don’t know what to do with this,” she says.
“You don’t have to do anything tonight.”
“But you want me to.”
“Yes.” Her eyes sharpen, and I hold up my hands. “I want. That’s not the same as demand.”
Some of the tension leaves her mouth. “What do you want?” she asks.
Careful. This is a dangerous question. A thousand answers claw at my throat.
I want you safe. I want you furious. I want you in my bed, under my hands, above me, around me, laughing, sleeping, screaming my name for reasons that have nothing to do with fear.
I want my mark on you. I want you to choose me. I want everything.
Instead, I give her the truth she can carry. “I want you to choose without fear.”
Her expression softens. Only a fraction, but it’s enough to ruin me.
“And if I choose slowly?”
“Then I wait.”
“If I choose touch and not everything?”
“Then I take only what you give.”
“If I choose you and panic tomorrow?”
“Then we stop tomorrow.”
Her throat moves. “If I choose you and change my mind?”
My beast howls, but I crush the sound before it leaves me. “Then I let you.”
She closes her eyes. For a second, she looks so tired I nearly step forward, but when her eyes open, there are tears in them, yet none fall.
“I hate that I believe you,” she says.
I breathe out slowly. “I am glad you do.”
“I’m still angry.”
“I know.”
“I may yell later.”
“I will stand still and take it.”
That pulls the faintest smile from her. The sight hits harder than any fist.
“Good,” she says. Silence settles again, but it’s different now. Not easy but less filled with secrets. Briana looks at the roof door. “I don’t want to go downstairs yet.”
“We can stay.”
“I don’t want to talk about the collar.”
“Then we won’t.”
“I don’t want everyone looking at me.”
“Then they don’t get to.”
Her gaze returns to mine. “You can’t control everyone.”
“No.” My mouth twists. “But I can glare effectively.”
That almost-smile appears again. Then she surprises me.
“Can you sit?” I blink, and she gestures to the low brick ledge near the planters. “You’re too tall. My neck hurts.”
I sit. Immediately, her brows lift. “I didn’t mean like a trained dog.”
I grunt. “Too late.”
She walks toward me slowly. I stay seated, hands open on my thighs, every muscle locked. The beast doesn’t understand why we’re below her eye level, why our throat is exposed, and why we’re not reaching, but he’ll learn.
Briana stops in front of me. Like this, she is taller. Not physically. Not really. But enough. She studies me with those tired, fierce eyes. Then she lifts her hand and touches the side of my face, and my breath catches.
Her palm is warm against my jaw. Her fingers tremble once, then steady. I close my eyes because the sight of her choosing this might finish me.
“Look at me,” she whispers, and my eyes open instantly. A small smile curves her mouth. “It’s not an order.”
“I know.”
Her thumb brushes my cheekbone, and A shudder moves through me before I can stop it. She notices.
“I like touching you,” she says, almost like she is confessing a sin.
My hands curl on my thighs. “Briana.”
“I’m not ready for more than this.”
“Then this is everything.”
Her eyes shine again. This time, one tear slips free. I don’t reach for it, not until she nods. Then I lift my hand slowly, giving her every chance to move away. She stays. I wipe the tear from her cheek with the side of my thumb. Her breath trembles, and so does mine.
The city moves below us, bright and careless. Above us, the night watches without mercy. Briana leans forward, only a little, until her forehead rests against mine. And my heart stops.
Her scent fills me. Her hand remains on my face, my thumb lingering near her cheek. It’s the most intimate moment of my life.
“I don’t accept fate making choices for me,” she whispers.
“I knew you wouldn’t.”
“I don’t belong to a bond.”
“No.”
“I don’t belong to you.”
“No.”
Her forehead presses more firmly against mine. “But I want to know what it feels like to choose you.”
The beast goes silent, and the man nearly breaks. I close my eyes. “Then choose one thing,” I whisper. “Only one.”
Her breath warms my mouth. It’s not a kiss. But it almost is, and that almost destroys me.
“This,” she says, and her hand tightens gently on my jaw.
I don’t move. I barely breathe. We stay that way until the roof door opens.
Ari’s voice drifts out. “I am not looking. I am only announcing that Akasha has food, and Krishka has made something dangerous with candle wax.”
Briana pulls back, cheeks flushed, and I mourn the loss like a wound.
Ari peeks through two fingers. “Oh. This is tender. Gross. I’ll leave.”
“Stay gone,” I growl.
She grins and disappears, and Briana looks down at me. Something has changed in her face. Not healed. Not fixed. But open, just a crack. Enough for air. Enough for truth.
“I’m still angry,” she says, and I nod. “But I’m less scared.”
I nod again because my throat doesn’t work. She steps back, and this time the distance doesn’t feel like rejection. It feels like a promise deferred.
At the roof door, she pauses. “Knox?”
“Yes?”
“Tomorrow, when I wear that fake collar, you remind me what you said.”
“Which part?”
Her eyes hold mine. “That I’m not yours.”
The beast flinches, but I don’t. “You are yours,” I say.
She nods. “And if I choose to stand beside you?”
I rise slowly. “Then I will be there.”
Her mouth curves, small and brave. “Good.”
She goes inside, but I remain on the roof for a minute, maybe ten, staring at the door she closed behind her.
The mate bond burns beneath my skin, hungry and aching and no longer hidden.
She knows, and she has not run. She has not chosen me either, not yet, but she touched my face.
She rested her forehead against mine. She asked me to remind her that she belongs to herself.
For tonight, that’s more than enough. For tonight, I let the beast settle around the truth. Briana is my mate. And the first act of loving her is not claiming. It is waiting.