Chapter Twenty-Five Say It Again
"Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same."
Adan and Nox hadn't spoken all day, and Nox was silently brooding in his office at Hot House. He had to get away from Adan for some clarity, leaving her and the others at the Forge.
He played over their talk--over and over. Leaning back in his office chair, staring at his desk, but not focusing on anything besides the fury on Adan's face as she stared him down. He couldn't remember the last time someone had the nerve to look at him like that.
A knock on his door broke his trance, His shoulders perked up in hopes that it was Adan coming to fight some more.
It was better than the icy silence he received before he left.
But Czandra slipped through the wide doors.
Her plated black hair swept over her bare pale shoulders.
Her slim eyebrow rose slowly as she eyed her head of house.
"I never took dragons for cowards." She crossed her arms in appraisal.
Nox only grunted in response— he wasn't in the mood. The word dragon hit a nerve. His fingers curled into fists where they rested on the arms of his chair, but he said nothing.
Czandra studied him for a long moment. "She told me what you said. Of course, you can't understand why asking her that is so unfair."
The vampire slunk down with grace into the gleaming leather couch before him.
"She fled for her life once, it cost her everything."
Her narrowed eyes softened. "Now you're asking her to do that again."
"You should be thanking me. She will blame me instead of you."
Czandra scoffed. "I get it, you think you're protecting her. But you still don't get it. She will always follow her own path. Not you, not me. Not even the fucking king can tell her what to do. What can the wind accomplish against a mountain. You may be able to shake a few pebbles free,
but you will never break her will."
"You were always one for platitudes, Caz." He rolled his eyes.
"And you were never one to give up without a fight."
The words rippled through Nox, igniting his anger. "There is not future there. Even if we do manage to defeat these pricks, then what?
"Then stop making her feel like she's something you have to survive despite," Czandra said, her tone suddenly soft. "She deserves better than a goodbye disguised as a command."
Nox looked away, jaw tight, throat working. The silence was heavy between them. "She is a fucking queen, and I am a bastard." He felt that he wasn't worthy of her--never would be. "Not to mention the other thing. When she finds that out... that I've kept that from her, she will never forgive me."
"You're my king." She said softly, Nox's eyes narrowed. "You've earned your spot and the title."
"Not legally." He scoffed.
"We're about to throw a coup, I doubt that laws matter all that much."
"Still a bastard."
"She won't care, Nox."
"She should."
"She loves you, you know," she added, more gently now. "And it's terrifying her. You don't get to walk away from that just because it scares you too."
Nox sat there, jaw clenched, eyes fixed on the grain of his desk like he might find an answer carved into the wood. He hated this—hated how much sense Czandra made. He hated more how his heart ached at the mere mention of Adan's name.
"That doesn't change what I am," he said finally, voice low and raw. "She's light. Fire. And I'm just..." He trailed off, shaking his head. "Shadow and blood. A killer with too many ghosts and too many secrets."
Czandra sighed, "She sent me here with a message for you."
He looked up at her then, and for a moment, the cool mask cracked.
The storm behind his eyes rolled in full force—grief, guilt, and longing.
'When you're done hiding, come and find me.'
She gave Nox a soft smile, "She can handle this, Nox. She can handle you."
Czandra moved toward the door, her boots soft against the marble floor. She paused with her hand on the knob. "Fix this. Before it becomes one more ghost that haunts you."
--
He found her in the fighting pit waiting for him, her hands already wrapped. Her fighting leathers, forming perfectly to every curve and hollow of her body. The body that he wanted to be wrapped himself around. That he had dreamt about--taking off her leathers with only his teeth and tongue—
Fuck. "Adan—"
She held up a wrapped hand, silencing him instantly. "I don't want to talk." She flexed her knuckles and gave him her back while continuing to stretch her muscles. Raising her arms over her head, elongating that perfect body that threatened to make Nox fall to his knees.
Instead, he flew down into the pit, his wings disappearing upon landing.
She whirled around, narrowing her eyes when she caught him staring at her ass.
"You know what." She pointed a finger at him.
"I do want to talk. You're an infuriating prick!"
He might have been slightly scared as she moved towards him, if she didn't look so darn cute.
"Hiding out in one of your properties like a coward because what? You were afraid to talk to me? Or just didn't want to? Fucking coward. You know what, Lennox, you might be a coward, but I certainly am not. Do not fucking ask me to run away, ever again."
Adan's chest rose and fell quickly as she tried to leash her anger.
Nox didn't move. Couldn't. She was a goddamn force of nature—fury and fire and heartbreak wrapped in leather.
"I didn't hide," he said finally, voice like gravel. "I just needed space."
"Oh, that's rich," Adan snapped.
"You're fucking adorable when you're pissed."
Shock rippled across Adan's face followed by burning fury. She blinked, thrown for half a second—and then her eyes narrowed to slits.
"Don't you dare flirt with me right now, Lennox Hollow."
"I'm not flirting," he said, one brow arched as he stepped closer, the edges of a smirk playing at his lips. "I'm just stating facts."
She let out a sharp laugh—humorless, cutting. "You are insufferable."
Her fire licked up her spine and illuminated her honey blonde curls in a red glow.
He couldn't help himself, he grinned deeply at the small display of her powers.
He couldn't stop himself from pushing her hair off her should.
He was completely unbothered by her fire, it did nothing more than tickled his fingers.
Her eyes widened at his tattooed hand that came away completely unblemished.
"And you are irresistible." He shrugged.
"And you're right--I was a coward." He stared at her, caught in that look, in those mismatched eyes like dusk and dawn.
"I need you to understand something, Adan. When I told you to run, it wasn't because I don't believe in you. It was because I do. I've seen what you are. What you're capable of."
Nox let out a slow breath, keeping his gaze locked with hers.
"I didn't know how to stay. Not when I knew what I was asking of you. It felt like the only way to keep you safe was to push you away."
Her jaw tightened, and for a second, he thought she might punch him. Honestly, he wouldn't blame her.
"You don't get to decide that," she said, her voice low and shaking with restrained emotion. "Not for me."
"I know that now," he murmured.
The surrounding fire flickered, dimmed—but didn't go out. It danced along her skin like a warning. Nox stepped closer, until their breath mingled, and her fire curled around him.
He didn't flinch. He leaned in.
She stared up at him, every muscle tight with everything she hadn't let herself feel. Her eyes narrowed in at the way his mouth opened slightly, and then pressed into a hard line.
"Say it," she whispered, her voice like a dare. "Say what you really feel."
Nox's throat bobbed with a swallow. His instinct was to deflect--to tease.
But he didn't--couldn't. Not this time. Not after their kiss, not after everything that had happened between them.
And everything that might happen still. He had plenty of secrets that had to be kept from her, but she had a right to know this one.
"You have bewitched me." He cupped her face gently, his thumbs brushing her cheekbones, his voice hushed but steady. Her breath caught.
"Gods." He huffed, dropping his arms, stepping back.
She wanted to reach for him, "I fought it, tried to bury it."
He went on, his voice breaking around the edges as he started to pace.
Her lips parted slightly, stunned, but he kept going.
"You drive me fucking insane. You challenge everything I am. You terrify me."
His gaze burned into her. "I tried to pretend it was lust. Obsession. Duty. Anything else. But it's not. It's you. All you."
Adan keep quiet as she watched him cause a small dust cloud with his back and forth.
He stopped and looked down at her, jaw tight, regret painted across every line of his face.
"I never stopped wanting you. I never stopped thinking about you. I hid because I knew that I would do whatever you asked of me."
He huffed, running both of his hands through his hair.
"I'm a coward because you could ask anything of me Adan and I would be helpless to obey you."
Her eyes flickered—something molten and wounded sparking behind them.
Nox's hands were on her again--like he couldn't keep them away.
His thumb ran along her chin. Her mis-matched eyes fluttered closed and her fire sputtered.
"The difference between you and Cias having taken my will, is that I have given it to you freely."
His thumb brushed her bottom lip and she gasped.
Eyes fluttering back open to lock with his piercing green gaze.
"Because I'm the last phoenix?" Her voice was breathy.
His gaze dropped to her mouth, and he swiped his thumb over it again. He shook his head slowly, "No," he whispered. "Because you're you. Not the phoenix. Not the rebellion's symbol. Not the butcher. Just... you." His hand lingered at her jaw.
"I'm in love with you, Adan," he said, finally. No smoke. No steel. Just Nox—raw, honest, and heartbreakingly human. "And it's fucking killing me."
Her breath caught, like the truth of it had struck her chest. For one heartbeat, she stood frozen—his words echoing inside her like a war drum.
She launched forward, fisting the front of his shirt, and crashed her mouth to his.
It wasn't gentle. It wasn't sweet. It was a clash of teeth and need and unspoken promises and everything they'd both been too afraid to say.
Her fire surged—real fire now—engulfing them both in golden heat, but Nox only groaned, pulling her closer, devouring her like he'd been starved.
Her back hit the edge of the fighting ring, and he pinned her there with his hips, grinding against her in a rhythm that made her gasp into his mouth. His hands were everywhere—her waist, her hair, her face—like he couldn't decide what part of her to memorize first.
When they finally broke apart, panting, her lips swollen and her body trembling, he pressed his forehead to hers.
Her fire now gone, replaced with something infinitely more dangerous.
A silence stretched between them—fragile, electric, infinite.
Then Adan's eyes shimmered with something more than fire. "Say it again."
He leaned in, his lips brushing hers in the softest of touches. "I'm in love with you, Adan."
He rested his forehead against hers.
A breath trembled out of her.
Then she whispered, "Good. Because I love you too."
Nox froze—just for a second. The world seemed to tilt beneath him. Then he was kissing her again, slower now, reverent, like her words had cracked something open inside him, and now he was pouring every part of himself into her—into this.
She broke the kiss first, breathless, her forehead pressed to his. Her voice was raw when she whispered, "You don't get to love me and push me away. You don't get to love me and ask me to run."
"I won't," he rasped, clutching her tighter. "Not again. I swear it."
The world would come for them.
The king.
The rebellion.
The secrets Nox still held.
But for now, it was just Adan and Nox.