“I am only saying the truth.”
She looks up at me. Those pretty green eyes flickering across my face with a glossy tint.
“You should leave,” she whispers. “Before you do something stupid.”
“Probably,” I murmur, letting the truth settle between us—heavy, electric, inevitable. “But Angel… I don’t think I’m capable of leaving you alone.”
Her fingers tighten on the bundle of clothes. Her throat moves in a swallow. I take one step toward her. Her breath stutters.
“You have to, because I’m supposed to be Xavier’s now,” she says, but she won’t look at me. “I can’t have you. I can’t have Ash. I can’t have anyone until Xav says different, and he’s in a coma.”
Fuck me.
She’s actually doing it. Pulling back. Shutting the door. Cutting herself off like that’s going to protect her or fix anything. She has no idea how fast that would gut me.
Yeah, the idea of sharing her makes something nasty twist in my chest. Makes me want to punch through a wall or break Xavier’s ribs all over again. But if sharing her is what it takes to keep even a piece of her—if it means I still get her breath on my skin, her eyes on me, her voice saying my name—I’ll do it.
I’ll take whatever part of her I can get.
Because losing her completely? That’s the one thing I won’t survive.
“Val,” I whisper. “You can have everything you want and more. You don’t think me and my brother would give you anything you ask for? Everything you deserve?”
And she deserves me. She deserves Ash. Hell, if she wants to deal with that moody bastard Xavier too, fine. She can have all of us if that’s what keeps her here. What keeps her close.
I lift a hand—hovering near her jaw, not touching, just close enough for her heat to roll over my palm.
“Angel,” I say softly, “you don’t have to choose a damn thing right now.”
Her gaze flicks up finally—stormy, exhausted, blazing in a way that breaks something open in me. There’s fear there. Fury. Want. Confusion. Grief.
I plant one hand beside her hip, fingers brushing the warm wood, and lean in just enough that her exhale trails over my collarbone.
“You don’t have to choose a damn thing ever,” I murmur, my voice low and steady, shaped for her alone. “You want all of us. You can have all of us. You want only me. You can have only me.”
Her breath hitches, the sound catching somewhere between relief and fury.
“Don’t do that,” she whispers, eyes flicking away for a heartbeat before snapping back to mine. “Don’t make it sound simple. It isn’t. None of this is.”
“It is. ” My other hand braces near her shoulder, caging her in without touching her—close enough for her body heat to wrap around my skin, close enough that a single flinch or breath could close the last inch between us. “When it comes to me being in love with you, Angel. It is.”
The wet strand of hair clinging to her cheek trembles as she inhales. The towel shifts on her chest, slipping a fraction, revealing the soft glow of damp, flushed skin. A drop of water rolls from her hairline down the slope of her jaw, over the delicate angle of her throat, and disappears into the shadow at the edge of the towel.
I track its path with my eyes, and her pulse leaps under her skin like a startled bird.
“Isaiah…” she murmurs—my name a warning, a plea, a confession all in one. Her voice is thick with conflict, with the dizzying pull of wanting too many things at once.
I step closer—closer than I should, closer than she should let me—until my chest nearly brushes hers, until the warmth of her skin seeps into me like a burn.
“Angel,” I call back, my hand slowly brushing a damp strand of hair behind her ear. The movement is gentle, almost reverent, but it hits her like pressure against a bruise. Her eyes flutter half-closed before she forces them open again, stubborn to the last.
“You’re shaking,” I murmur.
“I’m cold,” she fires back, but the sharpness is gone. The clothes slip from her hands without her realizing, falling to the floor in a soft, defeated heap.
“Then let me warm you up.” I lean in until my forehead almost rests against hers, until our breaths catch and break in the same space.
My hands find her face, my thumbs stroking the high bones of her cheeks. I don’t kiss her mouth. Not yet. That’s a different kind of surrender. Instead, I lower my head, my lips finding the frantic pulse at the base of her throat. It beats against my mouth like a trapped bird.So alive. So desperate.