My chest caves in around her words. “I’m trying to keep you safe,” I choke.
“From what?” she fires back. “The truth?”
“From me.” The second the words leave my mouth, she goes still.
“Why would I need protection from you?”
I finally meet her eyes. And it’s all there. The fear, the hope, and the desperate need for the right answer. A tear slips down her cheek.
“Tell me who you are, Ethan,” she pleads. “Not who you pretend to be. Not who you think I want. Just… you.”
Something inside me snaps. I grab her face gently but firmly, my thumb brushing away the tear. My forehead presses to hers.
“I ran from the first family I ever had. I walked away from men who called me brother. And I lied today because I didn’t want the second one to throw me out.” I take a sharp breath. “I’m the man who’s so fucking scared of losing you that I can barely breathe,” I whisper.
Syvannah’s breath stutters.
“And I’m the man,” I rasp, “who doesn’t know how to tell you the truth without burning everything down.”
Her eyes soften, pain shifting into something sharper, fiercer. “Then risk it.” Those two words steal the strength from my legs. “Or risklosing me, Tiny.”
The choice hangs between us. Lose her, or lose everything fast.
“Screw that,” I growl, and make my choice.
When I pull Syvannah toward me, she doesn’t pull away. She surges into me like she’s been waiting for the dam to break.
Our mouths crash together in a desperate, starving need. Her hands fist my shirt. Mine grabs her hips, hauling her against me until I feel every inch of her heat.
She breaks the kiss just enough to gasp, “Don’t lie to me again.”
“Then don’t run from me again,” I growl, pinning her back against the workbench, tools rattling. “I can’t lose you, Syv. Not to them. Not to fear. Not to myself.”
She grabs my hair, yanks me down to her mouth again. Her kiss is anger and forgiveness and hunger.
“Tiny…” she breathes, like a warning.
I slide my hands under her thighs and lift. She wraps around me instantly, gasping when my erection drags friction through the thin barrier of her leggings.
“You want honesty?” I murmur against her throat. “Here it is. I’ve wanted you every damn second since the day you walked into our compound shaking and stubborn and alive.” Syvanna moans, nails digging into my shoulders. “And I’m done pretending otherwise.”
Her eyes are wild and wet. “Don’t stop.”
“I’m not sure I can.”
“Then don’t.”
I tug Syvannah’s shirt over her head and toss it behind us. My shirt is next, landing on the same pile. We’re a heaving mess by the time her leggings are yanked off, and mine are at my ankles.
Clothes fall away. Every motion is a confession we can’t say out loud. The sound of her breathing fills the space between the heartbeats, the rhythm syncing to mine. It’s slow, then desperate, then something gentler, like the silence after a storm.
We move like we’ve both been drowning for too long and finally found air in the same breath. Her body presses against mine, warm, alive, defiant. I trace the lines of her spine, the curve of her shoulder, memorizing proof she’s real. Every scar feels like a map back to the person I thought I lost.
She whispers something I almost don’t catch. “I hate how much I need you.”
I rest my forehead against hers. “Then we’re even.”
When her fingers slide into my hair, the fight goes out of both of us. It’s not about claiming or control anymore. It’s survival. The need to feel human in a world that’s tried to strip that from us.