“My soul is so dark and stained, I’m certain I no longer have one. It’s disappeared, withered away. All that remains is a desiccated husk of the man I should have been, the man I gave up on being.” I shook my head. “You deserve better than that.”
“I don’t want that man.” She gripped my arms. “I want this one. This genius of a man and this weapon of a man. I want him, all of him, the body, and what remains of the soul.”
She wanted me, darkness and all. It’s what she’d been telling me the entire time, but I never considered it possible. My body ached to take her, bring us together until there was no separation.
Was it possible to have what I desired and still gain the power I needed?
My fingers explored her bare skin.
Would I not irreparably damage her—damage the pursuit of our goals?
“I will only hurt you,” I whispered. “Hurt all of us.”
“I can take it,” she replied. Her chest pushed against me, and desire surged through my body so strongly it made my head dizzy. Her hands cupped my cheeks, weaving through my beard. “What would be so bad about that?”
“Everything. There are only two possibilities. You would look at me, and all you’d see would be violence. You and my brothers would turn away in disgust and resentment, just like my siblings. Or I would cause your deaths, just like that boy. Nothing would have mattered. Everything I’ve done would be purposeless. It would be dust in the wind, and I would be left with the scars, yet nothing to show for them except failure.”
“Those are not the only two possibilities. You have to choose if this—ifwe—are worth the risk. You must trust that I’m not going anywhere. You have to let go, Obi.”
“I do not know if I can.”
“You haven’t even tried.”
My eyes flicked up. Had I not tried? Had I not been trying since the moment I first saw her?
I’d kept her at arm’s-length. I’d thought I could walk the edge between knowing her and getting what we both wanted, without it becoming messy. I’d wanted purpose and goals and safety.
Perhaps I hadn’t truly tried. Perhaps I’d only taken the pieces of her I thought were safe. I’d only taken the pieces I wanted to use from her.
But they were not enough.
I wanted more. I wantedeverything.
“It’s not me you need to be truthful with,” she said. “It’s yourself.”
She was right. It wasn’t her rejection I was afraid of. It was that I’d look in the mirror and only feel disgust and shame. It’s that I’d feel the same guilt I felt when that boy died in my place.
Leona said she’d wanted all of me. The tragedy and the strength. If she could see all of me laid bare, and still not run, I could do the same.
I brushed a stray lock of hair from her face.
“This is the truth I cannot speak aloud. I am a fool, through and through.”
I bent down and fused my lips to hers. It was darkness and it was light. As the sun rose over the city and bathed us in its soft summer glow, I was born anew. Her kiss was redemption.
My hands hooked under her thighs, lifting her, and pulling her taut against me. I carried her through the apartment, bracing her against the wall outside the door to my room. She could surely feel my erection straining against my pants just as I could feel the heat radiating from her core.
My body pinned her, my hands sliding up her thighs, a question on my lips.
“Yes,” she answered without me even needing to ask.
I carried her inside my room and kicked the door shut behind us. I carefully sat down on the bed, letting her legs straddle me on either side.
“Obi,” she breathed.
My hands traveled up her thighs, over her hips to grip her waist. Our mouths moved together greedily. The dam was broken, and desire raged as a flood. She ground down on my lap and my erection bit against the seam of my pants, begging to be free. To slide inside her and finally make us one.
She broke the kiss, breathing hard. She held my gaze as she gripped the ends of her shirt and tugged it over her head.
