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“What?”

“I don’t know who it is yet. Some princess, some heir. They pick her, not me.”

His voice cracked a little. Not much, but enough for me to feel it.

I set the clippers down. “Ares…”

He shook his head. “I don’t want this shit, Naomi. But I ain’t got a choice. And I damn sure don’t want to be alone in the process.”

He reached up, grabbed my wrist gently, and tugged me until I was standing between his knees.

He made me look at him.

“You hear me? I don’t want to be without you, Naomi.”

My stomach knotted up.

He wasn’t lying.

I knew when this man lied… his left eye twitched.

It wasn’t twitching.

But I also had a man at home.

A real one.

A calm one.

A safe one.

Still… Ares had been my weakness for years.

“Ares… I can’t backtrack with you,” I whispered. “I feel for your situation, I do. But we’re supposed to be friends at best. I can’t be your comfort pussy when you’re down. I can’t do that.”

He tilted his head, studying me like he was seeing straight through my clothes and straight through my soul.

“You think that’s all I want from you?”

“I know you,” I said. “I know how you move.”

“No, you don’t,” he murmured. “Not this part.”

His hand slid from my wrist up to my ass, gripping gently. I tried to pull away; he tightened his hold.

“Please,” he said quietly, so unlike him that it made me freeze. “I need you. You’re the only one I can trust.”

“Ares…”

“I mean it.”

He tugged me a little closer.

I felt weak and strong at the same time.

“Please,” he whispered again. “Don’t leave me by myself in this shit.”

His voice cracked something open in me.