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“Yeah, I definitely want that someday.”
Barbs stuck in my throat, and maybe my reasoning was all wrong, but I knew I’d regret not asking it. “Do you?”
Every line in his face contorted. A gash blown out right in the middle of his chest. A shockwave of pain followed in its wake. “Think I already wrecked the chance I was given.”
Uncertainty crushed down on my ribs. Confusion because I had no idea what he was talking about. But what I did know was it sent a rush of nausea boiling in my stomach.
A mix of jealousy and his grief.
“What chance?” It was a thin whisper. Hoping he’d let me hold the regret I was sure he carried. That thing I could feel haunting him, though he kept the source shrouded. Something he held onto so tightly I knew it was breaking him.
He wavered, and his attention seemed to unconsciously shift to the W tattooed on his forearm. His eyes poured pain as he gazed at it, and the muscle beneath roiled as if that spot alone housed his grief.
“What is it, Trevan? You can tell me.”
I hoped maybe he would open up the same way as I’d opened up to him, but I saw the second he shut it down.
When barricades slammed down around his broken heart.
“It’s nothing.” He forced one of those easy smiles that only I could tell was fake. “Besides, who would want to bring a child into the world we live in, anyway?”
What was he saying? Had he wanted to?
“People who would love them like mad,” I couldn’t help but insist. “People who would show them a way that is kind and good. People who would teach them to make this world a better place and live for things that make a difference, that’s who.”
People just like him.
I didn’t need to say it aloud for him to hear it.
My spirit clutched as he slipped his fingers into the fall of my hair.
He dipped in and pressed his lips right to the middle of my forehead.
“Only you would think that, Lena.” The murmur scraped against my consciousness.
I tipped my head back so I could see him. Our faces were so close that our noses nearly touched.
The scent of him overwhelmed.
Charred oak and butterscotch.
I curled my hand around the wrist of the hand that rested on the side of my head.
Right then, I didn’t know which of us was the anchor in the other’s sea.
“Maybe I’m the only one who really knows it,” I murmured into the dense air that was clotted with the kinship I felt to him.
That connection that had always been stronger than anything I’d ever felt.
Ever-changing and morphing and growing into what it had become today.
Severity crept across his face, but somehow, his expression was still soft. “I’m afraid that you might be.”
We stayed like that for the longest time.
Hovering on something forbidden.
Or maybe we just rested on something private and sacred.
