He lifts his head, and for a second, I expect him to tell me that I don’t know because I can’t know, but his face just settles into something quiet and grieving. “I think I’m coming to realize I’ll never fully adjust. I kept…shit,” he says, clearing a tight sound from his throat. “In the panic of it all—when the shots were coming at us, I kept trying to open my eyes. It’s been so fucking long, but…” His voice cracks again, and I can tell that this time, he’s given up.
I tug him close, and he comes easily. He doesn’t fit comfortably on my lap, but he does it anyway, and he nuzzles my face, drawing his fingers over my chest, around the back of my neck, into my hair.
When he was first recovering—when he hit the plateau of not wanting to live but not quite wanting to die—he did this a lot. He couldn’t stop touching, and later, he admitted it was the only way he felt safe in that sea of nothingness that had consumed his former vision.
He hasn’t done this in a while.
“Kiss me,” I tell him.
He does. His lips are a little cold, but his tongue is hot—seeking and just on the edge of desperate. He forces my jaw wide, and the kiss is a wet mess, but I don’t care. He kisses me like he wants to consume me, and fuck, I want to let him.
“I don’t think I can go back to actual fieldwork,” he finally says. “Until there’s some kind of technology that can implant some…I don’t know, AI sight into my brain, I’m a liability. Ari couldn’t defend James the way he needed to because I had no idea where I was or where to fire my damn gun.”
I want to tell him he can practice more, but this isn’t a fucking movie. We’re not in some hero novel where he becomes a blind sharpshooter, able to track anyone and anything with just the sound of their breath.
I frame his face with my hands and drag my thumbs over the slightly puffy skin under his eyes. He obviously isn’t sleeping well, and that’s partly my fault. Things are in chaos, and I don’t know how to reclaim my throne without putting everyone at risk.
“I can’t lock you up again,” I finally say. “We can’t go back to living that way.”
“That’s not what I want. But no field missions,” he says. “I’m better—more dangerous—behind my desk.”
It gets my blood pumping south when I hear him call himself dangerous, because he’s not wrong. He’s fucking lethal. He’s just lethal in new ways now.
“Show me,” I tell him.
It takes him a second, but I can see it in his face when he realizes what I mean, and suddenly, there’s a hand in my hair. He plants his feet firmly on the ground, then drags me up and shoves me to my knees. His fingers trail over my closed eyes, then my parted lips trembling with my stuttered breath, and my neck where my pulse is hammering.
I can see him struggle with himself—what he wants to do and what he needs to do. This is as much for me as it is for him. Watching him prove to himself and to anyone watching on the feeds that I will get on my knees for him because it’s no less than he deserves makes me want to come in my pants.
His fingers move to his zipper, then his button. He parts his trousers into a wide V, then pulls his hard dick out of the slit in his silky boxers. They’re light blue, and the sight of them is startling, but he probably doesn’t give a shit what color they are. He chooses everything differently now.
Grabbing my hair, he pulls me forward until my face is buried against him, and I rub it back and forth, breathing in the rich scent of him. In that way, I would always know him, even ifI lost my sight. He’s a piece of me, and he has been for almost as long as I can remember.
His fingers grip my hair harder, and I grunt as he pulls back and the head of his cock slaps against my chin. “Open.”
I do. I don’t suck, I don’t move, I don’t fight. I just let him slide himself between my teeth and thrust his hips and fuck my face until he’s trembling with the need to let go. My hands are shaking, but I keep them limp at my side as he uses me.
I know he’s not going to come down my throat. I know he knows this is a show to prove to those fuckers who seem to be watching our every move that we are not like everyone else. We will never be like everyone else.
Our empire will survive because I’m willing to get on my knees for the people who deserve it.
He pulls his dick out of my mouth with an obscene pop, then strokes it so fast the sound of it echoes off the walls. He groans softly, and I know what’s coming by the twitch in his calves, and I just manage to close my eyes before spurts of come hit me in the face.
His aim is shit, so a lot of it gets me on the neck and shoulder, but I can’t bring myself to care. His hand reaches out, and he smears the mess around before dragging me to my feet and kissing the life out of me.
“I love you,” he says.
Jesus. I know he does, but the way he says it now is so different. “We’re going to ruin anyone who tries to destroy what we have.” It’s my own way of telling him exactly what he means to me—what they all mean to me.
And he understands.
He kisses me harder, and I’m still hard, but I don’t give a shit. We bask in the mess we’ve made, knowing that things are going to get worse before we force them to get better.
I waituntil morning to drop the bomb on Alice, though it’s mostly a ruse. She’s going to be pissed when she realizes that I’ve been plotting behind her back, but she’s not skilled enough in our secret language for me to be able to tell her, and I can’t take any risks.
The plan is for me to try and force her to agree to postpone the wedding. She’ll put up a fight and be furious. I’ll agree to have it immediately—to elope—and when she says she’s willing, that’s when we leave.
Phoenix has already told the others. James is the only one making me nervous because the drugs are making him loose-lipped, but even with all the morphine in the world, he’s not saying anything. But I’m afraid he’ll crack when Alice looks at him, so Ari has been keeping her occupied.