CHAPTER 68

 

TARA

 

His big nose brushes the hair away from my neck enough that he can plant a possessive kiss against my skin.  When his hand seeks mine and finds it where I’ve still got it balled in the covers, I loosen up and link our fingers.

This time, I’m not waiting for Brax to fall asleep.  “Feel better?”

He’s quiet a moment, and if it wasn’t for him petting me so softly, and hearing the broken end of his chain clink with his movement, I’d think he’d have fallen asleep already.

“I’m sorry.”

Something in my chest loosens at hearing him say this.  But I feel like I’ve got to spell it out.  “Brax?”

Another beat of silence before he quietly says, “I’m listening.”

“You will NEVER go after Tac again.”  I try to roll, and after a moment, he lets me.  Even helps me.  “Do you hear me?  I need you to promise.”

His ears slap back so I snatch the base of one and force it to rotate so that I can use it like a microphone.  “Say it. I need you to say it.  Agree, Brax.”

Recognizing that I’m using his own words on him, he swallows and his tongue stabs at his bottom lip.  I can’t tell if he’s refusing, or working something out, so I stay quiet.

“I will try.”

“Oh no,” I grab his jaw with both hands, and ignore how nice it feels when he relaxes his neck so that I’m supporting his big, dumb head.  “‘Try’ isn’t good enough.  NO.  Like it or not, we’re all in this, together.”  I pause, thinking, then I just ask him.  “Do aliens have a saying like ‘you're with me or you're against me?’”

“I’m not against you,” he says softly, and I know he's having bad thoughts and I'm losing his attention, testosterone taking over, when his hand slides up my thigh.  His words confirm it.  “Not against you in the way I want to be.”

I pinch his ear and he rears back.

I wait until his eyes go from black rounds of arousal to his affectionately warm, tawny-sunrise color, his pupils slitting with rejuvenated concentration.  “SAY it, Brax.”

I know what he told me earlier, about his brother, is messing with him.  I can see it in the way he hesitates now.  And then I think back to him spitting on Tac’s injury before he sent him, unharmed, away from danger.  When he didn’t have to.  When he was upset enough he obviously wanted to hurt what Tac represented: competition.

But part of him knows Tac isn’t competing.

Do I like that he made Tac leave?  Do I like that he has a problem with Tac at all?  We’re already too deep for me to want to back out of this.  I just need us to find a way to make this all—and I mean all—work.

He made a choice, the right choice, and got Tac out.  He chose.

We have to be able to make this work.  “No one knows what happened to your brother.  No one is alive now to tell the story.  But Brax, no matter what: YOU are YOU.  Not him.  Not the same here.  YOU make the choices.  I get that it’s difficult to fight instincts—”

“It’s IMPOSSIBLE.”

“Is it?”

His eyes search mine, and I recognize worry on his face.  Worry. Maybe it’s only because he’s afraid I’m laying down ultimatums.

I’m not.  I’m telling him like it is.

But just maybe, right now, he could actually be looking worried for Tac.  I know he cares about him.  Here we are, talking about Tac—in bed—and he hasn’t growled once.

This is not a small miracle.

I kiss him, and his neck muscles regain their strength and he pushes his lips into mine with more force, more heat.  But before he can get as handsy as he's trying for, I say it.  “Stop.”

Brax flinches.

I move to slide off his cuff, ignoring his hand hovering over mine like he wants to stop me, but knows better than to try.  He makes a sorrowful noise of dismay when he’s cuffless.  He’s technically chainless too, since it broke, but I’m banking on him having more control and willpower than he credits himself with.  “I’m coming back later.  But you know what I have to do.  What I want to do.  Fairness.  Sharing,” I emphasize the concept before I stroke my fingers down the curve of his nose.  “You were definitely the youngest child.  You need work.”

At my teasing tone, his body relaxes.  As soon as I stand though, that all changes.

When his body reacts like he’s about to get up—to grab me, to stop me, like he can’t make himself not try to keep me here, with him—I say the other thing.  “Stay.”

There’s a bang as the heavy end of Brax’s tail crashes to the floor.

I give him a small smile, half afraid that if I praise him any stronger, it will break his control and he’ll be on me.

Also for that reason, I back out of the room, never taking my eyes off his vibrating body until the door panel separates us.

And I close my eyes and drag resolve around me like armor when his sad song begins.