Throne of Truth

Larry muttered under his breath. “He’d better not have refused his visitation rights again.” He searched the room, looking for a handsome, arrogant prisoner and finding nothing.

“He can refuse?” My heart lurched. “Why would he refuse?”

“Because he has this stupid thing called pride.” He lit up. “But it seems today, he’s decided to join us, after all.” Pressing my elbow again, he guided me toward the back of the room where a man in dark green overalls—same as all the other men in this place—appeared by the door escorted by a guard.

The instant his eyes met mine, the prison faded.

It was only him and me.

Me and him.

Larry didn’t even factor.

My arms ached to hug him. To tell him I was here even if I wasn’t there the first time he’d been arrested. I muttered under my breath, “I hate that stupid rule.”

Larry raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“The no touching one.”

He chuckled. “Ah, yes, I didn’t factor in how hard that would be for you two. For me, touching clients isn’t exactly normal procedure.”

Penn was in hearing distance, striding forward to join us. “I stopped being your client the moment you gave me a bed for the night.”

Larry grinned, relief coming off him in waves. “That’s true. And you became the son I never had when you agreed to come back to New York with me for my treatment. I know how hard that was for you.”

Penn flicked a quick glance at me. Hiding yet more things. Where had he been before Larry got sick? Did he hate New York because of the imprisonment or were there other factors, too?

Factors like me?

“Hello, Penn.” I tucked my hands behind my back, mainly to stop myself from reaching for him but also to hide the shakes at seeing him again. It was the strangest date I’d ever been on with a lawyer as our chaperone and the state prison as our restaurant of choice.

“Elle.” He crossed his arms, his biceps tight and arms ropy. Did he cross them for the same reason I kept mine behind my back? So he didn’t reach for me?

“Are you—are you okay?” I glanced around the room as Larry took a seat at a free table.

“Fine.” Penn motioned for me to sit too, pulling up a chair to face us. “You?”

“Good.” I grabbed my hair, twisting it into a rope over my shoulder like I always did when I was nervous. Penn’s gaze followed my hands, black hunger flashed with desire. His eyes stopped on the fading bruise on my face, his jaw clenching. “If he wasn’t already in lock-up, I’d punch him all over again for what he did to you.”

I had no reply.

Should I tell him I’d paid Greg a visit? That I’d been idiotic on his behalf? That I would never stop fighting for him?

The awkwardness between us reached an epic ten. My hands itched to grasp his. My lips ached to kiss away the pain of our last meeting and start anew.

Why couldn’t we touch? How would we delete this strange tension?

I couldn’t stop looking at him. His tussled hair, the thicker growth on his face. He hadn’t shaved, and for the first time, he looked like Nameless from three years ago. His lips were the full kissable ones framed by a dark beard. Half of his prettiness masked by stubble.

My heart growled with possession and apologies. I couldn’t stop reliving the awfulness of him walking down the stairs in police custody telling me he had no way to convince me he was who he said because he’d never told me his name.

How I could be so blind?

Tears tickled, welling from the constant pit I tried my best not to swim in. “Penn, I’m so sorry.”

He stiffened. His jaw worked as his eyes filled with emotion so deep and tangled, I’d need a century to learn everything there was to know about him.

“I know.” He lowered his face, his gaze hooded and dark. “Me, too. It’s me who should apologize for—”

“No.” I shook my head fiercely. “You have nothing to be sorry for. It’s all my fault.” A lonely tear escaped. “It’s my fault you were taken the first time and now history has repeated itself. It seems whenever you’re around me, I get you locked up.”

He chuckled, his chest rising and falling, begging me to touch it. To smooth away the remaining faded yellow and green of his bruises. To reassure myself that he was still eating and drinking and staying alive even while caged up.

How did I ever believe I could walk away from him? How did one truth delete so many lies and make everything seem inconsequential now he was back in my life?

Technically, Penn was a stranger.

Realistically, we had two lifetimes to reveal and compatibility to test.

But something intrinsic and basic linked us together, ignoring timelines and date-numbers. I’d wanted him from the first moment I met him. I wanted him now I knew the truth.

There was so much to say but how could we with so many people watching and listening?

I wanted to spill how many sleepless nights I’d had while searching for him. How my need to find him wedged a small splinter between my father and me. How I’d never looked at another man because a part of me still believed he was the one.

You can say all those things.

The other prisoners are here with their own families.

They wouldn’t listen to us when they had such a finite amount of time to listen to the people they loved.

I opened my mouth to blurt a billion things at once. To tell him just how desperate I was to fix everything I’d done wrong.