His teeth dug into his lower lip. Disheveled like this, he was so attractive—she knew not many got the chance to see him so laid back and ruffled.
"We said no more secrets and… Fuck, this is hard."
Rin blanched. She rarely heard him curse. Slowly, she let her fingers span out along the line of his jaw, feeling the smooth, shaven skin there. "Hey, look at me. It’s just you and me. No one else. You can tell me anything."
She wasn’t sure what it was, but she felt so… connected to him. More than she ever remembered feeling. Even after he’d pieced her back together when Kit—died. She had fallen into Lucien’s safe, comforting embrace. Still, she’d never felt so tethered to someone else. Like she could feel his breath, echoed by her own.
It was strange, peculiar, yet she didn’t want these feelings to go away.
She’d woken up alone and disoriented, and somehow knew Lucien needed her. And hehad.
Rin shifted, curling into his side—and she waited patiently for him, because for so long, he’d been the one to wait for her.
His thumb continued to smooth over her side, shifting up the soft fleece of her pajama top, until he touched her bare skin. Her cheek fell against his chest, and she felt her lids become weighed down by exhaustion. She was halfway asleep when he finally spoke, his voice rumbling through her; she felt it in her very bones.
"The reason why your heart is so much stronger after your episode… It’s because of me." She tensed, and Lucien shushed her. "Just let me talk, please." Sensing her acquiescence, he continued:
"I don’t know where to start with this, so I suppose I’ll go back to the beginning. In our past life, our only one together, I was a researcher. On Tarz. I did… bad things. I was forced to do bad things. I think it took me a long, long time to reconcile with the fact that I was coerced. Forced. The royal house was single-minded in its pursuit of research. No one knew their names, onlythe threat of them, dangling over us all. One slip, and we’d be killed. For so long, I worked diligently, kept my head down. And these—these memories. They’re like water. For all the stories of Soulbonds, that’s one thing they never mention: the memories of past lives aren’t concrete. The harder you try to hold them, the more they slip through your fingers."
Lucien huffed, distracted. "I remember meeting you, seeing you for the first time. It was like my whole planet shifted on its axis. I didn’t care about staying alive any longer—I cared only for getting you out, and getting you somewhere safe. You became my everything." His hands tightened around her. "You still are."
Rin took his hand, silently letting him know that she was hanging on to every word.
"The research I cultivated—I don’t remember it all, but I have these memories, these ideas… Harmony," Lucien said on a long exhale. "Have you heard of it? That might make this easier."
"I haven’t," Rin replied softly, confused about where he was going with this.
"Right. Harmony—it’s forbidden in the current medical world, considered inhumane. An act of god. One mention of its usage, and medical licenses are revoked. It’s a connection forged only by someone with Earth Stella. Imagine a string tying one person to another. The forger of the connection can control every function in the recipient’s body. Breathing pattern, blood flow…" He paused. "Heart rate. It can allow for complete and utter control of someone’s heart rate."
There was such pain in his voice, she couldn’t allow it to go on any longer.
Rin pulled away, and his hands fell limp to the bed. Lucien’s head hung low, hair in his eyes, like he was waiting for her to curse him out.
She got to her knees and leaned forward, taking his face between her two hands and lifting it to meet hers. "You used this—harmony, on me?"
Lucien nodded mutelyat Vesperin’s question. Her hands were so small as she cradled his face; he wished she would slap him instead of holding him. He didn’t deserve her concern after what he’d done.
A tension headache formed from trying to sift through the memories of his past on Tarz.
There was so much Lucien would tell her. He would cut open his chest with a scalpel and let her see inside him if she wanted, but the brain was a much more delicate matter, especially with his night terrors still clinging to him. His thoughts were already out of order.
"You should hate me. You should be angry with me for what I did."
Her scent washed over him as she moved closer, so close he could see the blue veins beneath the delicate skin of her cheeks. "I’m not mad. You saved me. How could I ever be mad at you for that?"
"You’re only saying that because of the lingering effects of me basically… being inside you. There’s a reason harmony is illegal. It makes the forger’s entire being lock onto the recipient, until all theythinkandknowis the feel of the one at the end of the string. The feeling is better than drugs." Lucien would never forget holding her lifeforce in his hands. "And the recipient can become wholly dependent upon the forger. Dangerously so."
Still, she looked at him with nothing but patience and love.
"Vesperin, I did something terrible to you. I acted as a god. It’s risky—whenever men pretend to be a god. You don’t play with things like that."
"The Celestials can damn my Soul; they can smite me down right now, but you’d make a great god. I think there’s no one else I’d rather have inside me." A blush painted her cheeks. "I didn’t—you know that’s not what I…"
Lucien laughed quietly, leaning forward to kiss the tip of her nose. "My sweet, blushing girl."
She sighed a soft breath against his mouth, and his nerves lit up. God, he wanted her. The taste he’d had in his apartment, with her grinding on his lap, as he spoke praises in her ear—he’d never forget.
As if sensing the change in him—wait, he reminded himself,she did, she could.
