“I want to give you every single thing in my body, my blood, my soul, my magic, my prayers, any and everything so that you can come back to me.”
“That could happen without you tying your soul to me.”
“You already have my soul.”
He gave me a sad smile. “I want you to spend the rest of this day thinking about this—”
“I don’t need to spend any more time thinking about it. If your dragon-shadow can fight beside you, then let’s do it. He’s huge now too.”
Kenji pursed his lips.
“So huge that he could probably weaken tons of men.” I bobbed my head. “And if you can see people’s deaths coming, then fuck. . .you can stop them.”
“I would try my best.”
“My Roar, Fangs, and Claws would come home.”
“Your Roar, Fangs, and Claws?”
“You heard me. Let’s do it. That’s worth my life.”
His smile left him. “It’s not.”
“Kenji. . .”
“I want the advantage, but I don’t want you harmed.”
“I don’t want to live without you.” My eyes watered. “I don’t. . .”
He looked away from me.
“I don’t Kenji. I really don’t. I want to wake up to your arms. . .every fucking day for the rest of my life. And if I couldn’t. . .” A tear left my eyes. “Then, I don’t want to wake up. . .”
He closed his eyes.
I wiped the tear from my face. “I’m just telling you the truth.”
“Tora. . .” He opened his eyes and put his gaze on me. “You’re still young. Beautiful. Intelligent. You’re fucking. . .amazing. If I. . .if I was killed. . .there are things that I have already had Reo put in place to take care of you while I’m gone. . .”
“I would just be a zombie without you. There is no man on this planet that could ever replace you. And even if there was. . .I don’t want him. . .”
Kenji went still.
Another tear left my eye.
He reached up and wiped it away.
I sniffled. “You don’t want me to do it?”
“Of course I want you to do it, but that is the selfish part of me—”
“Or it’s the part of you that knows how powerful our love is. How strong we could get if we come together.”
“Tora. . .this next battle. . .it will be deadly. In the last one, we left Yoshiwara Depths because things got murky. This one. . .we don’t leave until my father is dead.”
I shivered.
“That means no matter who dies or how many die, we move forward. We search and kill. We don't fucking turn around as we drip blood and exhaustion fills us.”
