lose you."
"Has she-" he cut himself off and I squeezed his fingers, which was definitely not the way to go as he tried to yank them free again.
"What?" I encouraged.
"Doesn't matter," he grunted.
"Ryder."
His gaze told me to back down, but I couldn't. There was an ache in my soul over Ryder. I'd seen his scars, everyone had. He'd been hurt more than any person should be in their lifetime. It was no wonder he was like this. No wonder he couldn't trust anyone or admit he cared for anything. Who knew how much had been taken from him in the past? I longed to heal that wound in him as keenly as if it had belonged to my girl. It was as if he was my…Lioness.
"If she wants you like she used to, I want her to have you. I want her to be happy. Really happy. And lately, I get the feeling that she's not," I admitted, bearing my heart to him even though I knew he couldn't do the same for me. My stomach twisted as I said those words. It made me feel like a shitty mate. I should have brought this up with her sooner, but maybe I feared that she'd shut the idea down. Because in my bones, I knew I wanted this. When I'd shared her with Dante, it had felt so good, no matter what the stars had to say about it. But I always followed my instincts, always trusted myself, and currently they were leading me to Ryder and begging me to wrap him up in cotton wool and cuddle him like a cub.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" Ryder growled as I stepped closer to him.
Just a little squeeze...he won't mind a little one.
I released his hand and pounced, wrapping him in my arms and dragging him in for a fierce hug. He struggled hard so I clutched him tighter, fighting to keep him there. Then he got his palms between us and shoved me away, his teeth bared.
"What the fuck, Mufasa?" he roared.
"You liked it.” I smirked. He totally did.
"If you try to hug me again, I will grow a vine so far up your ass that it'll get lodged in your throat and suffocate you to death," he warned.
I laughed, holding out my hand again. "Alright, alright, we'll put a pin in the hugging idea."
"No, there's no pin. It's a hard limit."
"Jeez, just power share with me already and we can figure it out later."
"There will be no hugging," he snarled. "Ever. I don't hug people."
"You’ve hugged Elise. I saw it," I said playfully. He wasn't smiling, but maybe deep, deep down, he was smiling. I was going to assume so.
Ryder snatched my hand in fury and I pressed my magic out to meet his. It didn't.
"If you were just honest with me, you might find you like getting a little vulnerable, then your magic barriers will come down and I'll slip right inside you."
"Can you stop talking about it like you're about to fuck me in the ass, because it's making this impossible. Let me do the pushing, I’m not a taker in any sense."
"Okay, just tell me something real. Something that you don't want to tell me."
He levelled his gaze on me and I cocked my head as I waited. I could feel him trying to let his barriers down without doing this, but it wasn't gonna happen.
"I'm a good friend, Ryder. Whether you want me as one or not. Whatever you say, it won't leave this shed just like the ghost of the kids who died in here." I painted a cross over my heart and he frowned at the gesture like he recognised it.
He looked away from me to the wall and several seconds of silence passed.
He cleared his throat. "For the longest time, I've been a weapon for the Lunar Brotherhood. Elise made me want to be the Fae I was before all that. Now she's gone and I can't forget what she made me feel. With her, I started to think I didn't have to just be a weapon anymore. At least before I met her, I didn't care that I had nothing in my heart. Now, I can't get back to that. Now I feel too much and I can't turn it off. I've tried every spell and cure and potion I know, but this pain makes me bleed inside every day. It won't go away."
I opened my mouth to