Page 27 of Beneath His Robes

“Maybe the one thing we can’t fuck up is feeding your family?” he continued and yanked me toward the door.

I held my heart, trying to still the erratic beating as I followed after him.

ChapterEleven

Elias

The chill in the air was absolutely frigid, but it was nothing compared to how my body reacted to Ronan being close again.

I hated how much he still affected me.

We walked in silence for a while. The soft crunch of our footsteps on the snow was the only sound that broke the stillness. His presence beside me was so familiar, yet it sent a shiver down my spine that had nothing to do with the cold.

He was always too close, always too present. It had been years since I’d seen him last, but the years didn’t seem to matter now. He was just as I remembered—steady, unyielding, a force of nature that had never truly let me go.

“Elias…” he said after a while, his voice low and rough, as if the cold had seeped into his chest, too. “You’re quiet.”

“I’m thinking,” I muttered, not knowing what to say. My mind was a whirlwind of conflicting thoughts, none of them good.

We were hunting, yes, but it wasn’t the hunt that occupied my thoughts. It was him. It was always him.

He stopped walking then, and I could feel it before I saw it—the weight of his gaze on me, the sharpness of his attention. The air between us felt charged, electric, as if everything we’d been holding back was about to burst.

I couldn’t look at him. Not now. Not when I could feel his eyes on me like a touch.

“Stop pretending, Elias,” Ronan said softly, and his words were like a shackle, dragging my gaze up to meet his. “You’re cold, but you’re not thinking about the snow.” His voice dropped even lower. “You’re thinking about me.”

I wanted to deny it and tell him he was wrong. But the truth hung in the air between us like a storm, and I couldn’t escape it.

“You should be,” he continued, his voice a whisper now, cutting through the cold air. “You should be thinking about me.”

I swallowed hard, forcing myself to stay calm to maintain control. It wasn’t easy. Not with the way his presence filled the space around me, the way his breath mingled with mine in the cold, and the way his scent—so familiar—wrapped around me like a second skin.

The snow fell heavier now, thick and soft, coating the world in a quiet blanket, but all I could hear was the rush of blood in my ears and the sound of my ragged breathing.

“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, and the words tasted bitter in my mouth.

But they were necessary. They had to be. If I let myself forget, if I let him get too close, I wouldn’t be able to walk away.

But even as I said it, I could feel him stepping closer. The air between us grew warmer, thick with something neither of us could avoid.

“I’ve always been here, Elias,” he replied, the words low and thick with something darker than the cold. “And you know it. You’ve always known it.”

His hand brushed against mine as he reached for his gun, the touch brief but enough to send a surge of heat through me, shocking in the freezing cold. I couldn’t focus on the hunt anymore—not with him standing so close.

Not with the way my heart was racing, not with the way every part of me wanted to reach out and drag him in, to close the space between us and finally let myself feel what I’d buried for so long.

But I couldn’t.

I wouldn’t.

“I made a vow,” I said, the words shaky but firm. “I chose this. I chose a path. I can’t…”

He didn’t let me finish. Before I could take another breath, his fingers curled around my wrist, pulling me a little closer. The touch was gentle, but it felt like a trap.

“Stop pretending, Elias,” he whispered again, his voice so close now that I could feel the warmth of it against my skin.

His breath was warm on my face, mixing with the cold, creating a heat that ran down my spine, making every nerve in my body tighten.

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