Page 238 of The Sin Binder's Destiny

“You’re impossible,” I breathe.

“And you’re unbearable,” he says, and his voice shouldn’t sound so soft. It shouldn’t sound like devotion wrapped in velvet and cut from steel. But it does.

His fingers curl slowly around mine. No command. No Dominion. Just his hand, warm and real and trembling.

“Do it,” he says, and his tone doesn’t dare. It begs. “If you’re mine…if you want this—us—then do it now.”

I can feel it between us, humming beneath the skin. The power of a bond not yet made, but already breathing. Alreadywanting.

Six.

The unthinkable. The forbidden. The inevitable.

My thumb brushes over his palm, and I see it in his eyes—the way he stares at me like I’m already his sin, already the thing that will undo him.

I don’t need to ask if he’s sure. Iknowhe is.

I reach for the knife. Smooth handle. Dull edge. His, of course. It always had to be his. Lucien watches me like I might disappear. Like this could all be a cruel trick cast by whatever gods still exist. And maybe it is. Maybe this is the moment the world shifts and never recovers.

I press the blade to my palm. A small slice. Nothing deep. Nothing dramatic. Just enough. Lucien doesn’t flinch. He cuts across his hand, lets the blood rise in a slow, crimson bloom.When our hands meet, when blood meets blood, it’s like the entire realm sighs into place.

Not a burn. Not a spark.

Apull.

Like something ancient has finally clicked into its socket. Like something dark and divine issatisfied.My head swims. His magic crashes into me like waves over stone, relentless and hungry and so deeplyhim—commanding and protective, cold and warm in turns, every part of him he never wanted to show me now laid bare through the bond.

Lucien gasps. Not from pain. Fromclarity.

“Fuck,” he whispers, and then his hand tightens on mine, almost possessive—but not quite. It’s reverent. Worshipful. “You’re in my veins.”

I smile, and it’s not sweet. It’s a warning. A promise.

“You’ve been in mine since the beginning.”

We sit there, bleeding into each other, and I think—this is it. This is the end of what we were. And the beginning of whatever the hell comes next.

I kiss him. It’s not careful. It’s not sweet. It’s not one of those shy things built on maybe or someday or later. It’s a confession. A wound. A war cry. His mouth opens under mine like he’s been waiting for this moment longer than I’ve been alive, like the universe spun a little slower just to get us here. And maybe it did. Maybe every cruel word he ever flung at me, every crueler silence he clung to, was all just foreplay to this—my mouth against his, my hand in his bloodied one, my magic curled in his chest like a lover that had always belonged.

His fingers thread into my hair, and he kisses me like he’s sealing something into place—something irrevocable. Something dangerous. Something we’ll both bleed for, eventually.

I break away just enough to speak. Just enough to ruin him a little more.

“I need to tell you something,” I whisper, resting my forehead against his. “You were last to bond. But you were first to ruin me.”

He goes still.

Stone still.

Like every part of him is braced for the blow he never saw coming.

“You—” His voice is hoarse, like he’s speaking through gravel. “You what?”

“I loved you first,” I say. Quiet. Final. “Before the others. Before any of this made sense. I hated you, too. But it started with you.”

Lucien doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe. But his eyes—gods, his eyes—burn with something that makes me want to crawl inside them and set up a home. That makes me want to carve my name into the surface of him so no one ever forgets I was here first, even if I was last.

“I didn’t deserve it,” he says, and there’s no power in his voice now. Only raw truth. “I still don’t.”

---