Page 149 of Shadowman
“Fuck yes…Lex,” he sighed. “I only wantyou, Lex… I want you back.”
A sob tried to escape my throat, but I swallowed it down. Kissing and biting his neck to distract from my sorrow, the spray of water absorbed my tears.
“Baby, I love the way you fuck me…”
Not me.
Never me.
It’ll never be me.
“I… I love… fucking you,” I sputtered, my voice a wallowing hurt.
He was my proxy, too. I knew he was… But as I fucked him and wept, I was tormented by the way it had become a lie.
“I’m yours,” Ren breathed, coming alive in his honesty.
The truth brought Warren Xavier to life.
But I was dead inside.
This is unreal.
I can’t believe it.
I can’t believe I’m actually doing this!
My stomach has been in my throat forminuteson end while I pace around and around, wearing a damn hole in the concrete floor. I’m trying not to look in his direction, but it’s difficult.
He’s too quiet…
Trevel is rarely quiet when we’re alone. That’s something I’ve come to realize. He likes talking to me—almost too much.
But right now, he’s been effectively shut up by what’s currently holding his attention, and it’s freaking me the fuck out.
Peeking across the room, I watch Trevel where he’s seated on the top bunk, face buried in a book.Okay, not really abookper se…
My journal.
He’s reading my fucking journal.
And the real kicker is, I’m letting him.
I’ve been ping-ponging back and forth between glaring confidence in this decision, and a nagging doubt—like buyer’s remorse—since I moved aside the loose piece of concrete to reveal my stash spot.
It’s as if those purple eyes can see right through all of my masks and my shields. Since day one, he’s been able to read me the way he’s reading my secrets right now. Tohim, it’s been clear that I’ve been hiding my true self beneath a layer of fury, disguising pain and confusion, and vulnerability… The way it never was to anybody else.
When he promised that I could confide in him, and that he couldhandleit, this sudden wave of yearning crashed over me, pulling me under. I’ve been dying to open up to someone forsolong… To release my demons and let them dance freely. Maybe even… with someone else’s.
The thing is, I don’t need him to open his vault for me to open mine. This isn’t aquid pro quosituation. After everything that’s happened recently—my friendship with Luthor and Ren imploding, after already losing people, and the general misery that is Alabaster Pen—I’mdesperateto drop my defenses and finally let someone in. Because life is too fucking short, and I don’twantto take my secrets to the grave.
Trevel just so happened to be there, begging for it.
“What’s that?” he asked, oozing curiosity, though he was clearly trying to downplay it.
“It’s where I hide my stuff,” I told him, about the hollowed-out space in the wall. “There’s a… um… a journal in there. And it contains all of my truths.”
He blinked at me, a baffled shimmering elation in those peculiar eyes.
