Page 14 of Laundering Down the Legions
The common room felt hollow after she left, the silence sitting heavy and refusing to lift.
I drifted over to the empty chair and brushed my fingers along the armrest, the warmth still there against the cool leather. This is what freedom looks like, I told myself. But something heavy held me in place, dragging at my resolve. Jericho had moved fast and clean. Hadn't made Maria prove herself or pass some test to earn the new life. And here I was, weighed down by doubts louder than her choice had ever been. Had he done it as a favor for me, or had I somehow facilitated it?
Kearan was there at the edge of my attention, still too stiff by the doorway, watching me.
But why did I feel guilty? Or why didn't I?
I pulled in a breath and turned to face him, ready to get out the thoughts knotting up in my throat. "Why don't we ever..." I stalled, hunting for words that had slipped me too many times. "I mean, why is it so hard for us to give ourselves permission? To just be open?"
"Fear?" Kearan's tone stayed measured, steady. He held my eyes, the warmth coming through even past that wall he kept up.
"Fear, yeah." I thought about all the times I'd shrunk back instead of leaning in, hiding what I wanted behind logic and armor instead of just admitting I wanted somebody. "But it's more than that too. I learned to earn what I want. I've got a whole lifetime of convincing myself love comes with conditions, that caring has to be bartered for and justified. So when you give it free, when you just let me take it?—"
"It scares you." He finished it for me, gentle, his voice rolling over me in that steady way I needed. "Because it's not what you're used to."
"I thought I was past this." Frustration soured the words on the way out. "Every time I drop my guard, every time I let myself believe I could have something without grinding for it, the bill always comes back around to bite me."
Kearan nodded, patience written all over him like he knew exactly what was tearing me up. "What if it's not about the cost anymore? What if it's about taking it at face value? Learning to be wanted without a price tag. Holding space for each other through the chaos, whether you ask for it or not."
His words hummed through me. It was huge, terrifying, and right, all at once.
"Then maybe it's about accepting what we don't know and moving anyway." I tested the thought out loud against my own life. "If you're right..."
"I am." Kearan smirked, that flash of mischief coming back. "I usually am."
We laughed, and it came out light against everything heavy still hanging in the air. Some small proof of what we'd found together in the middle of the mess. A sliver of clarity cutting clean through the doubt.
I wasn't just learning to take anymore. I was learning to belong.
CHAPTER 8
The common room had that weird between-acts feeling, everybody's discussion and question while Grayson drifted from person to person handing out flimsy reasons to be somewhere else. The whole performance had exactly one goal. Leave me and Kearan alone in it.
I watched him tip his head at Ryker, a not subtle let's-bail nod, and one by one the others started inventing places to be. The man had all the subtlety of a magician yanking a rabbit out of a hat. Big flourish, no trick. Nobody else seemed to catch it. I caught all of it. I let it happen anyway, because the last thing I wanted was to wreck the fragile quiet that settled when Kearan leaned against the counter with his tablet.
He was completely focused, brow furrowed, eyes flicking across the screen. Every little thing about him pulled at me. Even quiet, there was a steady pulse to him that anchored the whole chaotic room.
"You'll want to check the east sector while you're out," Grayson told Seph, aiming for casual and missing by a mile. "Rumor is some... interesting things are happening over there."
She blinked, too caught in his nonsense to do more than nod on her way out.
"You really think we don't see you, Grayson?" My mouth tipped into a smirk as Trux ambled past, eyes ticking between Grayson and me, clocking my reaction.
"I'll be in touch." Grayson said it way too fast, threw me a cautious side-eye, and swept the last of them out on his fake authority. The door clicked shut, and the quiet rushed in thick enough to feel, pulling Kearan's gaze off the tablet and onto me. Curious. Focused.
Alone in the dim, the tension wound itself around us, enough to kick up those little flickers of hope and nerves at the same time. I shifted foot to foot, heart skipping, the leftover conversation still drifting around the room. Kearan didn't look away. He looked at me like he already knew every word I wasn't saying, like the walls I kept stacked up were glass to him.
"You alright?" Low and warm.
"Just admiring your boy's spectacular orchestration." I rolled my eyes to take the weight out of it.
His mouth curved. He didn't fill the quiet, so I leaned into it instead. I stepped closer. "What's got your attention?"
He angled the screen toward me, a flicker of interest in his eyes. "Intel on the surge in demonic activity. We're not guessing about the why anymore. That part's settled." He looked at me, no blame in it. "It's you. Ever since the soul ring, your bloodline's been lighting you up like a flare. They feel it. They come for it."
"So I'm the dinner bell." Fantastic. But this wasn't new.
I'd known it, more or less, since the soul ring went awol. I couldn't put it back on right now, which meant I'd continue flaring for all the demons. Didn't make it sit any better hearing it laid out flat. Every demon scratching at our walls was scratching because of me. Some gift.
