It's all she can think the whole time she's standing there with her face pressed against him.
She shouldn't be doing this.
Touching him when he didn't ask for it.
She shouldn't be doing this.
Clinging to him like a pathetic limpet.
She shouldn't be doing this.
Begging stupid things from him.
She shouldn't be doing this.
Showing this kind of weakness.
No matter how hard that thought drums in her mind, she doesn’t move from where she’s stood. Doesn’t let go of him or step away from him the way the rational side of her knows she should do. She just stays there, and wonders if he knows that even this is a world of comfort.
The traitor behind her ribs threatens to burst inside of her chest when he says her namelike that. She doesn’t want to look at him, not yet, with the fears she’s admitted and the shame for laying it all at his feet in such a way still clinging to every inch of her. But that tone in his voice demands her attention, albeit softly, gentle in a way no one else would ever believe the man in front of her capable of.
She doesn’t look up, but she does turn her face so her cheek is pressed against the solid wall of his chest. She can hear the soft thrum of his heartbeat like this. Low and steady and sure. Not a waver one, in all these words she’s somehow tugged out of him. How she wished her own sounded like that, but she's sure it’s more akin to a hummingbird’s wings.
"Your worth is in a million things…"
She closes her eyes again against those words, unsure of how to respond to them at all. She knows other people see other things in her. But what does Kaz see? She does not find the bravery to ask.
The sound of the rumble in his chest at a laugh half caught and lost somewhere on the way is worth his weight in gold. She hopes one day to earn one, a real laugh, unbidden and genuine. But this will do for the time being. This and that softness in his voice.
And just like that, the spell is half-broken. A smirk slides over her lips and she gathers her wits. "Mmm, of course," she hums softly, pressing a hand flat against his chest and tilting her head back to look up at him. "Kaz Brekker always protects his investments," her eyebrows lift at her echoing his own, terribly timed and horribly phrased, words back at him. The context is different this time, it's not the sharp barb he'd used it as, back then.
no subject
It's all she can think the whole time she's standing there with her face pressed against him.
No matter how hard that thought drums in her mind, she doesn’t move from where she’s stood. Doesn’t let go of him or step away from him the way the rational side of her knows she should do. She just stays there, and wonders if he knows that even this is a world of comfort.
The traitor behind her ribs threatens to burst inside of her chest when he says her name like that. She doesn’t want to look at him, not yet, with the fears she’s admitted and the shame for laying it all at his feet in such a way still clinging to every inch of her. But that tone in his voice demands her attention, albeit softly, gentle in a way no one else would ever believe the man in front of her capable of.
She doesn’t look up, but she does turn her face so her cheek is pressed against the solid wall of his chest. She can hear the soft thrum of his heartbeat like this. Low and steady and sure. Not a waver one, in all these words she’s somehow tugged out of him. How she wished her own sounded like that, but she's sure it’s more akin to a hummingbird’s wings.
She closes her eyes again against those words, unsure of how to respond to them at all. She knows other people see other things in her. But what does Kaz see? She does not find the bravery to ask.
The sound of the rumble in his chest at a laugh half caught and lost somewhere on the way is worth his weight in gold. She hopes one day to earn one, a real laugh, unbidden and genuine. But this will do for the time being. This and that softness in his voice.
And just like that, the spell is half-broken. A smirk slides over her lips and she gathers her wits. "Mmm, of course," she hums softly, pressing a hand flat against his chest and tilting her head back to look up at him. "Kaz Brekker always protects his investments," her eyebrows lift at her echoing his own, terribly timed and horribly phrased, words back at him. The context is different this time, it's not the sharp barb he'd used it as, back then.