Total pages in book: 40
Estimated words: 38333 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 192(@200wpm)___ 153(@250wpm)___ 128(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38333 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 192(@200wpm)___ 153(@250wpm)___ 128(@300wpm)
Cash paid for the new clothes, the riding lessons with Madeline, the private tutors to catch her up before school started.
It was Cash's idea to enroll her at Rimrock.
Not mine.
I just... went along with it. Smiled and played nice aunt while my brother actually changed that little girl's entire life.
Mercy's thriving because of him.
Not me.
So what have I actually done?
What have I given Legion besides my body and my certainty that I want him?
Cassia's ears flick back again.
I straighten in the saddle, loosening my grip on the reins.
"Sorry, girl."
She huffs. Keeps walking.
The night air smells like sage and dust. Storm's still building somewhere to the east but it hasn't reached us yet.
I think about Eleanor.
Can't help it.
Think about the safe room deep underground. The old bank vault surrounded by cinderblocks. The red leather album inside.
The Book of Legion.
I should tell him it exists. Not ask about it. Not demand explanations or confessions. Just... let him know.
Hey, by the way, my dead mother kept a private archive of thousands of photographs she took of you from the time you were a toddler until six months before she died. Some of them are you as a child. Some are you and me as teenagers kissing. And some are professional studio portraits of you half-naked looking sad, and beautiful, and broken.
Also there's a selfie of the two of you together looking comfortable and happy, dated six months before her death, when you were twenty-four and I was at college and you definitely never mentioned knowing her that well.
Just thought you should know.
My stomach twists.
Finding that book destroyed something in me.
I remember standing in the safe room with the album open in my hands, flipping through page after page of Legion's face.
My heart hurt.
Physically hurt.
Like someone reached into my chest and squeezed until I couldn't breathe.
Because I knew what it meant.
Eleanor was obsessed with him.
The same way she was obsessed with creating the perfect Savannah Ashby brand. The same way she controlled every aspect of my childhood and turned me into content.
She did something to Legion too.
I don't know what. Don't know if I want to know.
But whatever happened between them—
God, maybe that's why I never fully committed to the idea of us.
Maybe some part of me felt like I could never measure up to her.
Eleanor with her talent, and vision, and terrifying certainty about everything she touched.
How could I compete with that?
How could I be enough for Legion when my own mother saw something in him worth documenting obsessively for twenty-five years?
Cassia stumbles slightly on loose rock.
I automatically adjust my seat, keeping her balanced.
"Easy, girl." She recovers. Keeps walking.
The stables come into view ahead. Dark shapes against darker landscape.
I take a breath. Let it out slow.
Whatever happened between Eleanor and Legion—it's none of my business. I've come to terms with that now.
Or I'm trying to.
Because the truth is… Legion Kane is the only man I want. Not Marcus with his political ambitions and cold calculation. Not some fantasy of who Legion could be if he wasn't who he is.
Just him.
The real him.
Rough, and damaged, and dangerous, and mine.
But he's not going to trust me with his secrets if I keep taking without giving.
If I keep letting him deflect and dodge and carry everything alone.
I need to change.
Need to be more present in his life.
Need to show him I'm with him—not because he's my rebellion, or my project, or my way of escaping the Ashby cage.
But because I choose him. Every day. Even when it's hard.
Especially, when it's hard.
Cassia and I reach the stable yard. I slide off her back, my legs shaky from the ride and everything else, then lead her inside. The barn smells like hay, and leather, and horse. It's familiar and grounding.
I unsaddle her, brush her down, check her hooves. She leans into the grooming, content.
"You're a good girl," I murmur. Better than me, probably.
When she's settled in her stall with fresh water and hay, I close the door and head toward the house. The mansion looms ahead. Every window dark except the kitchen where we leave a light on all night.
I slip inside and walk barefoot through halls I've known my entire life. Up the back staircase to the second floor, down the hallway to my room.
Inside, I close the door and lean against it.
What can I change right now?
What can I do tonight to show Legion I'm serious?
That I'm here. That I'm not going anywhere. That he can trust me with whatever's breaking him apart.
I cross to the bathroom. Strip out of the white dress that still smells like him—smoke, and leather, and sex—and then pull on a pair of sleep shorts and an old t-shirt. I wash my face and brush my teeth.
Then… I stare at myself in the mirror.
I look like exactly what I am.
A woman who got thoroughly fucked outside an abandoned grain silo by a man she'd burn the world for.