Chapter 31

Marshall

*****

I felt like a kid again. So impressed, infatuated and carefree. There were no strings attached to my awe, no logic or thinking. Just feeling.

Feelings, the thing only weak people experienced. The thing that made one vulnerable and exposed. The thing that made one forsake duty and obligation.

Feelings always lead to failure which always results in punishment.

So how then could I look at her with such naive wonder? How did I not quiver from that familiar burn of self-loathing? From knowing that I had lost control of myself? That I had rendered myself exposed to my enemies?

It wasn't that I didn't know better. My father had beaten me enough times for just pausing at the storefront of a toy shop, for glancing too long at a bustling playground.

I knew better but I no longer cared.

One glance at my stunning angel and my senses abandoned me. She stripped me of all rational logic, reduced me to a state of pure instinct and desire.

She was glowing, her fair skin shimmer