Chapter 12
Ezra’s back was stiff. He’d spent the rest of the night on the parlour floor.
Jem came by, saw him there and said nothing.
Ezra was looking into the bag Jem left when Analise breezed into the kitchen, dropping onto a chair at the table.
She drummed her fingernails on the table-top, but didn’t say a word and he couldn’t look at her, not yet, not when he wanted to run his tongue over her skin.
He shouldn’t have touched her last night but he couldn’t help it.
Ezra cleared his throat and indicated the bag. ‘I’ll make you something to eat.’
‘Will it be poisoned?’
‘My ego isn’t that fragile,’ he mumbled, reaching for the bag. Onions, tomatoes, potatoes, bread, meat wrapped in waxed paper, cheese, apples, more eggs.
Analise huffed. ‘You can actually cook?’
‘We were middle class, but not wealthy. No personal chef, anyway.’ He glanced at her.
She was dressed in a black blouse and a dark-brown skirt.
Her legs were tucked up, knees beneath her chin, feet bare.
There was a light surrounding her, sliding over her like a second skin.
Unlike most witches Ezra encountered, Analise’s magic wasn’t one colour, but a whole spectrum of it and he wondered why she was different.
He wondered what she dreamt that left her so shaken.
He wondered what would happen if he pulled her from her seat and kissed her.
For a moment it was another witch Ezra saw, with white hair and lines on her face. He blinked and she was gone. Shaken, he turned away, and began preparing their meal, Analise’s sharp gaze on his back.
‘Who taught you to cook?’ she asked as he sliced his way through an onion.
‘My mother house broke me. I guess she thought it might make me a more attractive potential husband.’
Analise said nothing, and they didn’t speak until he placed a plate of steak and vegetables in front of her. She didn’t touch her food, staring unblinking at her meal, until she sighed, picking up her cutlery with quivering fingers.
‘I’m sorry you lost your job,’ he said. ‘And I’m sorry you’re stuck here, with me. I’m—’
‘Enough, Ezra,’ she said, voice soft. ‘Let’s … I don’t know. Try and get along, I suppose, if that’s possible.’
‘I’m well aware of my failings, believe me.’ He didn’t mean to say it, usually better at keeping his self-loathing to himself, but somehow, her presence was opening doors in his mind he’d thought were locked.
Analise pushed some tomato around her plate. ‘You’re annoying, and I want to curse you into next week, but you’re not horrible, alright?’
‘Is that a compliment?’ he asked suspiciously.
Analise laughed, her whole face lighting up. It caught him off guard. ‘Maybe,’ she said.
‘You should do that more often. Laugh.’ Her expression sobered instantly, her magic shifting around her. It was golden today, just a hint of it, curling around her fingers like smoke.
It had been so easy for him. The smell and taste of magic faded quickly, so it could be concealed from his colleagues, but never from him. It didn’t matter how long it had been since a witch used their magic, Ezra could see it, like he could with Analise now.
She was watching him watch her, her expression cool.
He cleared his throat, but she spoke before he could.
‘I think it’s about time we got to know one another.’
‘Alright. How have you managed to hide—’ Ezra stopped abruptly.
Fuck. Her eyes narrowed but the colour drained from her face as her magic turned so red it was almost black.
She’d almost let it slip last night, and he’d caught the look on her face when he held her wrists, keeping her hands away from him.
A death witch’s power was in her hands—she had to be touching something to do any damage.
Ezra had felt that power once, in the beginning.
The witch was old, and he assumed age meant she wouldn’t be able to overpower him.
It was a mistake he never made again, and he never forgot what death magic felt like—claws, scratching ruthlessly at his insides, and the blackness that filtered into the corners of his vision.
He tried again. ‘How have I never met you before?’
Analise ignored that. ‘Why did you go home with me that night?’
This was easier. ‘Probably for the same reason you took me home—you were there.’
She blinked. ‘Fine. How do you know Jem?’
Dangerous territory. ‘You seem tense. I’ve got a method for relieving tension. All you have to do is ask.’
‘Just answer the question.’ Analise pointed her fork at him.
Ezra drummed his fingers on his thigh. His friendship with Jem had been a surprise. Where Jem was quiet, Ezra was loud. Jem was serious, taciturn, his eyes full of shadows. Ezra laughed and joked enough for the both of them. They were polar opposites, yet somehow, it worked.
Analise’s eyes bored into his. He sighed. Fuck it. ‘We met at school, then after I lost my parents, I joined the Gendarme with him.’
‘I knew it,’ she whispered, sitting back, her face tight. ‘Did they get sick of you and kick you out? Is that how you ended up being tucked beneath a gangster's wing?’
Ezra’s response was sharp. ‘Something like that. You have an inaccurate picture of what it means to be employed by Maddog Pierce, Analise. If he wants me to do something, I don’t have much choice in the matter. But it keeps me fed, so I do what I’m told.’
‘We all do things we don’t like to survive,’ Analise argued. ‘It’s the way of things, isn’t it? If you can’t harden yourself, the Credges will chew you up and spit you out with absolutely no remorse. It’s kill, or be killed,’ she added, her voice dropping.
Ezra thought back to the night he found her in the morgue, and the man at the mouth of the alley. He’d forgotten about him, until now, but recalled the magic coating his dead skin. ‘Have you killed a man?’
‘Have you?’ she demanded. Her magic was still deep red, angry.
‘Almost, but that was in the ring, not in defence of my life. I’d never judge someone for taking a life when theirs was on the line because, like you said, it’s kill, or be killed.’
They finished their meal in silence. Ezra came around to her side of the table and held out his hand for her plate, but she shook her head and stood. Her cutlery slipped and fell to the ground at his feet. Analise sighed and dropped into a crouch, picking the knife and fork up.
Ezra couldn’t help himself after watching her put food between those full lips of hers, after coming so close to revealing things he must keep hidden.
He was tense, especially after last night.
He needed to be the cocky, arrogant prick she thought he was, because that was easier.
‘While you’re already on your knees … I don’t think you returned the favour. ’
‘I don’t think you did me any.’ Analise looked up, those eyes like liquid darkness.
His knees threatened to buckle as she ran the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip, one hand sliding up the back of his leg, the other coming to rest on his hip.
He was vaguely aware of a knife an inch from his balls and a fork hovering over his cock.
She smiled a slow, knowing smile. Her fingers tightened on his thigh—her nails through his clothes sent a bolt of heat through him as he imagined them shredding the skin on his back.
Pale pink light curled around her shoulders; fingers of it brushed her cheek. It was the same colour as her lips. The longer he stared at her, that pink darkened until it was almost red then vanished as her hand tightened on his hip.
He needed to touch her. He could still feel the heat of her skin, the softness of her thigh against his knee and the way her fingers curled against his bare chest. He bit back a groan. How the fuck was he going to sleep tonight?
Analise didn’t take her eyes off him.
Before he could think about what he was doing, Ezra reached down and trailed his fingers over the curve of her cheek.
She didn’t break eye contact as he gently traced her bottom lip.
His toes curled and every nerve began to fray as her lips parted, the warmth of her breath curling around his finger.
She leant forward and caught his finger gently between her teeth, then slowly stood. Ezra didn’t dare move. The tip of her tongue brushed his finger. Fuck. He exhaled sharply as his insides turned molten. The plate slipped from his hand, shattering on the floorboards, but neither of them moved.
He inched closer to her, unable to help it. Her lips curled, then she bit down on his finger—hard. She chuckled, before stepping back and he couldn’t look away from her as she edged towards the door.
‘Thanks for the food,’ Analise said, and disappeared into the hall.
Ezra watched the white indent in his thumb bloom purple while he tried to remember how to breathe.