Chapter 8 #2
She came closer. Of course she did. Demetri focused on the line of her throat, the pulse there, the small tender flutter of it.
He could smell the warmth of her blood, and the dragon could too — not hunger, something worse.
Recognition. Anchor. The broken Chain had held his power inside him for sixty years, and now every piece of him reached toward Nica as if her body contained gravity, as if two centuries of drift had finally found the thing they were falling toward.
Her hand touched his forearm.
The red haze cleared instantly. Demetri stopped breathing.
Nica’s palm rested against his skin, warm and small and human, and the dragon went utterly silent, and the pain vanished — not diminished, gone.
Sixty years of the Chain grinding against his beast, and one bare touch of her hand did what all that silver never had.
Nica frowned. “You’re burning up.” Demetri looked at the place where she touched him: the darkened links of the Chain brightened, one thin line of silver light running through them, then gone. My mate is already affecting the magic. Without a bond. Without blood. Without knowing.
Nica started to pull her hand back. Demetri caught it — not hard; he closed his fingers around hers and held her palm to his arm. Her eyes widened.
“You make it stop,” he said.
“What?”
He should release her. He did not. “The pain.”
Her thumb shifted against his skin, an accidental caress, and heat rolled through him. Not fever. Need. The dragon stirred — no violence now, no demand to shift. Only certainty. Kiss her.
Demetri lifted his gaze. Nica stood close enough that the scent of her filled his lungs: tea, rain, laundered cotton, and the warm, unnamed sweetness that had destroyed the shape of his existence the moment she fell into his arms. Her eyes dropped to his mouth.
Kiss her.
She must choose.
She is choosing.
Nica moved first. One step. Her free hand settled against his chest, and her touch shook, and so did his control.
“Is this a terrible idea?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
She rose onto her toes and kissed him.
For one heartbeat Demetri did not move. He could not.
The first touch of her mouth erased two hundred years — every grief, every wall, every cold disciplined decade fell away and left him standing in the single warm instant of her lips on his.
Then the dragon roared, and he caught her waist and pulled her against him, and Nica gasped into his mouth, and he took the sound.
Her lips were soft, warm, tentative for only an instant before she kissed him harder, her fingers flexing against his chest, her body pressing to his as if she’d been fighting the same hunger all along.
He turned them, and her back met the wall beside the balcony doors, and he planted one hand against the glass above her head — trapping himself more than her — his other hand staying at her waist. No lower. Not yet.
Her tongue touched his, and fire moved through his veins. Actual fire; the dragon opened its throat inside him, and Demetri tore his mouth away. Nica made a sound of protest that nearly ended him. He pressed his forehead to hers and fought for control.
“Why did you stop?”
“Because I do not want to frighten you.”
“You’re already frightening me.” Soft. Honest. Demetri forced himself to release her waist, and Nica caught his bare side before he could step away. “You’re also making it very difficult to care.”
His eyes closed. The dragon preened. She wants more. He opened his eyes: her lips flushed, her pupils wide, a strand of pale hair clinging to her cheek. Beautiful did not begin to contain her.
“You are perfect,” he said.
Her expression closed by instinct, a joke rising behind her eyes, and he saw it coming. “No.”
She blinked. “No what?”
“You will not turn this into humor.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were.”
Her chin lifted. Demetri touched the strand of hair beside her mouth. “You are beautiful when you are angry. Beautiful when you are frightened and refuse to retreat. Beautiful when you forget to guard your face because a piece of history has captured you.” Color rose along her throat.
“You barely know me.”
“I know what I see.”
“You don’t know what’s wrong with me.” The words came too quickly, pain moving beneath them, and Demetri lowered his hand.
“There is nothing wrong with you.”
Nica laughed once, no humor in it. “That’s easy to say on day two.”
“Day three.”
“What?”
“It is after midnight.”
She stared at him. “Day three,” she repeated.
“Yes.”
“That makes this much more reasonable.”
“No.”
Her mouth twitched, and he wanted it under his again. Instead he stepped back. The distance hurt. Necessary. “I will court you properly tomorrow.”
“What does properly mean?”
“You will see.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“It is breakfast.”
“Terrifying.”
He looked at her bare legs, the thin shirt, the swollen curve of her mouth. “Wear something warm.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Are you taking me outside?”
“For part of it.”
“Should I expect more unidentified flying creatures?”
“No.” The lie tasted bitter, and she noticed — of course she noticed — but she let it pass. “For breakfast,” she said.
“For breakfast.”
“Not a date.”
“It is a date.”
“I didn’t agree to a date.”
“You kissed me.”
“That was a separate bad decision.”
“Then you may make another at nine.”
She folded her arms. “You are very arrogant.”
“Yes.”
“Most men would deny that.”
“I am not most men.”
“No,” she said softly. “You really aren’t.”
Demetri moved toward the balcony, and Nica frowned. “The door is that way.”
“I know.”
“You’re leaving through the balcony?”
“I entered this way.”
“Demetri,” she said, as he opened the door and cold fog rolled toward him. “When you say you’re courting me, what exactly do you want?”
Everything. Her body beneath mine. Her laughter in every room of this house. Her hand in mine when centuries pass. Her silver mark carrying my fire. A life I stopped believing existed.
He looked back at her. “I want the opportunity to make you happy.”
Her expression went still. Demetri stepped onto the balcony before he said more than she could bear. “Good night, Nica.”
“Good night.”
He climbed over the outer wall, and she lunged forward. “Demetri!” He dropped. The dragon laughed as Nica reached the railing; Demetri caught the ledge one floor below, swung onto the terrace, and landed on his feet. Above him, Nica leaned over the wall, her hair spilling around her face.
“What is wrong with you?”
“Many things.”
“That was not funny.”
“It was slightly funny.”
Her eyes narrowed, and then she disappeared, and the balcony doors slammed. Demetri stood alone in the fog, and the smile stayed. Until the Chain cracked again.
Pain drove him to one knee. The dragon surged against his skin, claws tearing through his fingertips, and Demetri pressed one bleeding hand to the stone.
The kiss still burned on his mouth, the taste of her still on his tongue, and even kneeling in the cold with his own blood on the terrace he could not make himself regret it.
Worth it, the dragon said.
Demetri looked up at the warm light in Nica’s windows. “Yes,” he whispered.
The damaged silver at his wrist darkened, and one of the bound links split neatly in two.
Caelen found him several minutes later, still kneeling. The elf took one look at the broken link and went pale.
“How long?” Demetri asked.
Caelen crouched and examined the Chain without touching it, and his silence stretched too long. “Caelen.”
“Three weeks,” the elf said.
Demetri looked toward Nica’s windows. “And if the damage continues at this rate?”
Caelen’s pale green eyes met his. “Days.”
By nine the next morning, Nica had learned three things.
One, Demetri considered breakfast a formal campaign.
Two, he owned a sweater in a shade of charcoal that turned his eyes almost silver.
Three, kissing him had been a catastrophic mistake — not because she regretted it.
She could regret a bad haircut, a missed deadline, the tattoo she’d nearly gotten at sixteen because Tasha dared her and they’d both been drunk on gas-station wine.
She could not regret the memory of Demetri’s body pinning hers to the wall while his mouth erased every rational thought she owned.
She could only want it again, which was significantly worse, and she’d lain awake most of the night wanting it, staring at the ceiling of a stranger’s beautiful house with her whole body still humming.
He sat across from her at a table overlooking the Pacific, calmly cutting into an omelet as though he hadn’t kissed her until her knees buckled six hours earlier.
Beyond the glass the sea threw back a hard silver morning light, and gulls hung on the wind off the cliff, and the whole open Pacific glittered as if the previous night had been something she’d invented.
Lirien had set out berries, dark bread, honey, smoked fish, eggs, and enough coffee to carry a small office through tax season.
Demetri watched Nica eat until she wanted to throw a strawberry at him.
“You can stop monitoring me.”
“I am not monitoring you.”
“You looked at my plate four times.”
“You have eaten half an egg.”
“It’s a large egg.”
His gaze moved to the untouched toast. Nica picked it up and took a deliberately aggressive bite, and satisfaction flickered in his eyes. Infuriating man. She’d examined the silver Chain at his wrist while pretending not to. One link was black. Another looked newly split. He caught her staring.
“Does it hurt?” she asked.
“No.”
“Liar.”
His knife stopped. “I am accustomed to it.”
“That is not the same answer.”
“No.” He set the knife down. “We should discuss today.”
“Should we discuss why you jumped off my balcony first?”
“I climbed down.”
“You vanished into fog after deliberately making me think you’d thrown yourself off a cliff.”
His mouth shifted, and she pointed her toast at him. “Don’t smile. You’re still in trouble.”
“I was not aware you possessed disciplinary authority over me.”