CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Myra
It felt like an eternity before he emerged from the bathroom.
His dark hair was damp and hanging in his eyes, and all he wore was a pair of grey sweatpants that hung low on his hips and seemed to fall lower still with every step he took into the room.
“You should have a shower,” he said toweling off his hair.
“It felt amazing.” The deep cut of his V was distracting at best, so I forced my gaze upward to the intricate, swirling tattoos that stretched across his chest and shoulders and crept up to the base of his neck.
I hadn't been able to see them well in the bowels of The Lion’s Den, but there, in the warm light of his apartment, I could make them out so plainly.
They looked exactly like the wispy shadows he’d worn like a cloak and called forth as a weapon.
“So, this ‘mistake’ you mentioned,” I said, dragging my gaze away from his torso to his deep green eyes, “care to explain more about it, because literally, what the fuck, Yael?”
He stopped in front of where I sat on the couch, hands on his hips—which shifted the waistband of his pants perilously lower—as he stared down at me.
“Would you care to explain how you ended up on the shore with a druid’s leash around your neck?
Because I think that’s the more pressing issue at the moment—”
“I’m sure you do—”
“Says the girl with a bounty on her head,” he argued, sobering me in an instant.
In the chaos following the druid attack, I’d all but forgotten that little disclosure.
Suddenly, all the strange things that had happened to me over the past week made way more sense.
“It’ll be hard to keep you safe if you’re abducted into another dimension—or dead. ”
“If it’s any consolation, I wasn’t actively trying to be either of those things.”
His eyes narrowed. “It isn’t.”
I stood to face him, so close I could feel the heat from the shower still emanating off his body, inviting me to touch that warm, smooth skin.
Instead, I balled my fists at my sides and edged backward a little while he watched my actions like a hawk.
My irritation grew as we stared silently at one another, waiting to see who would break first. A part of me was still angry about how things had gone down at the bar, but after the way he’d come to my aid, that anger had dulled, and in reality, I didn’t really want to fight with him anymore; I wanted answers.
Any answers.
“How did you find me?” I asked, doing my best to keep my attitude in check.
Sadness permeated his intense stare. “I followed you home after you fled The Riff Raff to make sure you were safe, then got a call from the king about fae business.” His expression softened and his shoulders rounded slightly.
“I knew you’d need space after everything that went down, so I let it go for a while before I tried to contact you and explain that I never meant to set you up like that.
” He hesitated for a moment, uncertainty tugging at the corners of his eyes.
“And to tell you I was sorry. But as the hours passed, I couldn’t shake the unsettled feeling your silence gave me, so I went to your apartment, only to find it empty.
Through your windows, I saw a flash of magic in the distance—over by the pier—and I knew.
” Darkness swam in his irises as his eyes narrowed with anger and the muscles in his jaw flexed.
“When I stepped outside, I could hear the druid mocking you from a block away… taunting you.” I squeezed my eyes closed to try and shut out the unwanted images cropping up in my mind.
“The rest, as they say, is history. But what I really want to know, love, is how you found yourself on your knees at the end of a druid’s leash in the first place. ”
I let out a harsh breath. “Because I’m an idiot,” I said softly, unable to look at him and see the truth of my words reflected in his stare.
“I just… I was so angry and hurt and ashamed. All I wanted was to sit by the water for a bit and let the sea air ground me a little. That's it. Just a few minutes to clear my head and remember what I’m doing all this for. And then—” I winced at the memory of the gag in my mouth and the whip around my neck, choking off my air and my only source of power.
“He snuck up on you,” he said.
I nodded. “I never stood a chance. He knew that I had the Siren’s Song, so he made sure to cut off my ability to speak right away.
After that,” I said, anger and embarrassment warming my cheeks, “I was helpless. Again. I never would have gone down there alone if I thought there would be a problem, but I really thought I’d be okay.
It’s been a few days since the attack at the bar, and I had no reason to suspect there was a bounty on my head, for fuck’s sake!
I thought the incident at The Riff Raff had to do with the brawl last week, since it was the same guys, but now it looks far more sinister.
Do you think…” I said, taking a step toward him, “do you think Argo’s dead bouncer is coming back to bite me in the ass?
Because Argo would have the means and the motive if he found out. ”
His brow furrowed in contemplation. “Argo would not dare come for you in Serpent’s Tongue and risk Ravi’s wrath, especially given that coming for you specifically would be personal.”
“I’d be inclined to agree with that, except a) this is the Playground, b) Ravi’s safety net appears to have a few holes in it as of late, and c) we killed one of Argo’s men—in his own house, so to speak—so it’s already personal,” I argued.
“Maybe that’s why they came for me at the bar… to send a message.”
“Except they didn’t kill you, and neither did the druid.”
My body stiffened at his words. “I think that had more to do with them playing with their new toy before they gave it away.”
A shadow danced through his eyes. “And now they won’t play with anything ever again.”
Heavy silence fell over the room as he stared at me, and I wondered if he was battling for control once again.
There’d been a shift between us hours earlier at the bar as we stood crowded together in the doorway having our hushed conversation.
At the time, I’d thought that his ‘fake’ affection was starting to feel real, but that maybe it was just me—that I’d allowed myself to get caught up in the moment and the lie.
But standing there in his living room, looking back at him under the weight of his intense stare and the harsh set of his brow, I realized it was more than that.
I’d seen it then, too—his desire to protect me—and I wasn’t so sure that it was only out of necessity any more.
Afraid to scratch the surface any deeper for fear of what I might find, I changed the subject.
“Yael,” I whispered softly so as not to push him, “I have lived in the Playground for a couple years now, and I have never seen anything like the power I witnessed you wield down by the pier. I really need you to tell me what that was—and please don’t say ‘a mistake’ again. I deserve an actual explanation.”
Again, the muscles in his jaw worked as he considered his answer. “Evil,” he replied matter of factly, as though that were answer enough and not another riddle dumped into my lap for me to figure out on my own.
My frustration was immediate. “What does that even mean?”
“It means that what you saw was evil. Now it’s my turn to ask a question.
” He closed the distance between us, forcing me to crane my neck to meet his gaze.
“Let’s assume you’re wrong about Argo’s involvement.
If that’s true, why would someone be so interested in you that they’d put a bounty on your head—one big enough for every bottom-feeder in the Playground to know about? ”
“Maybe because my little Siren’s Song secret isn’t a secret anymore, courtesy of the deal I was forced into.”
He towered over me, evergreen eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure I think that’s why.”
“You can think whatever you want,” I said, straightening my spine, “but that’s the only other explanation that makes sense to me.
Now it’s my turn.” I hesitated a moment, unsure how to phrase my question in a way that would force him to give me more than a vague, ominous reply, not that I was sure that was even possible.
Yael was fae, after all, and trickery ran in his blood.
“Back at my apartment… before we arrived here… do you remember any of that?”
His eyes narrowed to hide the swirls of darkness circling his irises. “Yes. My turn.”
“Hey—”
“Why were you banished from the Deep?”
I hesitated as he eyed me tightly, awaiting an explanation I hadn’t given anyone since the moment I set foot on the shores of Seattle—not even Ravi.
He knew the gist of things, but not the whole truth, and he’d never pushed for it.
So why, then, in the low light of Yael’s apartment, was I contemplating telling him my darkest secret?
Nothing about it made sense, but something deep inside me was desperate to release what I’d been withholding for far too long.
Maybe it was because he’d saved me, or because he was the reason I wouldn’t be in the Playground long enough for him to find a way to use my past against me, but whatever it was, I found the truth perched on the tip of my tongue, ready to be set free.
“Because someone I loved more than anything in this world accused me of trying to usurp the queen…and she believed his lies.” I swallowed back the sorrow I still felt at that memory and clung to the anger it bred instead.
“My turn,” I said, thinking through how best to ask what I wanted to know.
“That shadowy version of you… when I spoke to it, it implied that it was something separate from you.”
His body went tense. “Is there a question in there somewhere, love?”
“Is it something else? Something other than you?”