28. Helen
HELEN
I slip out of the dim chamber with my pulse still racing, and a grin I make no effort to conceal.
They tried, all those foxes with their ornate masks and assured hands. They boxed me in, grazing my skin, certain that temptation alone would bring me to my knees.
Lust is easy to come by, but I’m not here for easy. I know exactly who I came for, and I won’t be drawn off course by a convincing disguise. I will find the real Red Fox.
The carved door shuts behind me, and I step into a corridor.
Gold-threaded fabric hangs from the ceiling in long suspended veils. Lantern light filters through them, scattering geometric shadows across mosaic floors. The air is fresh, but there’s a warmth rising in it.
I slow my step and it brushes past me again.
That scent. Venus pressed the oil into my skin before I was admitted, it has the same note.
But what moves around me now is blended with different tints, more complete, like the trace that caught my breath before I ever saw him during the first Game.
It’s spice and wood, and something that belongs closer to skin than air.
I follow it. The corridor narrows. The ceiling lowers into a series of shallow arches, each one carved with delicate latticework. My footsteps echo softly against stone and tile.
Then—another set of footsteps.
I stop.
They stop.
A figure appears at the end of the corridor, partially obscured by drapery. The red lacquer mask holds the light like embers beneath glass.
Red Fox.
This time, there’s no mistaking it.
The scent deepens as if it knows I’ve found him. I can already feel him on my skin, on my lips, at the back of my throat. Everywhere.
He turns, giving me just enough of his profile to make the pursuit feel like my idea. Then he walks away.
“Oh, no,” I murmur, and go after him.
Silk veils brush my shoulders as I push through them. Low archways force me to duck, my bare feet pressing into cool mosaic. The corridor twists, opening into another passage.
My pulse pounds in my ears.
He doesn’t look back. He knows I’m coming.
For a split second, he vanishes behind a column wrapped in patterned plaster.
“Not tonight,” I growl.
I pivot, scanning, and catch the movement of red turning another corner.
“Fox!” I call, breathless but smiling.
He lengthens his stride to make me work for it.
Infuriating.
I gather my skirt and push harder. A low table forces me to veer sideways. Cushions scatter as I brush past them. The scent deepens, richer now.
The chamber opens. The ceiling soars, ribs of cedar crossing overhead like the inside of a cathedral. High above, carved into the upper span of the chamber, is a raised alcove.
Red Fox stands within it, watching me.
A wooden ladder leans against the stone beneath him—steep, polished from use.
“I swear to God, Fox…” I warn as I take the first rung. He’s made me work this hard he’d better not disappear again.
The ladder shakes beneath my weight. Fabric pools at my ankles, then trails behind me as I ascend. The room falls away with every step, my breathing grows louder in the vast space.
When I reach the alcove, he steps back.
“Oh, no you don’t!” I shout as he pivots behind a thick velvet curtain.
I swipe the curtain aside—
Suddenly there’s nothing beneath my feet.
A startled curse tears out of me as my hands catch whatever they can. The velvet jerks in my grip, and I find myself swinging out over empty space.
“Fuck!”
The curtain rod groans above my head. I risk a glance downward. Two stories down is stone. Real stone. And in the middle of the floor, he stands directly below me.
The curtain bracket cracks again.
“Let go,” Red Fox says.
“Have you lost your mind?” I shout back, breath shaking.
“Do you trust me?”
The rod splinters again.
This is madness.
I close my eyes and release.
For one suspended instant, there is only air rushing past my skin and the sickening pull of gravity.
Then arms.
Hard. Certain. Unyielding.
He catches me with a force that knocks the breath from both of us, absorbing the impact so completely it feels less like falling and more like being gathered into the living curve of muscle.
My fingers clutch at him, gripping his shoulders, his jacket, anchoring to his solid chest. My cheek presses against him, and his scent floods my senses—spice, wood, warmth—the same scent that drew me here in the first place.
“Hellion,” he murmurs near my ear. “We meet again.”
My eyes open slowly.
The chamber no longer feels vast. The ceiling isn’t as distant as I thought. The drop wasn’t two stories at all. It’s merely an illusion of height crafted by shadow, reflection, and my own racing imagination. The curtain hadn’t been mounted nearly as high as it appeared.
“You tricked me,” I say, breath still uneven.
His smile turns shameless. “A fox keeps a few tricks in reserve. I wanted to know whether you would fall.”
“You mean whether I would trust you.”
He lowers me with care, but my arms remain around his neck. My body stays pressed to his as though the fall hasn’t fully ended. I feel the rise of his breath against my ribs. I should let go, but I don’t. I’m not prepared for him to vanish again.
He notices. Only when my feet touch stone does he ease his hold, and even then his hands remain at my waist.
“What took you so long?” I say, lifting my chin.
He tilts his head. “Impatient, I see?”
“You released a pack of imitations.”
He laughs. “Aren’t they charming enough for you?”
“You sent the charming ones. I was waiting for the dangerous one.”
“You don’t scare easily. That’s going to change,” he rasps.
“Then show me.”
He draws me forward, arm secure at my waist, guiding me through a final archway draped in embroidered silk.
The space beyond opens.
Saturated blues and emeralds unfurl beneath our feet, intricate geometry radiating across the stone.
Iron-work lanterns descend on dark chains at varying heights.
At the center, a shallow pool glows, light breathing up through the water as rose rises warm and subtle into the air.
Clay urns flank the perimeter, their silhouettes shaping the shadows.
Cushions in jewel tones spill across layered rugs.
It’s lavish beyond reason. Storybook in scale.
I exhale, taking it in. “All this…”
“For you,” he says simply.
He draws me closer. Even with his suit still in place, he is spectacularly hot. When he pushes his sleeves up, revealing strong forearms corded with muscle, my thoughts spark into something incendiary. I picture those hands on me, decisive, unrelenting.
I lean into the threat of him.
“I don’t leave my woman underwhelmed,” he says, thumb brushing the line of my jaw.
“So you’re no longer dangerous?”
“On the contrary,” he says. “I haven’t forgotten. You took something of mine.”
Up close, I see it clearly, the missing crescent in the filigree. A clean tear. My tear. It matches the fragment hidden in my closet.
“If you’re expecting it back,” I say, moving to feel the hard line of his throat, “you’re going to be disappointed.”
A slow heat flares behind the Fox, turning the polished mask into something ravening.
“I don’t surrender pieces of myself easily,” he says. “And this isn’t a precedent for how tonight unfolds. But I’ll let you keep it.”
His finger beneath my chin shifts. Then his hand follows, spreading, firm around my neck. The possessiveness threads straight down my spine.
“And in return, I want something of you. A lot of you,” he says.
“Name it.”
His gaze darkens. “It’s going to hurt.”
I reach for his darkness, our lips only separated by a wisp of air. “I still choose you.”