Chapter Eleven
Colter
The moment the women disappear behind the door, I finally exhale. Lilith has sprinted off as if her life depends on it, and Maybelle is chasing behind in motherly concern.
Still, I’m left staring at the empty space she left behind. I’m fighting off some unfathomable sensation that’s gnawing in my chest. Distrust? No, I understand that. It sharpens my mind and heightens my senses. Whatever spell Lilith has cast on me, it cuts through my defenses.
I struggle to think straight. I’m itching to press her with questions she won’t have the answers to.
And somehow, in this smoldering wreck of an evening, I see clearly what has been right in front of me the entire time. The Head doesn’t need Lilith for what comes next. Sparing her life was done in the service of this marriage.
“And?” the Head asks.
I look over at him. I’d much rather be looking at her. “I did as you asked. This was her reaction.”
Out of all the terrible things this night brought, the Head’s ploy to see how Lilith would react to mentioning the past must be the worst. Thrusting her back into the traumatic event, just to see how she would take it.
He smiles. “What did she say?”
“That she was young and stupid.” He wants me to tell him Lilith’s been brainwashed into believing it never happened. We both know that will never happen, but his face lights up all the same, on hearing that she’s accepted that the truth will remain buried forever.
“Splendid.” He swallows the last of his champagne. The same guy who poured ours rushes over to fill his glass, before the Head has even set it down.
“She was caught off guard.” It bothers me, I think. I can’t be sure of it, but deep down, something inside me doesn’t feel right.
“It was meant to. Playing nice would give her the means to obscure the truth.”
There isn’t time to waste. Lilith and her mother could return at any moment, and there are questions and statements that must be made before they do.
“She’s been a liability from the beginning,” I say, shifting my gaze to some far-off corner of the room. “Now they both are.”
“Pray share your infinite wisdom with me?” The Head rolls his eyes, amused by my concern.
My jaw clamps down tightly at his mockery.
“She saw me.”
“No.” He shakes his head and waves at me dismissively. “She saw the Ghost. Now, she sees Colter.”
“They are one and the same.”
His face brightens with a sickening, sinister grin. “Ah, I see what this is. You felt something.”
Wrong choice of words. To have felt would mean I’m not feeling it now.
I won’t lie to him, so I choose not to respond at all.
“Your face says it all. That cold, shriveled prune you call a heart is beating faster, isn’t it?” He snickers to himself. “I should’ve seen it sooner. That obsessive gaze, the way she made your skin crawl… positively delightful.”
“That’s not what this is about.” I snarl, fury biting at every nerve. “I don’t trust them.”
“Of course.” He folds his hands, one over the other on the table.
“But if you get the foolish notion that it might be, I’m putting a stop to it.
The Veil requires her mother. Nothing more.
We especially don’t need our Ghost failing in his duties because he’s pussy-whipped by the first piece of ass that comes into view. ”
“We shouldn’t have brought her here,” I say, finding it tremendously difficult to keep my composure.
“Why not?” He rolls his hand in a silent gesture for me to continue.
“She’s…” Nothing comes to mind.
“Pure? Innocent? Delicate?” The Head urges me on. “Who gives a fuck? The Veil needs a Spirit, and Maybelle wants her in.”
My muscles tighten and flex at the way he says that.
Luckily for me, the door swings open and the Whittaker women return, before I have a chance to say something regrettable.
“Now, play nice, Colter. I won’t repeat myself,” he says loud enough for both of them to hear. Turning a conversation of his wicked designs into a scolding to win Lilith’s trust.
“Crisis averted, gentlemen,” Maybelle says, brushing a hand over my shoulder as she passes by.
“I hope everything’s okay?” Father asks, his face softening as he awaits an answer.
I’m surprised by it, although I shouldn’t be. Alistair Crawford is a man of many masks. He can pass from cold and ruthless to kind and caring at the drop of a hat. It’s remarkable. It’s also a skill I wish I could learn, but one that has always managed to elude my grasp.
“Perfectly so.” Maybelle reclaims her chair and leans in to whisper an explanation of what happened.
He chuckles and responds. “You know how boys are.” Loud again, another attempt at a public shaming of my transgressions.
Lilith returns to her seat beside me. Instinctively, my eyes fall on her. I am utterly enamored. A tickle in the back of my mind says it has nothing to do with how pretty she is.
I’ve never been one to care for looks. She has them, of course. A soft gentle face, with hair that frames it in rivers of gold. Her striking blue eyes command my attention, no matter my wish to turn away. She is small in stature, with curves that are amplified by her fit physique.
It’s almost as if she had been engineered in some lab, to have the perfect proportions any man would give his life to possess. Or, at the very least, kill to spend a night with.
But as much as I tell myself that having her here is a terrible mistake, I know it’s a lie. My mind and my body have different needs for her.
Where I’m going crazy with thoughts of the trouble she may cause for the Veil, my hands fidget uneasily. My internal parts disagree on so many things about Lilith; however, they are in full and absolute agreement about one thing.
They want a night with her, even if it means killing to get it…
“Did I make you uncomfortable?”
I hadn’t noticed my throbbing erection below the table, until she returned to it. It’s all I can think about now. Delusional fears that if it grows any thicker, my cock’s going to knock on the wooden underside to say hello.
“No,” she says flatly, uninterested in furthering our conversation.
Visions of all the terrible things I want to do to her flood my mind, and I have no way of distracting myself. Had we toppled over the threshold, it would not be for gentle lovemaking. Or as simple as having sex.
I want to destroy her. Devour her. Taste every inch of her skin and use her tight little cunt as my personal fucking toy.
I want to hear her gagged moans and see the mascara running down her face while I fuck it into obedience.
I long to bathe in the orgasmic euphoria of her screaming my name, begging for more.
“Scared you?” I continue.
She should be scared. If not of the Head and his plans never ending in happy endings, then of me and all the fun little things I’d do to her.
“I’m fine,” she says curtly, leaning into the newfound confidence her break brought.
“Maybe we got off on the wrong foot. Should we start over?” I ask, turning away from her, however difficult it is to do. It shouldn’t be hard to look away and I sure as fuck shouldn’t feel a hollowness in my gut when I do. I’m far from falling apart, but a thread’s unraveling.
And it’s her fucking fault.
“What’s the point?” She rolls her eyes. Two deep blue oceans that threaten to drown me. “You’ve made your judgment, and I know where we stand. So, this is me returning the favor. Let’s just sit here quietly until the night is over.”
Hmm. Probably for the best, yet I find the notion displeasing.
“The night’s still young.” A boiling mixture of anxious discomfort burns through my body, igniting every fibrous tissue inside me.
Come. Play with me, Lilith.
She ignores me and, instead, she shoves her slender hand into her purse. It returns with her cellphone in it, a message running across the screen:
Tell me if he’s hot. Mama needs a new man.
“There’s still time for you to change your mind,” I add.
“Don’t count on it,” Lilith snaps. Then her fingers dart across the screen with incredible and intense proficiency.
Yes, she intrigues me.
More than I care to admit. More than I should allow.
In some ways, I understand it. She was my first, so to speak. She fell across my path on the night of my ascension. Hers was the first face I saw, sleepy and dazed, when I became the man I was born to be.
Now she’s in my home.
She is also a liability, who should have died on that rock but didn’t.
And now, she’s crawling under my skin in all the wrong ways.