Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chrome
Chains rattled as I locked the cuffs around Gray’s wrists. The glare she hurled at me had me smiling. I missed that look. It was the look that snagged me from the start.
“Let me go.”
“Can’t do that,” I said, tightening the cuffs around her ankles, too, despite the deep part within me that rebelled against the idea of chaining her up. “I need you here.”
Thankfully, Slate was safely locked down on the other side of the cell. When we’d arrived, I’d used my shadows to suffocate him until he blacked out so he wouldn’t be a nuisance.
“Why?”
“Because you’re my queen.”
Gray’s face twisted with disgust. “You don’t lock your queen away. My Chrome never would’ve done something so vile.”
My laugh reverberated off the walls. “You obviously didn’t know the thoughts going through my mind when I chloroformed you and took you to that old house.
” I stepped back, feeling the bond strengthening with our close proximity.
But with it, my apathy melted a bit more, returning the love I had once felt for her.
The stabbing betrayal and sharp bitterness that shot down our connection had me unwittingly gripping my chest, rubbing it as if that would make it disappear.
“I hate this Chrome. I want the real one back.” Gray gritted her teeth, fighting back the tears I knew she refused to let drop. “Just fucking kill me now, because I’ll never be your queen when this is who you are.”
I leaned forward, breathing the oxygen that she exhaled.
Feeling another piece of me die at her venomous words, I clenched my jaw to shove out the pain.
“You say that now. But you don’t know the freedom you’re missing.
We could be free of it all together. Just you and me.
No one controlling us. No one dictating our lives.
We’d be dictating others. Wouldn’t you like that for a change? ”
“No. Our people depend on us. The real Chrome never would have abandoned his people, no matter what came up. You were many things, but loyalty was the one thing nothing or no one could strip from you.” Gray swallowed, not breaking eye contact.
“You proved you’d changed the moment you walked away from me. ”
“I walked away to spare your life.” My whispered words remained steady, but barely. “I’d do it again. The only reason I still exist is because of you. I won’t give up on us.”
Gray shook her head, the chains clinking from above her.
The pain in her eyes should’ve shattered me.
And while my heart fractured at the knowledge of what I caused her, I couldn’t stop the course I was on.
I needed her. “I’m not gonna stop until you’re healed.
I promise,” she whispered as a tear rolled down her cheek.
On instinct, I swiped it away with my thumb, that deep part of me hating to see her hurt. I cupped her cheek carefully in my hand as I studied her eyes. It was impossible to ignore the way my heart sped up when she leaned into my palm and closed her eyes.
Abruptly, my heartfelt moment for Gray ended, smothered by the Syphon Bond. My lip twitched. Frustration warred inside me at these moments of weakness I kept having for her. And why couldn’t she see the bigger picture? “What if I don’t want to be healed? What if I like being the way I am now?”
Another stab to my heart bolted down our bond. This one came from her. “You like being an Infernal? Explain to me why.”
I inhaled through my nose and briskly put space between us.
I placed my arms behind my back, gripping my wrist in one of my hands as I began to pace the ancient stone cell.
Silence passed between us that she let carry on before I spoke.
“It’s great not to feel for once. The guilt.
The pain. The emotional burden is all gone.
All I want is power.” It was partially true.
At least, it had been the entire truth before Slate got his hands on me at the Hollow.
I turned to meet her assessing expression, her face tight. “And you.”
“That’s only because of the Syphon Bond, then, if you can’t feel any emotion,” she argued.
I shrugged. “Perhaps. But I know you’re important to me. Special. You’re mine. And nothing can change that. You’re my queen. And we will rule Terraguard and Arcadia together. You’ll come around to seeing it my way. I assure you, little savage.”
“No,” Gray said, her tone flat. “I won’t. Not like this. Not when I’m your prisoner.”
Inky threads of shadow trickled from my body, extending outward until they taunted her face.
Gray flinched away, trying to escape the tendrils that crept closer to her throat.
“Never forget,” I said. “You and I are two in one. You may want to fight against me now, but we both know that you can only hold out for so long.” A tendril stroked her cheek, drifting down, down…
down until teasing the area just above her clit.
“You’re not my prisoner. I just need to show you the beauty of being in the shadows.
You only know the bad parts of being in the darkness.
But there’s no other place I’d rather be. And I know you’ll feel the same.”
Gray held her breath as my shadows dipped lower and caressed her clit, teasing her with immoral promises that I knew appealed to her darker half. “So what? You serve the Tempests now?”
I stared at her, fighting off my irritation from such a stupid question.
“I serve no one.” Dropping my tone, I added, “You’re the only one I serve.
And I’ll happily commit any atrocity if anyone thinks they can take you from me.
” The memory of witnessing Slate fuck her burned holes in my brain, and it took everything I had to restrain myself from killing him too soon.
I cut my attention to my traitorous cousin, who lay unconscious on the stone floor.
“Before I let Celanea and your father know that you’re here, I’m gonna let you contemplate the choices of your actions for a bit.
” My jaw ached, my teeth grinding together as my nostrils flared.
Returning my attention to Gray, I watched as the realization that I knew about her tryst sank her hopes to the pits of hell.
Her horror slammed into me, and in response, my vision faded to a shade of red.
I didn’t want her fucking pity. I didn’t want her guilt.
I wanted her compliance. Her loyalty. And in return for her duplicitous actions, I’d punish her accordingly.
Gray shuddered, and I internally rejoiced at the blood draining from her panicked face. Angling my head, I observed her like a cat would a mouse as she shook her head, clearly trying to deny the truth.
She stuttered, attempting to find words, but I cut her off, my patience running dry. “I told you. You belong to me.”
Not giving her a chance to respond, I snatched my shadows back to me.
They had begun to wrap around her throat, and all I wanted to do was to have them squeeze until she submitted to me and only me.
Instead, I spun on my heel and stormed from the cell to avoid looking at the betrayal glistening in her eyes, leaving her chained to the stone floor and wall with an unconscious Slate on the other side of the room.