Chapter Forty-Four #3
Her basilisk side wanted to hurt Leo. Her human side wanted anything but.
Her human side wanted him to live a long and happy life, free of any danger or bodily harm, preferably far away from any basilisks at all.
It was a dream that would only come to fruition if he lived through tonight.
The guilt of killing Leo would be insurmountable.
Tem knew she wouldn’t survive such loss.
Caspen’s voice whispered in her mind: Your love for him must be stronger than your desire to hurt him. It is as simple as that.
His voice was fading.
Tem stared at Leo. Caspen had said it was simple. But it was anything but. It was complicated and difficult to suppress her basilisk side—to tame the monster that strained in its cage. But if Caspen had done it for her, then she would do it for Leo. There was no other option.
Tem pressed her hands to Leo’s chest, pushing herself up.
She looked down at him, concentrating not on how he felt inside her but how she felt about him.
Tem loved Leo. Always would. It was a basic truth between them, and it would not be tainted or destroyed by this night.
Instead, this night was a way for Tem to demonstrate that love: to put into practice the words she’d said so many times.
It wasn’t enough to tell him she loved him.
She would show him instead. She would keep him safe.
“We have to go slow,” Tem whispered. “It’s the only way I can do this.”
Leo nodded, his pupils blown wide with fear and arousal. He looked like a man on the brink. “Then we shall go slow.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. Then Leo sat up, bringing his torso to hers and wrapping his arms around her waist. They were perfectly intertwined, their lips an inch apart.
He kissed her gently.
Tem kissed him back just as gently, threading her fingers into his hair and holding him against her.
She focused on the way his tongue felt against hers, on the softness of his lips and how they contrasted with the sharp points of his canines.
His gold teeth used to bother Tem, but they didn’t anymore.
Now she understood that they were a part of him—no different than her freckles being a part of her.
Leo could not run from his past nor was he trying to.
Leo was simply trying to be better in the future.
It was all Tem wanted for him, and it was all she wanted for herself too.
Leo’s hands were in her hair, tangled in her curls.
Tem knew he loved those curls. She pictured the way he always twirled them around his fingers when they talked, pulling them gently so they bounced back up again.
She thought of the way he’d gripped them in the library, pulling her head back over the desk.
It was his way of touching her when he couldn’t really touch her—his language of connection when they had been so utterly disconnected.
Tem missed Leo.
They’d been robbed of so much together. An entire marriage, to start.
But also mornings waking up together, evenings falling asleep in each other’s arms, breakfasts and lunches and dinners at the castle.
Evelyn had gotten all of those things. Evelyn had gotten everything that should have belonged to Tem.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered against his lips.
“For what, Tem?”
“For taking this away from you.”
“We have it back now. That’s all that matters.”
Leo was right; it was all that mattered.
Tem’s basilisk side was still there—looming in the background—a quiet observer. With its retreat came clarity and calm.
Keep him safe. Keep him safe. Keep him safe.
Words. Nothing more. Not an obligation or a promise. Just a plea.
Leo’s fingers were between her legs, stimulating her clitoris as she moved her hips. They were beyond the point of no return now: two people, in love, having sex. What could be more simple than that?
Leo was talking again, and this time she let him.
“I want you for the rest of my life, Tem. I don’t care what it takes. I want you and I need you and I love you and you’re mine.”
“You’re mine too.”
“You’re fucking mine.”
“I know.”
At last, they surrendered to each other.
Tem threw her head back in release, gasping as her orgasm took her.
Leo did the same, his cry of pleasure the single most beautiful thing she had ever heard.
Tem couldn’t believe her body could draw forth such a sound from him.
She wanted to hear it over and over until he couldn’t make it anymore.
She wanted to hear it until the day she died.
They clung tightly to each other, holding on even after their climaxes ebbed away.
Tem brushed the blond strands of hair from his forehead.
She kissed one cheek, then the other, then she did it again.
All she wanted was to cherish this perfect, exquisite boy.
He was her anchor. Her beacon. Her home.
Leo looked dazed, as if he’d just awoken from a deep sleep. He blinked, focusing on Tem. “That was…”
Words seemed to fail him. Truth be told, they failed Tem too. Power was surging through her—power that, up until a moment ago, had been just out of reach. She was not the only one affected. Leo’s eyes were bright, his skin flushed. He looked utterly and completely alive.
Tem leaned in to kiss him again. Before their lips could touch, someone pounded on the door. Tem threw herself over Leo protectively, holding him against the mattress.
“Temperance,” a voice called from the passageway. “I must speak with you.”
It was Apollo.
Tem leapt up, crossing to the door and opening it.
Apollo brushed past her. His eyes flicked over Leo before returning to Tem. His mind was closed off, but Tem felt an unmistakable energy radiating off him. He was afraid.
“Apollo,” she said. “What is it? What’s happening out there?”
In the haze of sex, Tem had forgotten about the state of things. But now, with her head once more clear, she heard the screams of terror coming from the passageway.
“The Senecas are revolting,” Apollo said. “Rowe is on his way.”
Tem looked at Leo. He was not supposed to be here in the middle of a revolt. Fear gripped her spine.
“Temperance,” Apollo said urgently, pulling her attention back to him. “He seeks you.”
“Why?”
“Is it not obvious?”
It took Tem mere moments to catch up. Rowe couldn’t marry her. That left him with only one other option—the one way to take her power.
“He wants to kill me.”
Tem knew from the look on Apollo’s face that she was right. Before he could reply, Leo stood.
“Tem,” he said. “I cannot hear about one more person who wants to kill you tonight.”
“It’s fine, Leo.”
“How is it fine?”
“Because…” Tem trailed off, trying to think of something that would placate him. There was nothing. She abandoned that train of thought, turning back to Apollo to say, “Where’s Caspen?”
Apollo’s lips flattened into a tense line. “He is running, Temperance.”
Although the update was terrible, Tem felt a strange sense of comfort in the fact that Caspen had confided in Apollo in the first place. It meant that all was well between brothers. That, at least, was some good news.
“Will he come back?”
Apollo’s gaze flicked to Leo’s. “I assume you consummated the crest?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes. He will be back. He will not have a choice.”
The implication of his words hung in the air. Tem stepped closer.
“He said there was another way. Was that true?”
Apollo’s golden eyes held hers. There was nothing but torment in them. “It is true there is another way.”
“What is it?”
Before he could answer, another scream pierced the air. This one sounded closer.
“Apollo,” Tem insisted. “Tell me. What is it?”
But Apollo had gone still. “He is here.”
There was no need to specify. Tem could feel Rowe on the outskirts of her mind, reaching for her. Already, he was homing in. Already, he was hunting.
Apollo touched her waist. “You must go.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m the only one who can stop Rowe.”
The moment the words were out of her mouth, Tem realized they were true.
Caspen, the Serpent King, was supposed to be the most powerful basilisk under the mountain.
But Rowe had bitten him during the tournament, and he’d been siphoning that power ever since.
That left only one basilisk who could face him. Her.
“No,” Apollo said.
“No?”
“He is extremely powerful, Temperance. And he is dangerous.”
“I’m extremely powerful.”
There was a pause in which both Apollo and Leo stared at her as if they were seeing her for the very first time. Tem let them look.
“I’m a Hybreed,” Tem continued. “And I have consummated the crest. That means I can transition.”
She knew without testing her theory that it was true.
Power thrummed through her entire body, seeping into her fingertips.
Up until now, she hadn’t realized she’d been operating at such a deficit, that such a fundamental part of her was missing.
But she was whole once more, and she would not waste it.
Apollo shook his head. “You cannot stay.”
“I can, and I will.”
“You are not safe here. You must go.”
“You can’t tell me what to—”
“YOU MUST GO.”
Tem froze. Apollo had never yelled at her before. Basilisks favored negotiation—logic and reason always trumped outbursts. But Apollo was beyond reason. He was an inch away, his eyes boring into hers. At the look of surprise on her face, he softened his tone, but just barely.
“I will not let you anywhere near Rowe.”
“Who are you to tell me what to do?”
“I am someone who loves you, Temperance. And I will not watch you die tonight.”
“Excuse me?” Leo interjected.
Tem held up her hand. “He doesn’t mean it like that, Leo. He just means—”
“I mean it,” Apollo said firmly, enunciating each word. “In the way I have earned the right to mean it.”