Chapter 8 Delusional Rabbit #2
She stumbled around the corner of the bed and toward him. Stars had fallen from the heavens into her eyes, and her lips—soft and pink and slightly parted—were fucking poetry when she said, “I won’t. But… will you really? Test me?”
He nodded, swallowed a lump in his throat, and took a large step backward. “Night, Miss Grant.”
He made it all the way to his room, resisting the urge to look back at her, to see those stars again, the soft fields of pink where she’d breathed those two pitiful words. You will? As if she couldn’t believe it. As if he was giving her what she’d always wanted, and he was the only one who could.
Who would.
Men were idiots, all of them. Including himself. Especially himself.
He sat at the table in his room—a mirror image of hers—and lit the candle with the brimstone stick.
He’d been told his whole life he was better than everyone, women included, because of his birth.
Eldest son of an eldest son in a very old family with a title.
He’d learned with the alphabet that everything was his, and he must do nothing to earn it.
The lie had almost destroyed him. Because of the lie, he’d almost destroyed his cousin.
At least he’d eventually learned the lesson—he wasn’t inherently better than anyone, and many were much better than him, including women.
The candle’s flame shrank, and that wasn’t what he was supposed to be about at all! He sat up straighter, rubbing his palms together, cupping them, then breathing into them.
“All right… How would Sybil do this?”
Do not dominate. Coerce.
Seduce.
He grinned and held his cupped palms over the candle flame. “Come along, little thing. You can do it.”
But the flame did not grow.
“I know you wish to bite me. I’ll allow it. Oh!” That reminded him. He found his satchel nearby and opened it, pulled the aloe plant out of it. “Poor dear. You’ve lost a bit of soil. I’ll replace it.” He set it on the table.
Yesterday, when he’d shaped the gold, he’d been thinking of Sybil.
Clearly he needed physical provocation, lusty inspiration. But it did not have to be the woman across the hallway from him. Absolutely not. If her brother ever found out, it would be off with his balls.
So Apollo cupped his hands, closed his eyes, and tried with the candle once more, envisioning the flame as his last mistress, bonny and curvy and entirely willing. For the right price. She’d been pretty and—
“Oh, hell.” It wasn’t working. He felt more clinical in his estimation of her bounteous beauty and quite, quite poor. Which was something of an antidote to lust when he needed an aphrodisiac.
He cut a glance at the door.
She’d never know if he used her as inspiration. He’d certainly never tell her.
The image in his mind slipped so easily toward Sybil—the jolly curve of her cheek, the wide innocence of her eyes, the teasing tenor of her tongue.
Bloody hell, her heart must be made of steel.
She’d been locked in a dungeon and never given in to despair.
And… and… he wanted to see her legs. Naked.
Or with silk stockings. He wasn’t particular.
He just wanted to know the shape and size of them.
Beneath her skirts, her thighs, her arse—impossible to know their shape.
He could guess. Anything would do. Whatever was under there was sure to be delectable.
A fire would gild her pale skin, bloom it rosy, and—
The candle’s flame was dancing. He laughed, and the flame seemed to laugh with him.
“Hello, darling.” He pulled his hands higher. “Play with me?”
The flame leapt toward his palm. Higher.
But not high enough.
“Come along, then, pretty thing. Hot and dangerous like her, aren’t you. Let me feel you.”
A hesitation, then the flame stretched high like a woman’s languid arm to roll against his palm. Sybil’s arm reaching for him from a mattress, her knuckles rolling across his cheek. He could feel it. Feel her.
Wanted more.
He removed one hand from the flame and undid the buttons of his fall.
He was hard and needy. He’d never felt so hard before.
Throbbing. He took his cock in hand and stroked it once.
Then he stroked it again, imagining a strong hand replacing his own, taking to pleasuring him as diligently as she seemed to take up everything else.
Except a few things here or there, little pockets of the world where she embraced convention. Fascinating contradictions.
He moved his hand faster, lightning gathering with each new image of Sybil that flashed across his mind, with each flicker of the growing flame against his palm.
His body had become the flame, the candle, and Sybil the oxygen. He might burn away entirely.
A knock on his door.
“Fuck,” he hissed, freezing.
“Hesperus,” a voice whispered through the wood. “Something odd has happened.”
Sybil. The real Sybil. The flame died down to its usual height, and he wished his cock would, but it seemed hopeful that the real woman had come to finish the job the imagined one had started.
“Just a moment.” His voice was ragged. He shoved himself back into his trousers, still hard. “Down, you delusional rabbit.”
“What?”
“Nothing!”
“Apollo.” His real name whispered so low she could barely hear it. “Is something wrong?”
Yes.
“It’s only…” She sounded worried, damn it. “The gold, your gold. It started to grow hot.”
He stuffed his shirt into his waistband and threw open the door. “What do you mean?”
She held one of the bowls that had held their dinner. Inside, singeing the wood, was his gold in its flat, almost woman shape, glowing hot.
“Hell.” He reached for it, changed his mind and kept his hands to himself. “What’d you do to it?”
“Nothing. It was in my pocket. It burned a hole right through my skirts.”
“Did it burn you?” His gaze devoured her fingers, hands, saw no marks.
“No. It fell right to the floor, and I prepared for the heat before picking it up. But it made me feel… odd.” She bit her bottom lip as she squirmed then looked up at him. “Do you think this means gold is my metal?”
“No idea what this means.”
She nodded, pushed the bowl out to him. “You should keep it.”
“No.” He pushed it back. “It’s yours for now. I think this is a good sign.”
Her face brightened. “I’ll figure out what to do with it to keep it from burning through my skirts again.” She stepped backward into the hallway. The fire there danced across one side of her body. “Have you had any luck?”
He nodded. “I’ve just about mastered growing the candle flame. With your help.” God, he felt so soft saying that, as if anyone could come along and tear him in two. “Good night.”
“Good night.” She opened her door.
“Sybil?”
“Hm?”
“You said it felt odd? What do you mean?”
“I felt…” Her head was bowed, and the silky, pale curve her neck made his trousers more uncomfortable than they already were. “Hot. And hungry.”
“Ah. Well. Perhaps call for more stew.” He shut the door. He’d request more stew too.
Because hungry couldn’t begin to describe the monster he was afraid ravaged him.
It was ravenous.
For Sybil.