Chapter 38
Darlington remembered the night of the Manuscript party, the shame that had burned through him, the mix of dread and desire.
He hadn’t understood who she was then, maybe he hadn’t understood himself either.
He could pretend it was the demon who longed for her or that hellfire had created a mutual madness between them, a thread of need that had tightened to the point of demanding release.
But the truth was messier, and more embarrassing, and it began the first moment he’d laid eyes on her, a monster girl with hollow eyes, Undine who had come to steal his soul.
He had resented her natural talents. He had flinched at her ruthless honesty.
But he had believed in her from the start, that she was more than anyone had predicted, that this driftwood girl washed up on his shore could somehow save him. And she had.
That was why he had needed to bring her to Black Elm.
Who else would walk with him into this echoing tomb, this inheritance that he no longer understood?
His great-grandfather had gone to hell. What did it mean that a hundred years later he had followed in his footsteps?
But then she’d kissed him and the worry had stopped.
Now he carried her out of the old study and up the stairs, like a hero in an old movie, or maybe a villain, bent on ravishing his prize.
He should have felt like a fool, but he only knew a sense of rightness.
All that training, all that study, all that hope for some great mission, when really his strength was meant to serve her.
He was meant to serve her. He’d been made to kiss her again, to touch her again, to make her moan against his ear.
Darlington laid her down on his narrow bed, on the old wool blankets in the tiny circular room surrounded by stacks of books. At last, he’d brought her home. He had a moment of concern about the cold, and then they were warm in the circle of hellfire.
He was allowed to look now at this woman whom he had forced himself to look away from again and again.
He wanted to turn on every single light and gaze at her, the splash of her hair over her narrow shoulders, the plush curve of her lips, and here, the arch of her back, the shudder moving through her as his hands traced her neck, her breasts, the jut of her hips.
Her body was slight beneath his, burning like coals, the warm slip of her skin making him dizzy with hunger as she tried to press closer to him, her legs hooking over his.
But when he entered her, he felt her longing bank, the tide of hunger receding just as it had at Wolf’s Head. The thread of hellfire that bound them was a vibrating chord and now the note turned sour.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m okay,” she said.
“You’re not.”
“It’s always like this with me.” She shrugged, the smallest movement. In the faint moonlight from the window her eyes glittered black.
“Like what?”
“I can’t…” Again her narrow shoulders lifted. “It always feels like giving something up.”
He hesitated, feeling her fear, and his own fear of failing, of disappointing. He knew what it was to be powerless.
“Use the leash,” he whispered.
Her eyes met his. Slowly, she lifted her hand and hellfire curled around her fingers, a rope of blue flame. It leapt at his neck as if hungry for it. Some part of him rebelled at this, the loss of control. But he could give it to her.
She gave the barest tug, bringing his mouth to hers.
“Don’t be gentle,” she said. “I’m not good with gentle.”
Through the fire that bound them he felt desire return and he knew he could oblige. “I will serve you ’til the end of days,” he vowed.
She laughed. “And love me too?”
And love you too, he thought as the wind rose and the world outside grew colder.