Chapter 17 #3
“Thank you so much for your help, Noir,” he says, stepping into the already cramped space. Somehow, he always makes the room seem smaller. Though he takes one look at me and seems to lose his words—the way he’s looking at me tells me everything I need to know.
Noir clears her throat, and only then does he blink. “How does she look?”
I swallow, standing there as his eyes lick over me with a heat that makes my lungs tremble.
“She looks lovely.” His eyes flick to mine briefly. “Godd—Kenz,” he corrects himself, which doesn’t go unnoticed by Noir. “You look lovely.” His eyes flash back to Noir, whose grin is borderline crazed. “I think it’s time for you to be going now, don’t you think, Noir?”
“Whatever.” She turns to my desk in a huff, tossing my makeup brush on it with the flick of her wrist. “You know?” she purrs, tossing her voluminous waves over her shoulder before turning to face us with a seductive sway of her hips.
“I learned the most interesting phrase from a mortal the other day…”
A sweet smile fixed firmly on her face, she saunters over to Daxton, adjusting his jacket.
“You’re down bad, baby.” She chuckles, but Daxton looks as if he could strangle her.
“Anyway.” She claps, tossing her head in my direction.
“I’m off. The parties and drugs are shit here.
I'm going back to Nethra.” She walks backward toward my half-cracked window.
“You two…” She points between both of us. “Figure your shit out, ’kay?”
She gives Daxton a wink before shifting into her raven form. Perching on the windowsill, she gives us both a pointed look, her beak dipping once before she flies out the open window, leaving us to stew in a deafening silence.
I huff. “So, are you going to at least tell me who we are going to kill? Or are we just going to go paint the town red like the hedonic monsters we are?”
“The first one, sure, the last is a surprise,” he says abruptly, as if I’ve struck a nerve.
He doesn’t even break into his speech about how they are already dead, which worries me a little.
“You have struck a nerve. Why can’t you see life and death are two sides of the same coin, belle ame?
To live means to die eventually, and to die is to give way to a new life.
Just because you don’t see it that way doesn't make it any less true. You tell me I’m obtuse, you say I lack empathy.
But the thing about mortals is that even once you are enlightened, you STILL.
CAN’T. SEE. You would rather be blind. Like ostriches, you would rather hide your head under the dirt. ”
“No, I know there is more. This can’t be just about me,” I say to him, standing my ground, tilting my chin defiantly. “There has to be more behind this endless disdain. Tell me.”
He sighs deeply before he speaks. “Monroe Williams,” he says as if that is supposed to mean something to me.
My brows draw together in confusion. “He had the same…affliction as you do, except his was only a one-time occurrence, unlike you. He had a vision before a deadly accident and stopped it. Of course, I came to collect. But I made one fatal mistake.”
“Yeah? What was that?” I ask, arms folding across my chest, my defenses battle-ready for him to hurl more insults about how intolerable and insolate mortals are. But he doesn’t. Instead, he sighs, his shoulders sagging.
“It was the only other time I thought I might’ve been in love.” His eyes are cast in a far-off look as if we’re calling a memory. “Na?vely, I asked him to be with me in the Underworld—he said he needed more…time. And he got all the time he needed, while I got to watch him wither away slowly.”
I blink, my defenses suddenly melting away. I stare at him, awestruck, unsure of what to say.
Is he…going to cry?
“Contrary to popular belief,” he says, slicking away a stray golden tear and clearing his throat. “I am not the monster you apparently still think I am. Let’s go, I want to get this done.” He turns away, about to head out the door, when my question stops him in his tracks.
“Why?” I whisper.
“Why, what?” He turns back to face me.
“Why did he say he needed time?”
“I’m sure because he believed as you do,” he answers simply, shrugging, but I can see the hurt in his eyes.
“To him, I was a plague, a sign of the end of days. A heartless soul who could never love or be loved, because no matter how many times I said it, and no matter how many times he echoed it back, I would only be this.” His hands run over his form.
“A monster—a dark black abyss of unfeeling callousness…obtuse.”
The words crack something clean in my chest—I did say that to him.
I had called him a monster, I had told him that he was too callous, detached from mortal feelings…
obtuse. I can hear that conversation echo in my head.
Even with what we shared, I can see how he could still be upset.
Especially if he heard the conversation I had with Noir.
My eyes sink to the floor, words that I could never repair hanging between us like a curse—he isn’t the creature that I thought he was, but sometimes it’s not easy to blindly accept the things he says. His truths clash with my Christian beliefs on a daily basis.
His eyes flash to mine, rage sparking there, and I realize what I just called him. I shouldn’t have said that, not even in my head.
“Daxton, that’s not—”
“Let’s go,” he says, more firmly than before.