Chapter 24 #3
He shrugged. I wanted to rip my hair out and with it all the rune gags in the world. “Ask me any question you want, Harlow. I will answer you anything that I can, that I am not . . . blocked from answering.”
Was he seriously offering me that? Time to test the waters then.
“You’re a Draw, correct?”
“I tried to tell you before you ran away.” His jaw ticked as he tipped his head in a clipped nod. “You need to know that it’s not a choice, Harlow. Any more than you can choose to be a Boost, or Tarquinius can choose to be a Shield.”
Of course, it wasn’t a choice and yet hearing him say it out loud made me rethink my opinion of him, just a little. “I know that. I know you didn’t choose it.”
“And yet you hate me for something I can’t change.”
I held up a finger, irritation coursing through me. “Hold that thought.”
I strode to my room and stuffed the locket under my pillow before heading back into the living room and closing the door behind me.
I had no idea if she could hear me, when she went away like this, but some conversations needed to remain private.
“I don’t hate you.” I met his gaze and instantly wished I hadn’t. “I hate that you lied to me. That you took energy from my friends –”
“I can’t take anything from House Phoenix, Harlow. I already told you that.”
“How can I believe that?” I strode across the room and grabbed his forearm. “And what about the cutting? What does that do for you?”
He took a step back and gently pried my fingers from his forearm. “Penance.”
Punishment, for doing the thing he had no choice in – a piece of my heart cracked a little more. I knew what it was to be backed into a corner and forced to be . . . something you’d never dreamed of as a kid.
My throat tightened and I chose not to continue down that path.
Another direction was a better idea.
I cleared my throat and turned away. “Tarquinius sent you to find us, and you found us. What were you supposed to do with us?”
He pursed his lips and shook his head.
Gods damn those fucking rune gags.
“Why are you really here?” I made myself turn back to him, despite the blood pounding furiously in my ears and my rising frustration.
He lifted his hand and cupped my face, warmth from his fingers seeping into my chilled skin.
“To find you. To reunite you and your housemates. But most of all, because I wanted to make sure you were okay after the bond was broken. I . . . was panicked, Harlow. I couldn’t sense you and I knew that the breaking of the bond could kill you.”
The desire to lean into his hand, to melt into his touch, was so strong I had to lock my knees and remind myself that he was not who or what he had pretended to be.
Nocta’s secret daughter says what?
I cleared my throat and swallowed hard. “What about Opie? How is she?”
Typhon didn’t take his hand away. Instead, he added his second hand to the other side of my face and moved closer, cutting the distance between us. “Sad, angry, confused. All things that teenagers are, even if their big sister is around.”
“Bandit?”
“Thieving from Wickersham whenever he can.” His forehead was pressed to mine, his scent lingering as I took a breath, as if begging me to drink him in, to taste him.
“Ph-Phyllis?”
He shifted his hands, so our cheeks were pressed to each other.
“Grumpy.”
I grinned, a laugh slipping out. “You sure you don’t see me as Hannah?”
“The glamor you have . . . it doesn’t work on me. I saw you that first morning I arrived.”
I wanted to ask why, but his lips were already brushing against mine, leaving zings of energy that seemed to tug my whole body closer to his until we were flush against one another.
His arms around me, my arms around him, clinging to each other as if we were the only port in a storm that would take us both out, if given the chance.
“I don’t know if I can trust you.” I slid my fingers through his dark hair, the soft strands curling around my fingertips.
What was it with him and me? He left me breathless, my skin crackling with need and want, my body aching .
. . and it seemed as though it was the same for Typhon by the way he clung to me.
The low groan rumbled through his chest, the hard length of all of him making it clear we were in dangerous waters. Waters that I didn’t think I could swim in and not drown. I drew a breath and forced myself to let him go, to step back.
“I need someone I can trust, Typhon.”
Typhon did the same, letting the space grow between us again, and just stared at me, drinking me in.
The scar across his face was less visible in this light, softening him.
“I know.” He opened the door, and a gust of wind sucked the warmth from my skin that had lingered from his touch.
“It’s up to you to decide if that person is me. But you’d better hurry.”
I fisted my hands at my side to keep from reaching for him, drawing him back in and letting his warmth sink into me, in a far more pleasurable way.
“Why is that?”
His expression was grim as he began to back away, slowly, as if each step was a struggle to leave me. Or maybe that’s what I wanted to believe.
“Because a storm’s brewing here at Heathermoor. And it’s shaping up to be a real motherfucker.”