CHAPTER FIFTEEN
WINTER
The water had long since gone cold. I hadn’t noticed.
I stand slowly, every muscle protesting as I step out of the bathtub.
Water streams from my skin in steady rivulets, disappearing into the drain along with dirt I’d carried for the longest time.
The water left behind is a dark shade of brown, and I simply stare at it.
Humiliated. I hadn’t realized there was so much of them left on me. Smoke. Ash. Blood.
Their touch.
Years of scrubbing floors until my hands split open, years of hauling water from frozen wells and sleeping beneath threadbare blankets that never kept out the cold.
Years of believing no amount of washing could ever make me clean again.
The water says otherwise. I wrap the soft towel around myself with hesitant hands.
It’s thick enough that it actually dries my skin instead of pushing water from one place to another.
It all feels… extravagant. Purple blooms across my ribs and shoulders, yellowing fingerprints stain my arms, and angry scars weave themselves over my pale skin like someone tried to use me as a butcher block.
I reach up, combing trembling fingers through my wet hair. It slips between them. Clean.
I close my eyes. I’d forgotten what it felt like.
The clothes Death left for me rest neatly on the stool where I placed them.
I hesitate before reaching for them, afraid they’ll somehow disappear the second I reach for them.
Afraid this is all some cruel dream I’ll wake from the moment the fabric meets my skin.
Slowly, I pull the oversized shirt over my head.
It smells like warmth. Like this house. Like him.
The shirt falls almost to my knees, swallowing my frame beneath soft cotton that hangs too large for me.
The sleeves drape over my hands until I push them back, staring down at myself in quiet disbelief.
I’ve never worn clothes that belonged to someone else before.
I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me blush a little.
I fold my dress carefully, despite every stain that mars the lace. It’s all I have to leave this house in, and I’ll be dead before I reach the boundary to the farm if they saw me in anything else. I leave it resting on the stool beside the empty bath before reaching for the doorknob.
The hallway beyond is quiet, and I hesitate before stepping into it.
The polished timber creaks beneath my bare feet, each sound making my pulse jump.
I half expect someone to shout. To demand or explain why I’d taken so long.
Instead, the house answers with only a distant groan of old wood settling around me.
My fingertips trail along the smooth wall as I walk.
Everything here feels lived in, but not. Not perfect. But loved.
My feet carry me farther before I realize I’m wandering.
Curiosity has always been dangerous. I should stay downstairs.
I know I should. Instead, I find myself climbing the staircase one cautious step at a time.
The second floor is darker, every door stands closed except for one.
A thin stop of golden light spills across the timber floorboards.
I don’t mean to look. I only mean to pass by.
But the faint rush of running water draws my attention, and before I can stop myself, my eyes drift toward the opening.
Death stands with his back to the doorway beneath the stream of water.
Broad shoulders. Dark ink on damp skin before vanishing around muscle I have no business noticing.
Water trails over the drawings covering his back, tracing each line before slipping lower into a curtain of steam.
I forget how to breathe.
Heat courses through my body, settling somewhere low in the pit of my stomach, unfamiliar, before spreading through everywhere else so suddenly it steals every coherent thought from my mind.
As though sensing me, he stills. Then he turns his head.
Our eyes meet through the drifting steam and my heart lurches violently against my ribcage. Oh my goodness.
I stumble backward, nearly tripping over my own feet. Mortification burns hotter than the bath I just had as I hurry down the staircase, one hand gripping the banister to stop myself from falling.
Fool.
Fool.
Fool!
By the time I reach the fireplace, staring into the flames as though they might somehow swallow the humiliation crawling beneath my skin, I think of something else. Anything but the fact that I saw what the angel of darkness looks like naked. Very naked.
The fire crackles, but it’s muted against the sound of my terrified heartbeat pumping frantically in my ears, refusing to slow. Footsteps thunder across the floor above, then down the staircase. I don’t turn around. I can’t. A moment later, I feel him stop several feet behind me.
“I didn’t mean to startle you.”
His voice is calmer than mine could ever hope to be, and I glance over my shoulder to peak at him.
His hair is still damp, dark strands falling across his forehead.
He’d dragged on a pair of loose charcoal sweatpants in obvious haste, leaving his chest bare, droplets of water still tracing lazy paths over his marked skin before vanishing beneath his waistband.
He looks as though he’d raced to make sure I wasn’t running away.
The realization catches me off guard. No one has ever chased me, not unless they intended to drag me back.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt out before I can stop myself, wishing that the floorboards would open up and swallow me whole. His sharp brows draw together.
“For…?” he asks carefully.
“I wasn’t trying to…” My face burns hotter and it has nothing to do with the fact that I’m still standing in front of the fireplace. “I didn’t mean to look.”
His expression softens with something I can’t read, as usual, and I can’t stop the heat that flames my cheeks.
For a long moment, he simply watches me.
Then, unexpectedly, he rubs the back of his neck.
Every painful passing second convinces me that I’ve ruined whatever fragile understanding had existed between us.
It’s as though he’s carefully searching for words that don’t seem to come naturally to him.
Either that, or he wants me to leave. I’d understand if he did.
If he told me that I needed to collect my things and leave back to the place I crawled out of for snooping around his house.
“I’ve…” He hesitates, the words seemingly unfamiliar on his tongue. “I’ve never had someone watch me shower before.”
The quiet confession fills the space between us, stripping away another layer of the angel I’ve spent years convincing myself was little more than a monster.
But instead, he feels almost…human. There’s no accusation in his voice.
No anger. Just an awkward honestly that somehow makes the heat crawling beneath my skin burn even hotter.
Because I’m not the only one standing here wishing the last few moments had never happened.
The corner of my mouth twitches before I can stop it, the ghost of a smile threatening to surface at the absurdity of the situation.
It vanishes almost as quickly as it appears, swallowed by the guilt that follows.
I shouldn’t find comfort in the knowledge that the dark angel is capable of feeling embarrassed.
And yet, standing here with damp hair curling against his forehead and water still glistening over the patterns covering his skin, he looks less like the man whispered about in fearful stories and more like someone who simply doesn't know what to say next.
Neither do I.
“Would you…” He pauses, reconsidering the words before they leave his mouth. “Do you still like hot chocolate?”
***
By the time I find myself sitting on the couch, the humiliation that had threatened to eat me alive has settled into a quiet calm, though every now and then my gaze still catches on the damp ends of Death’s dark hair before I hurriedly look somewhere else.
Anywhere else. The oversized shirt pools around my knees as I tuck my feet beneath me, the blanket still draped across my shoulders where he’d left it, cocooning me in a perfect warmth that I keep waiting for someone to snatch away.
Death disappears into the kitchen, returning several minutes later balancing two steaming mugs and a small plate that he sets carefully on the coffee table before me, then lowering himself onto the couch beside me, leaving enough space that I never once have to question whether he’ll invade it.
“I wasn’t sure what you’d like, so I just made toast. Sorry it’s not…great.”
My eyes fall to the plate. Thick slices of buttered toast sit beside a bowl of sliced strawberries and apple, the butter already beginning to melt into the warm bread.
A simple gesture that means everything to me because I don’t remember the last time anyone has prepared food for me.
My father had kitchen staff when I was growing up, but that seems like an entire lifetime ago that I question its truth.
My fingers tighten around the mug resting in my lap as I try to find the right words to thank him.
“I can make something else,” he says after a moment, mistaking my hesitation for dislike. I shake my head in reply.
“No. It’s perfect. Thank you. It’s just that… I don’t remember the last time I was waited on.”