Chapter 24
STELLA
I stepped inside, closing the door behind me as I pressed my back into it. ‘I’m terrified,’ I admitted, staring into Damien’s dark eyes. I didn’t have to say anything else for him to know what I meant.
His study was lit up by the soft glow of the fireplace that flickered in the corner.
His notebook was spilled out over his desk, and ink stained his fingertips.
His wire-framed glasses still rested on his nose.
I’d interrupted him in the middle of his work, but he hadn’t thought twice about dropping it all to meet me at the door.
The dark rain clouds filled the window behind him, the rain angrily hitting the glass.
He gave me the smallest shake of his head. ‘I won’t let anything happen to you, Bambi.’
‘What if you aren’t allowed to?’
He stepped closer, pressing his arms on either side of my head. ‘Allowed to?’
‘Yeah. You know. If it’s me or…’ I waved around his office. ‘All this?’
‘I give it up.’
Enveloped by his smell, an endless mix of midnight forests, his words sank into me one by one. He sounded so sure, so simple, like there was nothing to debate. Like I was an easy choice to make, a simple decision.
‘Damien…’ I found myself lost for words. ‘I can’t let you give up your life for me.’
His frown deepened. ‘I told you before. You mean everything to me. All of this is… smoke and mirrors.’ He brushed away my concerns with a wave of his hand.
‘Smoke and mirrors,’ I repeated dumbly.
‘Yes. A glamour to keep the world at bay. But what do I have, really? An empty manor that’s decaying faster than I can bring myself to care.’
‘Power?’ I offered.
‘Meaningless, if I have nothing to protect.’ Damien gave me a pointed look. ‘If I can’t use my title, my power, to keep you safe, then it’s worthless to me.’
‘I… I don’t think I’m worth that much concern.’
He smiled, dipping to press a kiss on my jaw and then another, higher, a whisper away from my ear.
‘You looked beautiful today in the garden.’
I frowned. ‘I was a mess.’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t mean your outfit. I mean you. You are always beautiful. Did you even see yourself in the mirror before you came down here?’
I looked down at the yellow dress I wore. ‘Agatha told me this color yellow was your favorite, and I thought it didn’t make sense.’
‘Why?’ he murmured, sliding his hand down the golden fabric.
‘Shouldn’t your favorite color be black?’ Glad one of us was breathing because I had lost any and all air in my lungs.
‘Maybe it was, once upon a time. Before you.’ Damien pulled back, grasping my hips in his large hands. ‘As usual though, I seem to have underestimated the power you hold over me. You might kill me the way you look tonight.’
‘Is that even possible?’ I choked out, doing my best to ignore the way his thumbs swirled into my skin.
‘Hmm… that’s a hypothesis I think I’d be willing to test out.’ He pulled at the hem of my dress, tugging it up my leg.
He was touching me, running his hand over my bare thigh. I was going to lose my mind. My brain short-circuited. ‘I used to have a sweater this color.’
‘I know,’ Damien groaned into my neck.
‘You know?’
‘Yes, silly girl. How do you think I know how incredible this color looks on you?’
I gasped as he pressed a kiss along my jaw. ‘How… how would you know that?’
His hand brushed higher up my thigh, tracing words on my skin I wanted to translate. ‘I told you when I first brought you here. I wouldn’t have made a deal with you without knowing you.’
Damien pulled at my chin, snapping my face to look up at him. His dark eyes looked through me, seeing everything I hid away. ‘Does that bother you? Knowing I watched you?’
It should. It should’ve made my skin crawl, leave shivers trailing across my skin. I should leave his study, barricading myself in my room. Except I wasn’t scared in the slightest. ‘No. It almost feels reassuring.’
‘Reassuring,’ he repeated.
‘Yeah. Like all the times I thought I was trying to handle things on my own, I actually wasn’t.’
His thumb stroked my jaw, soft and tender and sure.
‘Does that make me weird?’
‘No. No, Bambi, it doesn’t make you weird. It makes me sad I couldn’t have saved you the stress before.’
This time, it was me closing the distance, pressing my lips against him, pulling him closer while he let out an unholy moan.
His hands drove higher under my dress, so close to where I wanted them, where I needed them, and yet not close enough. I gasped into his mouth when his tongue demanded entrance, losing myself in him.
I pulled away, straightening his glasses with a smile. ‘I like these,’ I breathed. ‘You should wear them more often.’
‘Anything for you, Bambi.’ I expected him to smile, but his face was completely serious.
‘Anything?’
He nodded. ‘I would give you anything and everything that is in my power to give. All you have to do is ask.’
I kissed him again, his hand brushing along the seam to my underwear, already damp with how much I wanted him, needed him, right this moment. It seemed my body would always know before my heart caught up to speed.
‘Fuck, Stella. You’re so wet for me. I just want to sink inside you, fuck you until you scream my name, see those pretty lips beg me for more,’ Damien murmured against my neck, sliding his finger against my pussy.
I’d noticed that every time he touched me, he seemed to lose control.
There was no filter between his brain and his mouth; everything he thought or felt spilled out from between his lips, his innermost thoughts brought to life while his hands caressed my skin.
It was probably one of the most erotic things I’d ever experienced, knowing I turned him on enough that he simply just lost control.
I kissed him back, trying to urge him closer, to help me soothe the ache between my legs that hadn’t gone away since the first time he brought me to the Fringe.
I desperately clawed at him, wanting to be closer. Closer. Closer.
Until Damien pulled back, annoyance written all over his face. ‘Fuck.’
Seconds later, Agatha burst in through the door. She looked between us, not even remotely shocked to see the position we were in. ‘Silas is here.’
‘I know.’ Damien cursed under his breath, stepping away. ‘Of all the times. Fuck. Stall him. Stella, come with me.’
Agatha hurried out of the office. Damien pulled me across the room, stopping in front of a bookcase. He reached around the side, pulling at something I couldn’t see and the whole bookcase swung open, revealing a small, dark closet hidden inside.
‘And here I thought we’d already gone over every scary mansion cliché.’ I tried to smile, staring at the small space.
He rested his forehead against mine. ‘I’m sorry. I wish I had somewhere more comfortable for you to hide. But this is the closest place. I promise I’ll get rid of him as quick as I can. Silas is lazy, and if he can’t find you immediately, he’ll leave.’
I looked into the dark closet and nodded. ‘It’s okay.’ I stepped inside, staring up at him.
‘Stay quiet.’ He leaned in, pressing one last kiss to my lips, and then swung the bookshelf shut. ‘Silas. What can I do for you?’
With the door shut, the only light came through the smallest crack at the floor. Otherwise, the room was pitch-black. I shuffled until my back touched the wall, the cool stone grounding me.
‘Cute. You know why I’m here. Clarissa couldn’t be bothered to drag herself out of Hell so she sent me.’
I breathed as quietly as I could, my heart racing. Damien had this handled.
Damien laughed quietly. ‘I don’t know why you listen to her.’
‘What’s my other option? Listening to you and having to socialize in the human realm? No, thanks.’ I could almost hear Silas roll his eyes in his silence. ‘Where is she?’
Damien’s footsteps drifted away from the bookshelf and I pressed my hand against the door, not wanting to be alone. When he spoke, his voice was cold. ‘I sent her back to the human realm. I was bored of her. So many emotions. If you’d like to go collect her, I can take you, though.’
‘Oh? Did you take her yourself, or did she find one of your many anomalies you refuse to get rid of?’
‘I took her myself, obviously.’
Silas barked out a laugh. ‘That kind of lie might work for Clarissa, but you know I’m not going to buy that shit. Humans aren’t usually my thing, but she’s a nice piece of ass. Worth putting up with a few emotions, surely.’
My hands tightened into fists. Don’t react. Don’t react. Keep quiet. Damien has this under control.
A low growl escaped Damien, and he quickly cut it off. ‘We had our fun.’
‘So why not just give her over to Clarissa and be done with it? You know she’s like a damned dog with a bone. She’s not going to give this girl up.’
Footsteps, heavier than Damien’s, drew closer to my hiding place. I shuffled away from the door, pressing myself as far back as I could, certain Silas would hear my echoing heartbeat.
‘I’ve made this much of an effort. Might as well see it through. Besides, isn’t it fun to watch Clarissa not get her way?’
Quiet thuds came from the other side of the door, and I made myself as small as possible. Silas was going through the books. Shit. ‘Yeah, if you aren’t on the receiving end of her bad mood. Which you seem to have a knack for putting her into.’
‘A talent I’m quite proud of. Now would you like me to take you to the human realm and we can collect Stella together, or do you have enough information to run back home now?’
Go away. Go away. Go away.
‘Like you’ll trick me into going there.’ He sighed, and his voice drifted away from the bookshelf. I felt like I could breathe again, just once. ‘Look. I might not like you, but I’m fucking tired of Clarissa being miserable. Just bring her the fucking girl, and we can all be done with this.’
Damien’s silence was answer enough.
I pressed my hands to my eyes, counting backward from ten. Over and over. Maybe if I counted enough times, all of this would disappear, and it would just be Damien and me.
Light peeked in through my fingers, and Damien was there, pulling my hands away from my face. ‘I’m sorry, Stella. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean a word of what I said.’
‘I know.’ The realization shot through me that I hadn’t once thought he was telling the truth about any of it. ‘You told me you can’t trick Hell. You told Silas I was back in the human realm.’
‘You can’t.’ Damien pulled me into his arms and I rested my head on his chest. ‘And I did. But like I said, Silas is lazy. I just needed him to leave. I needed to buy us more time.’
I pushed him away, the truth bubbling to the surface.
‘I’m scared this is all temporary. That one day, I’ll wake up, and my soul will be gone and I won’t remember anything about my life any more.
I won’t remember Grace, or Archie, or you, or how old I was when I learned to ride my bike, and that terrifies me. ’
He tugged me back to his chest. ‘You didn’t learn to ride a bike until you were twelve.’
I froze, midway to pushing him away again. ‘What?’
Damien slid his hands down, holding my wrists hostage, a vice I wasn’t sure I wanted to escape.
‘You didn’t learn to ride a bike until you were twelve.
Your favorite color is yellow, but for some reason, you tell everyone it’s blue.
You hate cooking, but you can never decide where to order from, so you usually cook.
You hate socks, winter, and days where the weather can’t make up its mind. ’
I stared up at him, unblinking, my heart hammering in my chest.
He raised a dark brow, daring me to contradict him when he knew I couldn’t.
‘You were going to go to law school, but swapped to an accounting diploma when you took custody of Grace. You didn’t question it for a moment when they called, either.
You just did. Because you love your sister more than you love yourself, which is why you ended up here in the first place.
’ Damien stared down at me, breathing hard.
‘How do you know all that?’ I couldn’t disagree, not with a bit of it, because every single fact he spewed at me was entirely accurate.
Damien’s lips twisted into a smirk. ‘I won’t ever let them take your soul, Stella.’ His face softened. ‘And even if they did, I’d remind you of all the things that make you, you.’
He pulled me to him, and gently pressed his lips against mine. I let him take my weight, let myself fall into him. It wasn’t until he finally let me go that I realized he never answered my question.