CHAPTER FIFTY
EMMERY
Tentatively, Emmery took the man’s hand and let him pull her to her feet.
Her legs trembled, that raging fire in her blood still molten, and her heart thumped against her ribs, angry and hurt.
Feeling foolish, she adjusted her clothes the best she could, pulled her dress back over herself, but couldn’t look away from the man standing before her.
His smile held none of Dez’s sunshine quality, and the longer she stared, the more it morphed into a shadowy imposter.
But as she studied his green eyes, she couldn’t hold back the question as it bubbled up her throat. “Shade?”
“Most call me the Treasurer,” the man purred and stole her hand to press his lips there. “But you may call me whatever pleases you.”
Emmery barely heard him, her stomach tangled in knots, as her eyes traced the nearly identical face to Destonne’s, down to the tiny scar on his eyebrow. The similarities struck her silent and she studied him like a damn fool.
Evidently, Dez had been right about the labyrinth’s terrors and trickery following them here, because they stood before her, her hand draped in his.
“You are quite a rare find. And you and your lover put on such a charming show for me,” he continued. His chuckle rumbled against the back of her hand as he kissed it once more. A shiver wriggled beneath her skin and, this time, when she pulled away. her lip curled back.
“Not my lover,” Emmery muttered under her breath. She searched over her shoulder for Dez but found him nowhere.
Emmery lifted her fingers to her lips. She could still taste him there, still feel him, and her core tightened, that space between her legs still painfully wet, and, humiliatingly, aching for him.
The Treasurer’s words snapped her from her thoughts. “It would please me greatly if you would join me in my room.”
Attempting her best seductive voice, she said, “The pleasure is all mine. Please lead the way.” It sounded ridiculous in her own ears, but his answering grin told her it was convincing enough.
He led her to a room with transparent glass, but Emmery snagged his hand and stopped him.
“Is there somewhere more private?” she asked. She threw a glance over her shoulder at the throng of people. “I’m a bit … shy.”
This seemed to please him and sparked another imposturous smile.
“Very well,” he said. “This way.”
The next room had a solid door, and between the pulsing music and distracted people, surely no one could hear anything inside. Perfect.
The Treasurer strolled through the doorway as if he owned the universe and perched himself on an upholstered bench swathed in burgundy velvet. His gaze undressed her and his tongue swept over his lower lip.
Emmery’s pulse thumped in her ears as the door snapped shut behind her. Only three candles lit the room, and the scent of roses overwhelmed her. While she usually loved that smell, now bile climbed her throat.
He gestured to the spot beside him in an invitation.
Emmery tiptoed across the room, acutely aware of how he watched her: beast-like and assessing, like he sought a way to break her.
The foreign expression on Dez’s face caught her by surprise and made the room sway.
He’d never looked at her that way, and surely never would.
The trumpet still puppeteered her too-hot, sensitive skin, and she needed to pull herself together. But as she stared at the Treasurer across from her, all she could see was Dez. But rather than arousal it … hurt.
Emmery shoved the feeling away and sat, her hip butted up against his.
She toed off her shoes and adjusted the stockings and undergarments Dez had nearly torn off.
And, really, she would have let him. She would have let him have all of her.
Would have stupidly handed over everything she had to give.
The Treasurer's hand followed the seam of her stockings and slid up and up. Emmery’s back arched, but it didn’t feel like Destonne’s hand. Didn’t hold that fire he’d injected into her veins.
“I have never seen you before. What do I call you, beautiful creature?” he asked, his voice nearly indiscernible from Dez’s lilt, and slow, seductive cadence. His fingers danced along her bare thigh above the band of her stocking.
“Whatever pleases you,” she parroted back. A snake coiled beneath her shy smile.
Emmery hummed again and bit down on her lip as the Treasurer pulled her into his lap, her hips gripped in his hands. A gasp slipped from her at the forwardness of the gesture, but she had to play along.
However, as she stared into his familiar green eyes—Shade’s eyes—a swirl of emotion choked her. She had really forgotten him as she let Dez put his hands all over her.
His eyes hooded as he scooped her into his arms and strolled to the bed. Emmery leaned into his neck and inhaled his scent, similar to Dez, but not quite right. Everything about him was slightly off. A little sharper, colder, mixed with a tinge of dark desire in a deep velvety, musk. And no mint.
When he set her down on the bed, and braced his hands on either side of her, for a split second, Emmery lost herself.
She wished it was Dez.
She wished it was Shade.
She craved some twisted fantasy where this man could be both.
“Am I to your satisfaction?” he asked, tucking a hair behind her ear.
Emmery frowned. “What do you mean?”
The Treasurer cupped her cheek as Dez had, and his thumb skimmed her birthmark. “Do you crave me? Find me irresistible?” His lips lingered only a sliver from hers.
In answer, Emmery fisted his shirt and brought his lips to hers. Unlike Dez, his firm mouth parted her lips with haste. She threaded her hands into his hair, wound his curls around her fingers, and he smiled against her mouth.
But nothing about this felt the same. He may look like Dez, but his kiss held none of the same emotion. None of the same fire.
As he kissed her, his eyes closed, and she took the moment to search him from the bed wrangled curls to the tip of his boots. Chains and keys of all kinds hung off him, but they appeared welded to his body somehow.
Then he leaned into her, his lips urgent against hers. She couldn’t breathe and just wanted to get the fuck away from him, but her fingers found the bottom of his tunic, and her hands slid up his torso.
Smooth. No scars. No thorns. Disappointing.
His body pressed her into the mattress as the kiss grew, expanded and morphed into need. At least for him.
“Can I tell you a secret?” she whispered against his lips.
The hard length of him strained against his trousers and he rolled his hips against hers. He inhaled sharply and murmured, “Tell me all your secrets.”
It sounded so much like something Dez would say she almost pulled back, convinced it may truly be him. “I sort of—” She put on her best doe eyes and batted her lashes for the full effect. “If I wanted to tie you up, would you let me?”
The Treasurer grinned against her mouth. “If that pleases you.”
With a sly smile on her face, Emmery placed a hand on his chest and shoved him back. She stood, happy to put distance between them, so she could breathe. His eyes followed her, his hot gaze tracing her every dip and curve.
“The second drawer, love,” he drawled.
Emmery froze and ice spread in her veins. Her shoulders hunched.
Love. That’s what Shade called her. But in Destonne’s voice it spurred a new ache. Her mouth grew dry. “What did—what did you call me?”
He smiled and this time it bordered sunshine, like light filtered through thick clouds. “Love. That’s what you like.” He tilted his head, a softness to his gaze. “Is it not?”
She swallowed her feelings, and willed her mind not to wander, descend or plummet, as if the ground gave out beneath her.
At the foot of the bed, she yanked open the chest of drawers and sifted through all sorts of ties, chains, blindfolds, and dear gods—
Before she could see anything else that would surely traumatize her, she chose a pair of iron handcuffs and slammed it closed. When she turned back to the Treasurer, he lounged with his arms lazily draped over his head. Shirtless. Waiting for her.
Emmery’s hips swayed as she stalked back to him, though her mind raced. Easily, she crawled onto the bed, and kissed him, then slipped the first cuff on one of his already chained wrists and snapped it shut. She did the same with the other and secured him to the metal headboard.
She smiled against his lips as she yanked the key free and tucked it between her cleavage. Then she sparked her flame and held it to his throat.
The Treasurer’s eyes flared and he shrank back but had nowhere to go. “Is this part of the game, love? Because I do have hard limits, and burning my face is one of them.”
Emmery bared her teeth. “Who—what are you? Why do you look like that?”
“You truly don’t know?” He leaned in, his voice low, “I’m your desire. Your weakness.”
Unable to decide how to feel or think or process that statement, she ignored her worries and demanded, “Tell me which key will get me into Deimos’s study.”
“The study?” The Treasurer tilted his head, picking her apart. “And what is it you wish to see? Perhaps, I can help you.”
“Just the key is fine.” She offered a mocking smile. “Or shall I find out exactly how you’ll scream when these chains melt into your flesh?”
The Treasurer, who still wore Destonne’s face and Shade’s eyes, blinked. Blinked again. Likely tried to decipher how they could sway this. “It seems you cannot get in without my help.”
Emmery peered at the keys and shrugged. “If I can’t pick one, I’ll just have to take them all. Your hand with it.”
And then his eyes flashed. The green snapped to a crimson, the same she had seen in her dreams, the colour of blood and death and endings.
Then he laughed a wicked, cruel sound. “Such a feisty, vivacious woman, with eyes of both innocence and peril. Very well,” he drawled. He jingled his left wrist. “It’s of no consequence to me. All will fall into place. Take your key. Black iron with the heart-shaped handle.”