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“Fuck, yeah, I mean it.” Everything about her intrigued and appealed to him. She didn’t merely suit him, no, it sometimes felt like she was designed specifically for him. “To varying degrees, the other Ancients matter to me. But you . . . you’re something I need.”
She bit down on her trembling lower lip.
“Remember I talked about that dark state of mind I was in? Nothing made me feel alive anymore back then. I’d stopped wanting anything. Until you walked into my office at the manor to apply for residency. You slashed right through the black cloud that hovered over me. I was drifting, but you pulled me back. You center me. There’s nothing at all irrational about you being my priority.” He gave her a searching look. “Do you get it now?”
Wynter licked her lips. “I get it.” Her gaze dropped as she fingered his shirt button, awkward all of a sudden. “Y-you’re my priority, too. You . . . you know that, right?”
He fought an amused smile, very aware that she wouldn’t appreciate how cute he found her when she fumbled this way. His witch could smoothly impale a man twice her size on her sword. But verbalize her feelings? She wasn’t so smooth at that. “I do.”
“I understand that numbness you were talking about better than you might think,” she said. “Having an undead soul means you never feel fully satisfied. Ever. Not by food, not by sex, not by sleep, not by anything. So you stop wanting stuff, because nothing brings you any real gratification.” She gently poked his chest. “You changed that for me. And I don’t just mean because your ability to touch my soul makes me come so hard I almost pass out.”
Almost? “You’ve passed out once or twice.”
“We don’t talk about that. We agreed we wouldn’t.”
Cain felt his lips quirk. “Oh yes, I remember.”
“Anyway, as I was saying before you rudely interrupted me, you chased away that numbness by becoming so important to me. There’s no way for me to be at all numb when it comes to you.”
A warmth bloomed in his chest, and he squeezed her thigh. “Then we understand each other. So never think it’s anything but perfectly logical for me to choose you over anyone on this planet. You come first to me. That won’t change.”
“Right back at you, no matter what you’ll one day tell me about yourself—I promise you that. And I wouldn’t if I wasn’t so certain that nothing could change what I feel for you.” Wynter settled against him, tucking her face into his neck, no doubt oblivious to how much those words had affected him.
She gave him hope. Hope that he could have the kind of things with her that others would take for granted. Hope that she could accept him, flaws and secrets and all; that he’d never find himself in a situation where he faced the prospect of losing her.
The trouble was that her vow had also fed his creature’s belief that she’d accept it without question. And that, in turn, further spurred it to usher Cain into spilling the secret of its existence—something it would continue to do until Cain finally gave in. And he had the feeling that said time would come sooner than he’d planned.
*
That evening, as Hattie and Anabel were preparing a later-than-usual dinner—they’d had to wait for Anabel to stop vomiting up the potion she’d tested on herself before they could eat—Wynter brought her coven up to speed on the Abel situation. The news about his ultimatum was met with snarls, curses, scowls, and also threats to disembowel the little fucker.
Wynter was all for the latter.
At the table, Xavier folded his arms, his jaw hard. “He couldn’t have just tried storming Devil’s Cradle like a good little Aeon, could he? Oh, no. He had to be awkward. Would it really be asking too much that he play into our hands?”
“I don’t think so,” said Wynter, placing drinks on the table.
“Seems perfectly reasonable to me,” said Delilah, briefly looking up from the black obsidian mirror she held. She’d been using it to “search” for Saul. Other witches might stare into such a mirror, block out all external stimuli, and try projecting their consciousness outwards. But Delilah swore that the more intense her concentration, the less success she had with this form of scrying. As such, she preferred to be casual about the whole thing and not try too hard.
“I could happily cut that prick’s balls off,” said Hattie, slicing into the crusty loaf of bread a little harder than necessary. She flicked Wynter a look. “With that damn ultimatum, he might well have turned every Ancient other than Cain against you. I know that most of them assured Cain that they wouldn’t give you up, but of course they’d say that. He would have butchered them otherwise.”
“That’s my worry,” said Wynter, taking a seat at the table.
“And even if they were being truthful, there’s no saying that they won’t change their minds,” Anabel chipped in, stirring the pot of spaghetti bolognaise. “Especially when there’s a high chance that Ishtar will try convincing them to do that.”
Wynter nodded. “My thoughts exactly. I made those very same points to Cain, but he strongly believes that the others won’t cross him in any event. He could be right. But he could also be wrong.” And that would play on her mind a hell of a lot.
“We need to keep an eye on that Ishtar bitch,” proclaimed Delilah.
“Definitely,” said Xavier. “I don’t trust that she wouldn’t try to smuggle you out of here, Wyn. She’s cunning enough to find a way to do it that would never lead back to her.”
Wynter had had that very same thought. If she ever mysteriously went missing, people would of course suspect Ishtar of being culpable. But that wouldn’t be enough to warrant an execution. The Ancient would know that.
“Yeah, if she thinks she can get away with it, she’ll try it for sure,” said Anabel. “I mean, it isn’t like she hasn’t gone behind Cain’s back before, is it? She once came here, bold as you please, to try to talk Wynter into ending things with him. Ishtar knew he’d be pissed, but she did it anyway.”
Yes, she had—consequences be damned. As Wynter once told Cain, the female Ancient was a law unto herself.
“I personally wouldn’t be surprised if she went against the other Ancients in this.” Placing a plate piled with buttered crusty bread slices in the center of the table, Hattie slid Wynter another quick look. “She loathes you with a passion, dear. One of Ishtar’s hirelings told me that the bitch threw an almighty tantrum on hearing that Cain had imprinted his seal on you. She acted like a woman scorned, apparently. And, well, we all know how dangerous a scorned woman can be.”
