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“Release me and perhaps you will find out.”
Never. The beast’s response remains trapped in my aching chest, but it is no different from mine. Because I never want to let her go.
But I have to.
Softly she asks, “Will you give me the key, Gideon?”
“No,” I tell her hoarsely, though it is a lie.
Because the only other choice is to see her hurt. Better that she runs from me. Better that I die.
If the price of her freedom is to give my own life, I will pay it.
But not yet.
“Well, then.” With tears pooling in her blue eyes, she lets her legs drop from around my waist and gently pushes away from me. “We have nothing else to say. And you have given me no reason to ever marry you.”
Except that I love her. And that I have always loved her.
I don’t think she would believe it, though. Not when I keep her here, chained to me. That is not love, she would say.
And the cost of proving my love is to die. But perhaps there is another way to show her.
In despair I watch her leave the tower, then listen to her retreating steps, to the slithering of that cursed chain. The beast rages at me to follow, but he is at his weakest now. The new moon rises tonight.
She has been at Blackwood Manor for two weeks. Two weeks remain until the moon is full.
So I have two weeks to give her reason to marry me. Two weeks to hope that everything I do will make her love me in return.
Or two weeks until I let her go…and watch her run away, taking my heart—and my life—with her.
3
Cora
I wake up the morning of my twenty-fifth birthday with sun streaming through my bedchamber’s sparkling windows and warming the gleaming floor. No more dust. No more cobwebs. Two weeks ago, Gideon threw open the manor’s gates—then hired nearly every handyman and housecleaning service within fifty miles to come and polish the interior of the house into a shining jewel. Gardeners and landscapers have transformed the grounds. Those have not been restored to their former glory—only time will do that—but the air of neglect is gone. Flowers provide bursts of color and perfume and new sod has been lain, the spring grass as green as Gideon’s eyes.
Only the south garden was left untouched because, as Gideon told me, that garden is mine.
All done to persuade me to marry him.
Every night, he asks me. Every night, I long to say yes.
But the chain still circles my neck, and if I accept his proposal just to buy my release, then I will be saying yes for the wrong reasons. A woman should be free to choose to marry. Not choosing to marry because that’s the only way to be free.
So I give Gideon the same answer—that I will tell him after he releases me. And each time I give that answer, the brilliant light in his eyes seems to fade. As if with every night that passes, he loses hope that I’ll ever accept him.
But he has also not touched me since the day in his tower, so perhaps it is not only his hope that fades. Perhaps his desire for me is waning, too.
A thought that claws at my heart, digging into my chest until it hurts to breathe. Miserably I curl up beneath the blankets, picturing the version of Cora in his painting who is already free and awaiting Gideon in his bedchamber, eager to love him with her body and soul.
The Cora who stayed.
I would stay. But staying means nothing if I don’t have the choice to go, and although the gates are open, the chain still would not allow me to pass through them. So he has to release me first.
But I’m beginning to think he never will.
A gentle tug at the back of my neck brings me out of my miserable cocoon. I poke my head out from beneath the blankets.
Wearing jeans and a black T-shirt, Gideon stands at the entrance to my bedchamber, his brooding gaze fixed on the chain wrapped around his fist. “You were not at breakfast, so I followed this to find you.” His eyes lift to meet mine, and concern warms his gaze as he studies my face. “Are you well, Cora?”
He doesn’t need to follow that chain to find me. Somehow he always knows where I am. It’s another part of the mystery of this new Gideon, who is at once the boy I loved and a stranger I’ve fallen for all over again. This new Gideon who can rip apart solid oak, and who somehow possesses the key to a magical golden collar with no lock.
“I’m well,” I tell him and it’s not a complete lie. My body is fine.
It’s my heart that’s sick.
“Yet you still lie abed.” Silently he prowls closer, and sudden tension prickles my skin. Because there’s something different about him this morning. Something taut and wild, sharper than the feral edge he’s gained as this new Gideon. Something more like he was that first day, when he was covered in dirt and blood.
That is not the only the only difference in him, though I can’t immediately pin the other down. But whatever I’m sensing in him, it knots in my belly, heavy with despair and dread.
I sit up. “Are you all right?”
He doesn’t answer as he reaches the side of the bed. Instead he cups my cheek in a gentle hand, his thumb sweeping over my lips. “Do you linger in bed in hopes of a breakfast tray appearing? After all, it is your birthday.”
Joy fills my heart, unknotting the dread. “You remembered?”
“I could hardly forget.” Something dark passes through his expression before he focuses on me again, his gaze searching mine. “So shall I pamper you today, Cora?”
I grin. “Yes, please.”
“Then you shall be pampered. And on this day, I will not ask anything of you.” Abruptly his mouth lowers to mine, and he says gruffly against my lips, “I will only give.”
Starting with the sweetest kiss. Then giving pleasure, as the kiss deepens and heats, until I’m whimpering and clinging to him in desperate need. And giving more, slowly making his way down, worshipping my breasts and teasing my nipples into fiery points of arousal. Tasting the taut skin of my belly, until I’m quivering with anticipation, and finally moving lower, pushing my legs wide to make room for his shoulders as he settles between my trembling thighs.
Then he gives me another kiss, one that doesn’t end, even as I writhe and scream and convulse against his tongue. After I collapse back against the pillows, shaking, he gives a few seconds’ respite—then claims me with his mouth again, fingers thrusting deep as he lashes my clit with merciless teasing licks.
The second orgasm he gives builds slowly before crashing over me in a devastating wave that leaves me boneless and sated—unable to do anything but simply lie in my bed, threading my fingers through his thick hair when he pillows his head against the softness of my stomach, holding me tight.
Thinking I know the need that holds him in such a rigid grip, I try to urge him up over me again. “Let me taste you this time, Gideon.”
On a rough groan, his body goes utterly rigid—then he abruptly pulls away. Pushing his hands through his hair, he stares at me with blatant hunger, his cock a thick bulge behind denim.
“Not today,” he says hoarsely and the bleak despair that flattens his gaze twists that knot tight inside my chest again. “Today is only for you.”
I reach for him. “That would be for me—”
“Not today.” He closes his eyes as if to shut out the sight of me, naked and yearning for him. “I barely have any bloody control as it is.”
“Good. The point would be to make you lose it completely.” Just as his mouth completely destroys my control.
He barks out a short laugh. “You don’t know what you ask for.” Then shaking his head, he turns away. “Stay right there in bed, birthday girl. I’ll bring your breakfast tray.”
“I’d rather you feed me something else!” I call after him.
His long strides never falter. He vanishes into the corridor, and I’m left staring after him, feeling utterly lost.
Then utterly bewildered, when I glance down—and spot the parallel slashes tearing through the white linen bed s
heet on either side of my hips.
The chain feels heavier today. Oftentimes I barely even notice it. The links never catch on any objects and pull me up short. If I have to thread it down the back of my shirt, such as when I’m wearing a T-shirt that I pull over my head instead of a button-up blouse, the chain seems content to lie against my skin. Even when the house was busy with people cleaning, it never seemed to get in anyone’s way despite trailing across the floor from one wing to the other.
Not today. Today it seems to deliberately lie in my path to trip me. Today it catches on practically every leg of furniture I pass. Today it gets trapped in the shower drain, and as I dress it tangles in my hair, yanking painfully at my scalp. As if trying to slow me down, to halt my every step. As if to keep me from going anywhere.
