The heat in Darien’s gaze had returned, and suddenly she was very aware of how alone they were. She was in this Devil’s bed, and he was looking at her as if he wanted to lower himself between her legs, just as he’d told her last night. To eat his way to her heart and find out if she tasted as sweet as she looked.
“I should get ready for work,” Loren spluttered. She disentangled herself from the sheets and duvet that were wrapped around her, and nearly toppled out of bed as she got to her feet. The floorboards were cold in the morning chill.
She swayed for a moment, the room gyrating. When was the last time she’d eaten anything?
Darien sat up, his full attention falling upon her as she straightened her pajama shirt and tugged her fingers through the tangles in her hair. She was painfully aware of how awful she must look, and she became desperate to hide herself before he noticed she didn’t look quite as sweet this morning as she had last night. She could feel the makeup still caked to her skin, could feel tightness at the corner of her mouth that suggested she’d drooled sometime during the night.
That smile on Darien’s face grew. “Quit fussing, Rookie,” he said. “You’re beautiful.”
“Says the perfect god with no shirt on,” she joked, every word breathless. He really was a perfect god, and the way the light streaming in through the slats in the blinds illuminated his body…
Star. She wanted to pounce on him. Wanted to call in sick to work and spend all day riding him instead.
Darien was full-on grinning now, and Loren became desperate for a need to take the focus off the tension building between them, desperate to draw his attention away from how hard her nipples were beneath her shirt. There was hardly any air in this room—hardly any air left in the world. If they ever progressed from feeling each other up to making love—or fucking, as Darien liked to say—she might collapse from a death of her heart’s own making.
Loren cleared her throat and said, “What happened last night? What happened with the warlock? Is he…?”
“We didn’t kill him,” Darien said, his smile fading as he became all business and no play. He leaned back against the cushioned headboard, propped up a knee, and balanced an arm upon it. Gods, he was… He was stunning. She forced herself to focus on what he was saying, so she wouldn’t have to ask him to repeat himself. Darien continued, “But I made sure that everything that happened last night will be nothing but a dream to him.” He quickly filled her in on what the warlock had revealed—about the Arcanum Well replica, about Nacht Essentia, about the demons and the missing girls, about the Blood Potions deal going awry, about the phone call from Calanthe. When he was finished, she was speechless.
“What do we do now?”
“Don’t worry about it for today,” he said. “My main concern is keeping you safe and helping Doctor Atlas find an antidote for the girls who’ve been changed by the Well replica. I’ll also be putting any purchases of Nacht Essentia on our radar; if we can’t find who created the Well replica by intercepting Blood Potion deals, then maybe we can find them by tracking purchases of Nacht Essentia.” He studied whatever her face was telling him. “You don’t need to do anything, Lola. Do you understand me? We’ll handle this.”
She gave a faint nod. “I guess I should go get ready. I’m running out of time.” She made for the closed bedroom door, all too aware of Darien’s eyes tracking her every movement, all too aware that her pajama shorts barely covered her backside.
She was just about to open the door when the question he voiced gave her pause.
“Will you have dinner with me tonight?”
Loren turned to face him, and when their gazes locked, that adorable smile on his face grew. One hand resting on the door handle, she snickered, though her heart was skipping in her chest—with delight and nerves. “I thought dating wasn’t in your vocabulary, Darien Cassel.”
“It’s not a date. It’s just…dinner.”
“Right. Dinner between two friends?” She had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing.
“Right. Friends.” The dimple in Darien’s cheek showed as he fought his own smile.
A grin broke like the sun across her face, and a rosy warmth spread through her chest. There was a tiny, rational voice in the back of her mind, screaming at her to be careful, to take it slow. But she ignored it, shoving it behind a door in her mind and locking it.
“Okay, Darien,” she said. “I’ll have dinner with you, but only as friends. We’re not allowed to fall in love.” She’d meant for the words to come out as a joke, but as soon as they were hovering in the air between them, she realized how painfully true they were.
They weren’t allowed to fall in love—not really.
She was mortal; one day she would die. And sometimes she wondered if it was better to accept the truth than to hold on so tightly to something that may never be.
She left Darien’s room before he could reply, slipping out into the hallway with a sharp burning sensation suddenly behind her eyes. But she glimpsed his expression in her peripheral as she closed the door behind her—the one that told her the statement she’d made hurt him as badly as it hurt her.
Those awful, unfair words chased her all day.
She was mortal. One day she would die. And Darien…
Darien would live for a very long time. Maybe even forever.
—
Loren’s shift at Mordred and Penelope’s felt far longer than the seven hours it really was, and she knew it wasn’t just because of the lack of sleep she’d gotten last night.
It was because she was too excited—and nervous—for when Darien would pick her up, and they would go and have dinner together. Asfriends. Laughter threatened to bubble up her throat as she flitted about the apothecary, looking for the most minute tasks that would help the time pass faster. Friends didn’t feel each other up the way they had last night; friends didn’t call each other when there was nothing to say, just so they could listen to the sound of their voice.
