Page 20 of Where the Light No Longer Follows

Another day where he would get the chance to finally confess the truth. He had to. It was bound to come out at any point, anyway.

Five o' Clock

Though she’d been sent to Asador again to collect another life, she had not seen who she had thought she’d see. The letter he’d left her this morning had made her think otherwise. Two simple sentences on it: Wear your yellow coat and take an umbrella. It will be raining today.

It truly had been raining and the tiniest part of her was thankful for the warning. There was nothing she hated more than being drenched by rain. Sure, she had felt silly showing up with a yellow raincoat to guide a soul to Asphodel, but it had made them laugh.

Just when the weather cleared and Silene thought she might stay and take a peaceful stroll through this pale realm perhaps for the last time, she spun round and pointed her umbrella at him. “You’re terrible at this thing.” The more she thought about it, the more she realised he’d never really been discreet all the times he’d followed and watched her over the years.

His laughter made her flinch for reasons nothing sane would consider fearful. Of course he noticed, his smile falling entirely. “Really adorable.”

“What is?”

“Your umbrella. Of course.”

Of course. Straightening her shoulders, she returned to her planned walk, determined to ignore him. “Remind me why am I being stalked?” she shouted over her shoulder, slowing her steps despite the old urges to remain away from him whispering in her ear all sorts of cautionary words.

He appeared right in front of her, blonde hair wet and dripping, and she came to a halt, eyes wide from nearly crashing into the space that usually always stood between them like an isthmus separating two seas. “There is a show being played tonight just across the street. Accompany me.”

A play? “As in please or?” she asked, lifting her umbrella between them and pressing the end of it to his chest when he got closer and pushed her raincoat hood down.

“As in you might enjoy it. Could be a few of the last times you can sneak in without paying, or getting noticed,” he said, his tumultuous eyes dropping at the umbrella between them. “Or being watched.”

“All this comes from the goodness of your heart?”

“So, you do think I have one?”

“Well, it still takes a heart to be evil. You’d be less so without one.”

“I will keep that in mind,” he said, slowly pushing the umbrella down, and leaning in to add, “Maybe I will rip it out and give it to you.”

“Why would I want your heart?” she asked, putting the end of her umbrella on his chest again.

“To eat it out.” A serpentine smile rose on his face that Silene did not possess enough words to describe how seraphic it looked even under the shadowed light cast from the streetlamps overhead. “You’ve always looked at me like you wanted to take a bite out of it.”

Despite the chill slowly spreading down her limbs, she remained rooted there, out of words, her umbrella lowering. “What play?”

He didn't answer her, simply started backing away and crossing the street towards an older building hidden between towering glass ones. Forcing her feet to move, she’d followed after him, her eyes latching on his broad back, the distance between them taunting her.

“Stop glaring at me.”

“You have a perfect back,” she said, an unusual skip to her words, “to stick a knife in it.”

“Don’t flirt with me, Silene.”

In turn, she glared even harder.

“Silene,” he warned, and she jolted straight, quickening her steps and jumping over the puddles of water to follow him. “What about tickets?” she asked as they crossed the lobby towards the theatre rooms.

Throwing her a look over his shoulder, he said, “You know what I am, Silene.”

She batted her lashes at him, shedding her raincoat. “A rude, arrogant prick?”

“Besides that.”

“We can literally be here all day.”

He chuckled, grabbing a door handle and pushing it open, pointing for her to go in. Just when she was about to enter, he put a hand on the other side of the door frame right in front of her face and leaned in her ear to whisper. “Do you just follow anyone anywhere they ask you to follow them to?”