Page 47 of Devoured

I glare at him, my lips moving against his as I say, “Maybe I don’t want to care about right or wrong anymore.”

He grabs my waist with his free hand, and his fingers bite deliciously into my skin. I can’t tell if he’s pushing me away or pulling me closer. “What do you want? Tell me, Vanessa. You need to say it.”

“I want…” His touch burns me, scorches through my core, and I close my eyes, reveling in the feel of his body against mine. The heat. Maybe he can incinerate everything, after all. Maybe we can do it together. “I want…” His grip on my throat shifts, fingers hot as he tilts back my face. His lips hover over mine. Waiting. But I hate him. He killed Celeste.

I have no one left.

His breath tastes like warm cider, and all I have to do is lean in. Just one centimeter. I could kiss him so easily. It would feel good. It would feel like true escape, even for a night. “I want…” I hate him. He killed Celeste.

He killed Celeste.

He. Killed. Celeste.

The thought blisters in my brain, forcing my eyes open, and I stagger back. Away from him. What the hell am I doing?

Before I can hesitate, I move across the room and wrench open the door, stabbing a hand toward Sin’s room. “You sh-should leave.”

My heart slams against my ribs. What the hell is wrong with me? I shouldn’t have touched him. I shouldn’t have let him touch me.

I will never be a fool again.

“Vanessa,” he says softly.

His arms are already back at his sides, however, and he makes no move to reach for me again. Instead, he straightens as if nothing happened at all, but there’s a glint in his gaze that I loathe. Pity. He pities me.

Those fires return in another wild blaze, and I let the poison seep through my veins as Calix watches me with that ruthless compassion. “Leave, Calix.” My voice sharpens. “Before Sin returns. I’m sure he wouldn’t want to see you in his mate’s room.”

The words hit their mark at last.

Calix growls. A dangerous sound that raises the hair on my nape.

Good. My lip curls. Let him hurt. Let me hurt. We deserve solitude and pain. We deserve to hate each other. I release the door just before it splinters beneath my fingers. “Go find Arielle,” I tell him, refusing to care that I sound bitter and jealous.

“With pleasure, Hart.” He storms past me without another word, careful not to touch me, before seizing the door and slamming it shut. I jolt at the sound, breathing hard, and stare at the wood as his footsteps thunder up the corridor.

That felt good. Too good.

But I can never do it again.

Provoking Calix, touching him—it isn’t healthy. It isn’t right. “Maybe I don’t want to care about right or wrong anymore.”

My own words drift back to me as I cross the room, dropping to my knees beside the broken glass. I can’t afford to stop thinking. Not even for a second. Picking up each shard, I resolve to carve the pity from his eyes before I ever consider kissing Calix Severi again. I am smarter than this. I know better.

So I spend the night alone, and I do not sleep. I do not dream.

Instead, I transform into a wolf, over and over again, until the pain devours me and I forget my own name.

19

VANESSA

EVIE AND I HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO MEET UP AGAIN—NOT with Cora’s suspicions higher than ever—so I patrol the castle with a fervent need to track Cora’s chaos, examine it until I find a fatal flaw.

So far, however, there is nothing.

I expected Cora to enforce some sort of lockdown after the paralyzations, but she only encourages visitation from other courts. She entertains her guests with grand dinners and teeming parties. Wine flows. Envoys float through the castle like gleeful ghosts. They drink in her honor, in her name, and feast without reservation.

All the while, the Antarctic soldiers—including Princess Valja—wither away in the dungeon.