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I pretended to zip my lips and motioned to the chair by the bed.

He watched me, looking momentarily puzzled, then he bared his teeth. He stayed where he was, and I wondered, not for the first time since I’d encountered this male, if he truly meant to do me harm. Right now, he looked like he wanted to wrap his hands around my throat and choke me out. If I wasn’t so weak, I would be running like hell.

His arms unfolded, and he fisted his hands at his sides. His black, slightly wavy hair looked like he’d been running his fingers through it, and his jaw, covered in a dark shadow, was clenched. Every muscle in his upper body, a body that was scattered with scars, seemed tight as if he were physically restraining himself. This whole situation did not bode well for me.

His green eyes were sharp and filled with a wildness that made my heart pound and my palms sweat.

He took an abrupt step closer and planted his fists on the mattress near my hip. “Release me.”

I waited for more, but nothing more came. “I don’t understand.”

“Release me from the spell you have me under and I might allow you to walk out of here.” That deadly stare never faltered from mine.

A lie.

He had no intention of letting me leave—of letting Selene leave.

“What spell do you think I have over you?” I asked, trying to remain calm when I realized my life literally depended on me convincing him who I was, and even then, he still might not let me walk out of here.

He rushed me, a blur of movement like he had in the office, and gripped my throat. “A witch’s most vile of tricks, a spell to make me want you. Break it now, or I break your neck.”

I blinked up at him, my fingers wrapped around his thick wrist. He thought I’d given him a love draft? “There is no such spell,” I rasped. “There is a draft, but I have not, would not use it, not on anyone.”

His eyes darkened. “At the bar, you would’ve had plenty of opportunity to put it in my drink.”

I shook my head. “Why? Why the hell would I do that?”

“The same reason you did it the first time, Selene. To control me. To entrap me,” he said through gritted teeth. “To use me and my pack for your evil machinations.”

“I am n-not Selene. I told you at the bar, my name’s Iris. Selene’s a distant relative of mine. We h-have her portrait in our library at home. I look a lot like her, but you need to look closer, Draven.”

He snarled as his eyes slid over my face. “I don’t believe you.”

“Her eyes were blue, mine are brown.”

“More tricks.”

“Not tricks. She’s buried in our cemetery. Witches are not immortal, they’re not long lived, and if there was a spell that granted eternal life, no witch would grow old, and cemeteries would not be one of the main sources of our power. What you are proposing is impossible.”

He shook his head in that way he had before, as if he were trying to shake something loose. “No, you’re lying.”

“If you knew Selene, then you’ve been around witches. They weren’t all young, were they? You were in Salem, you know that, you saw it yourself. I can take you to her resting place if that will help?”

His lips pulled back, and he flashed his teeth, his canines extended. “Your tongue is poison, the lies drip from it so easily.”

How the hell was I going to get him to believe me? “Do you think Warrick is so easily fooled? That Willow gave him some love draft?”

“Possibly,” he said, fingers tightening around my throat. “I believe he is somehow under her spell. Your family is twisted and evil. You are all capable of darkness.”

Okay, right, maybe I could work with that. “Warrick spent most of his life in Hell, did you know that? Do you think he wouldn’t sense evil when it was right in front of him? In bed with him?”

Draven stared, gaze still wild, but he seemed to falter.

I rushed on. “Warrick has powers. He wouldn’t be fooled by my sister’s magic, even if she had used it on him. He’d sense evil in me, in the rest of my family, if it was there. Warrick was void of emotion when he met Willow. Other than anger and lust, he didn’t feel anything else. He’s a brutal warrior. He executed his brother and sentenced him to eternal limbo. Do you really think my sister could win him over unless she were his mate in truth?”

“Lust, it was lust that blinded him,” he said, looking triumphant, as if I’d somehow slipped up and given him the ammunition he needed.

“To Warrick, loyalty comes first. When Lucifer created him and his brothers, it was loyalty that kept them together. It came before anything else. He wouldn’t have mated with Willow unless what he felt was real. And he sure as hell wouldn’t let me live or be near his mate if I was the dark, twisted witch you’re accusing me of.”