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"Say you'll come with me, Carly," Kassam presses.
"No. I'm staying here in my world. I don't want to go to yours."
Kassam continues to wash my back. "Have I not done everything in our agreement? I have cleaved only to you. I have not shared my affections with anyone else. You would force me to return to my world without an anchor and start over? To pull another man or woman into this?"
I frown at the shower, parsing that. "Are you trying to make me jealous?"
"Yes. Is it working?"
I clench my jaw, because it kinda is, and that pisses me off. "You're asking me to go and risk my life because you don't want to fuck a stranger?"
"No." He takes me by the elbow and turns me in the shower, gazing down at me. His clothes are soaked from the shoulders down, and I'd laugh if this wasn't such a serious moment. "I am asking for your help because you are my friend and we make good partners." He runs the sponge down my front. "Did we not make the same vows to one another? To cherish and protect?"
He's got a point there. If the vows work, they don't work just one way. "I hear what you're saying, Kassam. It's just…" I spread my hands. "Let's say the best-case scenario happens and you're able to protect me and I live. Which is fantastic, right? Except…now I'm trapped in your world? How is that fair to me? You get to go home, and I…what? Settle down and have babies with a caveman?"
The look he gives me is downright strange. He goes still, then shakes his head. "You are my wife. Why would I let you go?"
My mouth hangs open. Of all the arguments I thought he'd give me, that one hits me by surprise. "You…that wasn't real."
"Why not?" Kassam brushes the sponge over my breast, teasing the nipple, almost as if he can't help himself. "What if I have decided it was real? The High Father cannot kill my wife without justification. As my mate, you are safe from the machinations of others." His mouth crooks up in a half-smile. "And like you, I do not share."
I…have no words. He wants to make this sham marriage between us legit? I need to argue this…but how? "But…you're immortal."
"And you are my anchor," he agrees, moving to soap up my other breast.
"Who is supposed to be mortal."
He frowns at that, as if the thought bothers him. "But when I return to the Great Endless Forest, you will join me there."
"Are mortals allowed?"
His frown grows deeper. "I…I would figure something out."
Yeah, that's a “no mortals allowed” if I ever heard one. "You see?" I say. "This isn't going to work—"
Kassam tips a soapy finger under my chin, forcing me to look up at him. "I would ask the Fates to intervene and make you immortal. You could prowl the forests for all time at my side."
"Or…you could ask the Fates to intervene and send me home? One seems as easy as the other."
"Would you prefer that?"
I'm not prepared for Kassam's crestfallen look. He's a god—why is he disappointed at the thought of me leaving his side? We're just scratching each other's itches, according to him. I don't understand why he'd be upset if I didn't choose him. Anyone can scratch an itch, after all? "Let me think about all of this," I say softly. "You're asking me to leave my world behind—and my mother—on the promise that you won't let people kill me despite the fact that everyone says this needs to happen." When he continues to give me an entreating look as he soaps my breasts, I take the sponge from him and sigh. "You're asking for a lot of trust here. I'd be going in on faith alone."
"As a god, I happen to be an expert on faith." The look in his silvery eyes grows intense. "I mean it when I say I will let nothing harm you, Carly. I made a vow, and I intend to keep it."
"I'll think on it," I state again.
"Think quickly. We must leave tomorrow night. It is our best chance."
So says the trickster god. I'm still not sure I want to put all of my faith in that one, but I'm not sure we have another choice. "I said I'd think on it, Kassam. Don't push me."
"Push you?" He laughs, and his hand goes to the wet necklace at my throat. He fingers one of the quartz crystals and leans in. "I could steal your crystals and make you want me. It would take nothing at all for me to convince you to come with me, just with a few licks of my tongue. We both know this."
I slap his hand away, angry and more than a little hurt. "You'd do that to me? What happened to us being friends?"
