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He stopped abruptly when he saw the painting on the easel in the middle of the suite. It was turned away from us and covered with a sheet.
Slowly, he raised a pointed finger. “What is that?”
“It’s your portrait,” I said. “The one you won’t look at? I had it shipped from London. It must’ve arrived while we were out.”
“Why is it here?”
I went to the coffee table beside the easel and picked up a manila envelope and thrust it in Ambri’s hand. “Because tomorrow is your birthday.”
He stared down at the envelope, then up at me. “How…how can you know that?”
“It’s all in there. I asked Casziel to use his connections through the NYU history department. He connected me with a London-based historian. I knew there had to be a record of your birth and I was right. June 3, 1762.” I swallowed hard. “You’re not erased, Ambri. Not anymore.”
Ambri stared at me and clutched the envelope in a fist.
“Why?” he asked brokenly. “Why are you doing this to me? Why are you still painting me?”
“Because,” I said, “I’m scared that’s all I’m going to have left of you.”
“No. I’m not worth it. I’m not worth anything. Paint someone else,” he said, and I heard his real meaning.
Love someone else.
I shook my head. “I don’t want topaintanyone else. I don’t want anyone else ever again. Ambri…” I inhaled raggedly. “I love you.”
His face crumpled as if I’d struck him, and he broke down to a whisper. “No. You don’t… You can’t.”
I moved in front of him, trying to force him to look at me. Because I wasn’t going to let him go without a fight. “I do. I love you and I think you love me.”
Ambri shook his head vigorously. “No.No.This entire endeavor was a huge mistake.”
“You’re lying again—”
“Frequently, yes. But not about this. I don’t love you and no one can love me. I’m a demon. We don’t love.That’s thewhole point.”
“Well, sorry to break it to you, but that’s bullshit. I love you—”
“Stop saying that,”he thundered. “You’re drunk and high on success and it’s all going to your head. You’re full of fanciful ideas and none of them can come true.Do you hear me?None of them can come true.”
I refused to let his words sink in. They were born of his fear, and the abuse he suffered as a child was still with him, working its terrible evil on him. Making him think he wasn’t worthy.
“Do you know the craziest thing about getting everything I ever wanted?” I asked, my hand slipping over his skin to cup his cheek. “It doesn’t mean shit if I don’t have you.”
His eyes fell shut, and his jaw clenched under my fingers.
“I love you, Ambri. You don’t have to say it back. You just have to believe it.”
twenty-eight
Cole’s words slam into me and then settle warmly in my chest. My heart. I nearly break. I nearly confess that I’m madly in love with him too, then remember Eisheth’s words.
We’re watching you…
Cole waits, hope and love shining bright in his dark eyes. Then his phone buzzes from his suit pocket. He’s so fucking handsome in a suit. And in paint-splattered sweats. And in nothing at all. And I want all of it. I want his every day to be my every day. A life together…and it can never be.
“Say something,” he whispers, his hand slipping away from my cheek, leaving my skin cold.
But I can’t. Anything I say will reveal my betrayal to the dark cause. I’ll be punished, and Cole will be surrounded by the Vices. He was at the bridge once. He can be driven there again.
