“That’s pathetically cynical of you.”
“Why?” He laughs coarsely. “I’m an eater and a seeker myself. I devour. I hunt. I consume people and use them up.”
I reach out, my fingertips wandering the blue forest of his bearded jawline. “Are you going to use me up, Beresford?”
“I can’t.” He moves in closer, his breath quickening. “You’re deeper than they are. Richer where it counts. I could dive into you, swim for years, and never reach the bottom. I could swallow your soul for ages, and yet no matter how much I consumed, you would remain wholly yourself. That is why I love you.”
His words catch me in the heart like a hail of tiny, glittering arrows. I don’t pause to contemplate my answer. “I think I might love you, too.”
He gives me a questioning grin, tinged with hope. “Youthinkyou love me?”
“I become more certain of it each time we’re together,” I whisper. “But we’re not supposed to be saying any of this to each other when our acquaintance is so new.”
“Yet here we are.” He moves over me like a mountain, bathing me in his heat and shadow. His bearded mouth finds mine, and I revel in the salty warmth of his lips. “Sybil, will you let me ruin you for anyone else?”
“I think you’ve done that already,” I whisper. “But I’m always happy to let you try again.”
“Remember, you will be the only one coming tonight. I will be suffering, and enjoying the torture immensely.” He gives mychin a playful tweak before taking my petticoat in both his huge hands and ripping it down the front.
I can’t help the little sound of distress that escapes me when he destroys the piece of clothing I worked so hard to embellish.
Beresford notices immediately and halts, with the ruined garment still clutched in his fingers. “What is it?”
I bite my lip, struggling against the truth. I’m embarrassed to admit how few items of clothing I own, or how long it took me to sew the salvaged lace onto the petticoat he so casually demolished.
“I shouldn’t have done that.” His voice aches with repentance. “You liked this nightdress.”
“It’s old. It shouldn’t matter.”
“But it matters to you, and therefore it is of infinite importance to me. I will have it mended.”
“No need.”
“Then you shall have a new one. Fifty new ones.”
“Beresford.” I cup his face. “It’s all right.”
“I’m sorry. Sometimes I don’t understand humans—women.” He corrects himself hastily, but my brain latches onto the phrase.
I don’t understand humans.
An odd thing to say. Not a sentence that the average man would speak, even by mistake.
My mother has repeated a particular mantra to me and Anne over the years: “Believe what a man tells you about himself by accident.”
Slowly, almost mechanically, I push Beresford’s head down between my legs, if only to occupy him so he doesn’t see me pondering his words.
He spoke as if he isn’t human. But he is, of course. Isn’t he?
He doesn’t want to talk about his past. He has no family. He moved here a couple years ago but didn’t introduce himself to anyone until recently.
“What changed?” I ask.
Beresford lifts his head, his beard glistening with my arousal. “I put my tongue inside you. You liked it before.”
“Not that. I was wondering why you suddenly decided to begin inviting people over. For your first couple of years in this region, you were practically a recluse.”
“That question is related to my past.”
