“Light, bad. Got it,” she said, confused.
There was a knock at the door, then Viola appeared. Her black hair was pinned back tightly. She was wearing a black gown, the neckline reaching her throat, with lace trim and an A-line skirt. She’d dressed for the occasion. To watch me have sex with her son. My stomach bottomed out.
“We’re ready for you,” she said.
The booming inside me was fuming and petrified. And I felt like I was going to be sick. “Can I have a moment by myself for a second?”
Her cynical eyes flickered with impatience.
“I’m not going to jump out the window, Viola. Please, I just need a minute.”
She huffed with a scowl. “One minute.”
Fable kissed my cheek. “I will be there, rooting for darkness,” she whispered with a supportive smile. Then her smile faded. “There are words I never thought I’d say.”
Then she was gone.
I waited five seconds, six, seven ... finding the strength to look at myself in the mirror. Then my chin lifted.
These were all decisions that brought me here. This was a mess of my own doing. I ...lovedand in every direction love led me in, it hurt and it was wrong. Because I loved Mom, I’d manipulated Kane all these years by having sex with him, and it made me disgusted with myself. Because I loved Lena, I’d helped end her life, and I was the one who must bear the look in her eyes each time she died in my mind. Because I loved Cyrus, it hurt to love Stone, and because I loved Stone, I was sitting in this chair so no one would hurt him. Maybe I loved wrong all along.
“I thought I’d be strong enough to go through this life without you,” I whispered as though Stone was in the room with me. “But look,” my whisper cracked, and I shrugged. “It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours and I’m falling apart. How am I supposed to last another sixty years?” I looked down at my hand. “You’ll think I’m weak. You’ll think I took the easy way out, and I am. This is me holding my breath. I just hope you’ll forgive me one day for this.” I took off the cap, tipped my head back, and gulped down the love potion. The vial I’d taken from Jolie.
“They’d have to drink the whole bottle. And then you’d have to kiss them for them to fall in love with you,”she had said. And since I’d drank it, all I would need to do was kiss Cyrus to fall in love with him.
The potion was thick like blood but tasted like nothing.
I pressed the back of my hand to my mouth to hold back my cry.
Afterward, Viola led me to a door. “You will not be able to see us,” she said. “The walls look like mirrors and are all one sided, but magic can penetrate through to your coven.” I nodded. “Your father and Ivy will not be there.”
I nodded again. “I know.”
She said some last words, but I didn’t catch them, in a daze, but I knew they were worthless words. Ones to make me feel better about what I was about to do.
I opened the door.
The room was diamond-shaped, mirrors circling me. A canopy bed took up the center of the room, sheets scalloping the frame at the top and cascading down, curtains all around.
Cyrus was leaning against the bed frame, wearing a white cotton shirt and white linen shorts, his fingertips drumming against his bottom lip. He’d straightened his posture when I entered the room, and I closed the door behind me.
“I don’t know if they can hear us,” he rushed out, stalking toward me. “Stay right there, I need to talk to you.”
I backed up against the door, scanning the room again.
Cyrus stood close, caging me between his elbows. He dipped his mouth to my ear as if trying to hide both our voices and our lips so no one could read them. “For one hour,” he whispered, “can we just pretend that nothing else exists outside this room? I know that’s a lot to ask, but Adora, I’d rather fucking burn in the Wicker Man than feel like I’m raping you.”
I nodded, just wishing to kiss him already to finish the last step and stop this sickness in my stomach. I just wanted to get through this night and the rest of my life. So, I stood onto my toes, grabbed the back of his head, and kissed him.
When I pulled away, Cyrus seemed relieved. His hands slipped over my sides, and his forehead fell to mine. “Thank you.”
The rest happened in a blur.
Cyrus took my hand and brought me to the bed. We avoided looking at the mirrors. Then all I saw was arctic blue when I wished to see black. Cyrus stripped his shirt off his back.
Then he was coming down on me.
A kiss here. A kiss there.
